Appalachian Glass Furnace of Meaning and Memory (collection)
Appalachian Glass: Furnace of Meaning and Memory
This edited collection addresses a major gap in current work focused on Appalachia’s glass industry. We have catalogs and reference books. We have histories focused on class, labor, and gender. We have histories focused on the rise and demise of glass factories. But the human work of meaning, identity, and memory--in the context of Appalachian glass--has yet to be gathered and shared in book form.
I seek creative nonfiction, memoir, personal essays, hybrid scholarship, oral history, literary journalism, reflective criticism, interviews, and poetry centered on Appalachian glass and the cultures surrounding it. The collection will explore the collectors, families, artists, dealers, thrifters, archivists, and communities who find and create meaning in glass. Submissions from staff and factory workers associated with companies such as Fenton, Blenko, Pilgrim, Viking, and lesser-known glassmakers are also welcome.
Contributors may approach glass as material culture, inheritance, regional identity, memory, domestic ritual, aesthetic obsession, economic decline, craft tradition, or personal archive. Work from collectors, museum professionals, artists, former workers, descendants of workers, creative writers, scholars, and community historians is welcome.
POSSIBLE APPROACHES GROUNDED IN APPALACHIAN GLASS
Memoirs of collecting Blenko, Fenton, Pilgrim, Viking, or other glass
Family inheritance stories involving glass objects
The role of glass in memory, mourning, or family ritual
Narratives about growing up in glass towns
The emotional psychology of collecting
Glass as creative, communal empowerment
Glass and religion
Glass cabinets and curio culture
Creative nonfiction about specific objects or single pieces of glass
Online collector groups and digital nostalgia
Road-trip narratives centered on Appalachian glass sites
Appalachian labor and community identity
Essays about thrift stores, antique malls, flea markets, estate sales, or glass shows
Oral histories of glassworkers, decorators, painters, mold makers, or salespeople
Reflections on factory closures and deindustrialization
Museum or archival encounters with glass collections
Immigration and ethnic communities in glass production towns
Queer, feminist, or disability-centered readings of decorative glass culture
Mid-century modernism and American consumer identity
Dealer culture and collector communities
Ecocritical (environmentalist) approaches to the glass industry
Documentary literary journalism about surviving glass communities
Reflections on preserving endangered industrial arts
Note: Work informed by cultural studies is welcome, though the content and style should be moderated in light of an educated but non-academic audience. If you have questions about your proposal, feel free to query at the email address below.
Poem(s) should be no longer than three pages; longer texts should be 3,000 words or less in length.
Deadline: Sept. 1, 2026
By the deadline, use this subject line, “Proposal for Glass Collection,” and then email the following in an MS Word attachment to toddcomer@gmail.com:
1. A 500-word abstract, summarizing your submission’s form and content
2. A resume/CV summarizing writing and/or glass experience, if possible
3. A 200-word biography, in part, addressing your connection to Appalachia
4. Full-length texts are optional at this stage.
The collection is currently in the proposal stage. Selected abstracts will help shape the final book proposal. First-round decisions will be made within 2-3 weeks of the above deadline.
Editor: Todd A. Comer, PhD
toddcomer.com
Todd Comer