Preserving Art, Culture, and History: Glass in Central City

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Friends of Glass

Historian Earl Ray Bush grew up near Central City his entire life. He was fortunate enough to have learned about the art of glass blowing as a young man, he said. His grandmother collected glass, who he said enjoyed the vibrant orange and ruby red glass from Rainbow Glass Company. Bush said he knew many glass blowers at a young age, and two brothers who were glass blowers lived just around the corner from him. 

"I was friends with two glass blowers and knew them pretty well," Bush said. "Jerry Stinner and his brother were both glass blowers. Stinner worked at Rainbow Glass as a glass blower. His brother and I ran around together when I didn't even have a driver license. We'd go over and pick up his brother at Rainbow because he worked evening shift. Sometimes we'd park outside and you can see in through the mesh fence, similar to chain-link, and you could watch them work. They were have a gatherer and the guy would take the pipe and get the glass on the end of it out of the vat and take it over to a bench where they would work the glass on the blowpipe."