J.B. Cole

1869 to 1943, Seagrove potter who started the famous J.B. Cole Pottery

*I see that I've left a ridiculous amount of incomplete and semi-accurate information on this page that could be filled in by just reading chapter three of Stephen Compton's It's Just Dirt (and plenty of other books, but that one is pretty concise yet detailed). You kind of get what you pay for, this page will get better with time, but in this hobby you should still buy books, even in 2022.*

Did not mark his pieces. Joked that the grinding marks of a belt sander used to remove glaze drips were his signature (and, well, they kind of are, except 4 potters worked in his studio, and Waymon Cole is said to have made the same joke, so either Waymon stole his joke and his signature or the historic record is a little iffy on this point). There are certain shapes that can be attributed to him or his son Waymon Cole who took them over, as the 1940 JB Cole catalog has codes that match up individual potters to the shapes they did (it is not complete, of course). You can see two very different looking JB Cole bottoms with stilt marks from the 1950s on page 89 of Robert Lock's "The Traditional Potters of Seagrove North Carolina". I think the difference between them was how much time was spent on the belt sander (but also the glazes).

Any mark that says JBCole or J B Cole/Pottery/STEEDS, N.C. was made in the 1980's or later, and not by him obviously. There is a nice list of marks on page 42 of It's Just Dirt and pictures on page 126-128.

I have seen it said that prior to JB Cole Pottery he operated Sunset Mountain Pottery, however, it appears to be more accurate to say he produced a product line called Sunset Mountain Pottery for another store, and that it existed rather early, approximately 1929-1935. J.B. Cole initially opened his own pottery in 1922. Nell Cole Graves did not close it until 1980 (I have also read that it did not close until her death in 1997, one of those things is not true).

JB Cole made a number of pieces on contract. Those are often marked. For example one contract he supposedly had was for "The Jug Inn" in ???mont N.C. and those are marked. Not sure if they had any pieces made by other shops, so it is probably not a guarantee.

People can supposedly date JB Cole pieces by the clay color, as they dug a "white" (it's not white like texas or anything) clay at a pit called Mitchfield and then when it ran out had another place they dug from after that. Or two. I don't remember. It's in a book. Probably more than one book.

Please see the references for more detail including great information and photos.

Known former employees at the JB Cole shop (partial list):

Robin Auman

Virginia Shelton

Waymon Cole

Richard Gilson

William Cole

Nell Cole Graves

Phil Graves

Linda Shelton Potts (owned half interest in 1991)

Known Glazes

According to Stephen Compton's "It's Just Dirt", within the first ten years there were 15 glazes. Obviously, they added more over the subsequent half century, so this is a partial list (I hope to add descriptions add or photos eventually).

1. Gun Metal
2. Yellow
3. Blue Green
4. Rose
5. Dark Green
6. Turquoise
7. Light Blue
8. Dark Blue
9. Blue and White
10. Speckle Brown
11. Brown
12. Black and Green
13. Rose and Green
14. Peacock Blue
15. Ivory
16. and from the 1940 catalog...
17. Alice Blue
18. Periwinkle Blue
19. Blue-green
20. Enamel Green
21. Rust
22. Antique
23. Orange (possibly the same as Chrome Red)
24. Fritted glazes (see page 42 of Its Just Dirt)
25. Burnt Sugar
26. Dove
27. Redeye gravy: a highly varied glaze but with a distinctive look. I believe it could best be described as having a white cream colored glossy glaze that at thin points shown through to a red clay. The surprising part, or maybe it's a myth, is that the red color is not from the glaze at all but from the clay. Only from the JB Cole shop and descendants. There are a couple of glazes that look similar but are distinct from red eye gravy: Waco Pottery in Kentucky, had a Strawberry glaze and the A.R. Cole pottery in Sanford, N.C. and other NC potteries (including JB Cole) had the Brown Sugar glaze. Distinguishing Red Eye Gravy from Strawberry or Brown Sugar is probably worthy of its own page.
28. Malachite Glaze

There is information on early JB Cole glazes on page 393 of Charles Zug's "Turners and Burners: The Folk Potters of North Carolina" and other NC potteries of the time as well.

References

1. ↑ http://www.internetantiquegazette.com/lighting/2294\_cole\_j\_b/
2. ↑ http://pottersforncpc.blogspot.com/2008/12/jb-cole-catalog-byjay-henderson.html
3. ↑ https://www.blueridgenow.com/news/20060125/seagrove-pottery-still-popular-after-more-than-200-years
4. ↑ https://web.archive.org/web/20100125164244/http://www.backcountrynotes.com/north-carolina-pottery/2009/7/7/notes-on-the-1932-j-b-cole-catalog.html