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I appreciate the article. How I wish if the writer had provided a description to the marbles! Glass marbles are generally beautiful...maybe compared to other cheap toys. Also imports from a country of weak currency floods to a country of strong currency is no wonder. Opposite does not happen. That is why old marbles are domestic in my country.
1907 in Japanese time is Meiji 40, the time glass marbles are said to become popular among children nationwide. The marbles from Meiji are lampworked ones with snap-cut pontils. These are poorly made clearies, which are distant from perfect roundness. You can see grooves around a pontil. Also bright colors like red or yellow were not used for the first marbles. Makers like Tokujiro Oi and Wakamatsu Yoneda (Komeda?) are the first exporters. The first record of glass marble export that I could find is Taisho4 (1915) of Tokujiro's via a Kobe agent called su-re-man (Sleiman? Suremann?). Tokujiro's was a pioneering maker for glass bangles, mercury beads, seed beads, gold beads and artificial pearls. So-called Chinese-style transitionals are the snap pontil type, highly-likely Japanese export from Taisho - early Showa era.
I'm learning something from here too. I read the Winnie's 2015 post of Santa Claus box and finally understood that my Yasuda factory research started from the information she left in this forum. It is always good to know the source of information.
I didn't have much time for Steph's Japanese Transitionals yesterday. My reading takes much time...I hope I can read it through in a few days.