Medalta Ware: The Dream of an Alberta Pottery Industry

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For over fifty years, Medicine Hat, Alberta, was the centre of Canada's pottery industry, producing dishes, vases, crocks and other wares that were sold throughout the country. This exhibition, at Dunlop Art Gallery, documents the material history of an industry which affected the lives of hundreds of people in Medicine Hat from 1890 to 1990. Much of this history has never previously been recorded, and the exhibit provides an important opportunity to document the rich material remains of the pottery industry. The exhibition focuses on the artifacts and on the people who made and used them, and as such is a major contribution to western Canadian social and labour history. Medicine Hat's pottery industry was born during an industrial boom just prior to World War I. The raw materials were readily available with a river, natuaral clay deposits and enormous natural gas fields nearby. By the 1930s, and continuing until the 1960s, distinctive wares from Medalta and other potteries were common across the country. Over the years, the Medicine Hat potteries faced many challenges, from the invention of glass bottles to two World Wars. Medalta Ware: The Dream of an Alberta Pottery Industry traces the chronology and innovative technology of this industry while examing its impact on the people who worked in the potteries and on the people who purchased the wares.