Feats of clay
Keith Koury looks over some of his ceramic artwork in his Greensboro studio.
Pottery and mugs created by artist Keith Koury at his Greensboro studio
Keith Koury holds his ceramic artwork along with a shard of original Greensboro pottery.
An original James Hamilton & Co. stoneware jar made in Greensboro
Keith Koury shows off a salt-fired pottery jug he made while attending West Virginia University next to an original James Hamilton & Co. stoneware jar.
A large replica pot is partially buried in the ground as part of a public art display at Potters Park in Greensboro.
Even the street addresses on Front Street in Greensboro have a pottery theme after the borough received a grant to help purchase numerous placards for businesses and homes.
GREENSBORO – The pottery industry that made Greensboro an economic powerhouse 150 years ago is now inspiring a new generation of artists to settle and create in this quaint borough along the Monongahela River.
While Greensboro will never return to the days during the mid-19th century in which it was the pottery capital west of the Alleghenies, potters are hoping for a mini-renaissance and using the town’s history as a springboard for a pottery revival.
“They’re looking for an echo and trying to revive the memories of those days when there were a lot of potters making millions of pieces of pottery and crocks,” said Phil Schaltenbrand, who runs Westerwald Pottery in Scenery Hill, about local artists moving into the borough to work. “It was a bygone era and I applaud the (modern-day artists) trying to recapture it.”
One of those artists is 29-year-old potter Keith Koury, who moved to Greensboro in 2012 to connect with the history. Koury grew up across the West Virginia state line in nearby Preston County, and studied art at West Virginia University.
“I have a strong passion for the history and maybe the bragging rights that Greensboro is so important to pottery,” he said.
He connected with Greensboro Mayor Keith McManus, who had purchased the old Davis Theater on Front Street and needed help restoring the old building that had most recently served as a hardware store. McManus and Koury have worked to restore the building, part of which Koury uses as a studio with his pottery wheels and electric kilns to make pots and mugs.
“I could do it anywhere. It’s a skill set you can take anywhere,” Koury said. “But we have the opportunity to create a renaissance in the art world because of the history here. It’s a great place to create.”
Greensboro became so vital to pottery because of its location at the end of the “slack water” on the Mon that made it the starting point – or end point – to ship goods to and from Pittsburgh and beyond. The potted jugs famously made by the James Hamilton & Co. and Hamilton & Jones factories were needed to store food for shipment.
“Without a need to preserve perishable goods, this wouldn’t be a place,” Koury said.
The pottery world centered around New Jersey during the 1850s, Koury said, but that was too far of a distance to transport the containers, making Greensboro and its “seemingly endless seams of clay” a perfect place for the satellite factories. The borough and neighboring town across the river, New Geneva, thrived.
“As time went by, the clay industry took hold,” McManus said. “You can just imagine what this town was like along the river in its heyday.”
Schaltenbrand said the next 30 years were a “magical time” before the potteries were replaced in the 1880s by more efficient factories elsewhere.
“Both of those towns were near excellent locations of stoneware clay, known as fire clay back then,” Schaltenbrand said.
People such as Koury and Greene County potter Jennifer Adamson are spending time in Greensboro working to hone their craft and recreate the past.
Adamson will spend the next few months in Greensboro while living at the home of California University of Pennsylvania art professor Maggy Aston, who has opened her doors over the past six summers to art students and college alumni. The summer retreats have given aspiring and professional artists a time for inspiration and reflection, while living at a prime location just a few feet from the river.
“We have pottery shards on the river,” Aston said. “You can look at them and see how they made them, how thick they were and how the handles were formed. You can learn so much from looking at the shards.”
While Koury hasn’t lived at Aston’s home during those summers, he has spent enough time in Greensboro to gobble up both the town’s history and those voluminous clay seams. His hand are stained dark orange, not only from time spent on his potter’s wheel, but also from digging into those clay reserves to pull material for his ceramic artwork.
Koury envisions one day owning his own pottery studio in town and transforming it into a consortium for other potters who want to learn of the history and make their own creations here. He’s traveling to China next month to reconnect with old friends and he wants to share the story of Greensboro, maybe eventually encouraging them to return to this area to share their skills.
“I feel like I’m drawn here because no one else is going to do it,” Koury said. “People like to talk, but will you sweat and bleed for it? Do you believe in it?”
Schaltenbrand applauded potters such as Koury and Adamson who are “trying to keep the dream alive” even if pottery will never again be mass-produced in this sleepy borough like it was generations ago.
“I just hope they can do something. Greensboro is so remote that it’s so difficult to get to it,” Schaltenbrand said. “I wish them well and hope they can do great things.”