J & E Mayer

The brothers, Joseph and Ernest Mayer who founded the J. & E. Mayer pottery (1881-present), were British potters from a long line of Staffordshire potters.  They knew Tea Leaf and produced it in large quantities with copper lustre covering the brown underglaze motif, a rarity in American Tea Leaf.  Their Tea Leaf was called 'Luster Band and Sprig' as they had known it in England.  In early 1900 Tea Leaf production ceased and the company was purchased by Shenango Pottery who retained the name of Mayer Pottery and is, today, the largest produccer of restaurant china in the United States.