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The West Virginia Encyclopedia
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The West Virginia Encyclopedia
The Louie Glass Company was established in Weston to produce quality, hand-formed, mouth-blown stemware and glass articles. Founded by Austrian native Louie Wohinc and fellow immigrant glass workers, the firm was one of several related Weston-area glass companies. Louie Glass manufactured colorless and colored stemware, tumblers, vases, pitchers, and many other products which were sold by the hundreds of thousands to glass jobbers and decorators.
Louie Wohinc died in 1950. Daughter Margaret Wohinc managed the company as president from 1950 until it was sold in 1972, during a time when women were uncommon in the glass industry and rare in top management positions. The new owners, Princess House, had long been a major buyer of Louie Glass for its home party sales plan. In 1978, Louie Glass became a subsidiary of Colgate-Palmolive. In 1986, Louie shipped $24 million worth of glass and employed 525 people. The company changed ownership several times, but kept the Louie Glass name alive until the late 1990s. At that time, the name was changed to Princess House which sold the facility to Glass works West Virginia in 2000. Glass works continued to create quality hand-crafted glass at Weston until July 2003 when the 77-year-old business closed, citing dwindling markets and overseas competition.
Written by Dean Six
Louie: Salesman and Glass-Manufacturer. West Virginia Review, (Oct. 1931).
Louie: Noted Industrialist. West Virginia Review, (Nov. 1936).
Six, Dean. Weston Glass. Glass Collector's Digest, (Dec.-Jan. 1994).