Beach Glass
Celeste Van Kirk/Observer-Reporter
Small pieces of beach glass are scattered July 13 among the rocks on the shore of Geneva State Park at Geneva on the Lake, Ohio.
Celeste Van Kirk/Observer-Reporter
Valerie Wojtkiewicz of Beaver Falls holds several different types of glass she found July 13 at Geneva State Park at Geneva on the Lake, Ohio.
Celeste Van Kirk/Observer-Reporter
Artist and vendors sell a variety of products from necklaces to bracelets and rings made from beach glass found on Lake Erie at Ashtabula Harbor Beach Glass Festival.
Celeste Van Kirk/Observer-Reporter
A necklace made from beach glass found at Lake Erie at Ashtabula Harbor Beach Glass Festival
Celeste Van Kirk/Observer-Reporter
A necklace made from beach glass found at Lake Erie at Ashtabula Harbor Beach Glass Festival on Sunday, June 30, 2019.
Lake Erie has a rich history – from the War of 1812 when the United States defeated the British at Put-In-Bay, Ohio, to the resting place of more than 2,000 shipwrecks due to shallow water, poor navigation and rough waves.
There are a multitude of colors of beach glass that can be found on the shores of Lake Erie from products dating as far back as early as the 1820s to the late 1970s.
Green, emerald green, white and clear are some of the most common colors of beach glass found while strolling the beach. These typically come from bottles used for beer, juice and soft drinks.
Some of the less common colors are amber brown from whiskey, medicine or old bleach bottles dating back to the late 1800s, soft blue from soda bottles, ink bottles and medicine bottles from the late 19th century and lime green from soda bottles during the 1960s.
The rarest glass colors include red from nautical lights and car tail lights, yellow from ship lanterns and depression glass, pink from depression-era plates, lavender from pre-World War I canning jars, turquoise from electric glass insulators and seltzer water bottles and orange from auto warning lights.
What was once tossed overboard as trash or emerged from a shipwreck has transformed into treasure – a colorful souvenir from the past.