Merrimac Pottery Marks

(1897-1908). Merrimac Pottery was founded as The Merrimac Ceramic Company by Thomas S. Nickerson in 1897 in Newburyport, MA. The firm manufactured inexpensive flower containers. In 1900, Nickerson shifted his interest to decorative and glazed art pottery. Reflecting this emphasis, the firm’s name was changed to The Merrimac Pottery Company in 1902. Nickerson had studied colors and glazes in London with Sir William Crookes, the English chemist and physicist. As a result, he experimented continually, expanding the glazes to include various tones of green, violet, blue, black, orange as well as fine crackled glazes and purples with a metallic lustre and iridescence. Most work was hand thrown although some forms were molded and a small percentage received tooled decoration. Nickerson exhibited at the Society of Arts & Crafts Boston exhibitions in 1899 and 1907. In 1904, Nickerson was a silver medalist at the St. Louis Exposition. In 1908, the pottery was sold to Frank A. Bray and later that year fire destroyed it and the remains of the inventory were sold.