Oneta No. 9 Cast Iron Skillet
If you couldn't afford Wagner, you bought Wapak. If you couldn't afford Wapak, you bought Oneta. Made in Wapakoneta — the town between Sidney and Piqua, Neil Armstrong's hometown — this budget skillet is now harder to find than the premium brands it once undercut. The cheap things get used up. The survivors are scarce.
Buckeye Iron & Brass Works 2” Fig. 671 Cleanout Cap
This cast iron cleanout cap was produced by Buckeye Iron & Brass Works of Dayton — the foundry the Wright Brothers walked into when they needed an aluminum crankcase for the engine that would fly at Kitty Hawk. Some of the best stories in American cast iron are not on skillets. They are on the workpieces that built the infrastructure.
The Madison Foundry Co. Enameled Mini Skillet Ashtray
Madison Foundry didn't make skillets. They made manhole covers. This mini skillet ashtray was their calling card — a promotional piece that sat on a city engineer's desk, catching ashes and advertising the Cleveland foundry that cast the iron beneath the city's streets. Five Cleveland foundries now in the SSC collection.
Superior Foundry Inc. Cast Iron Melting Scoop
Finding one piece from Superior Foundry is hard. Finding two is what happens when you know what to look for. This melting scoop carries the same Cleveland mark as the miniature bowl — and its original working patina tells the story of a tool that actually melted metal in a Cleveland workshop.
The Cleveland Foundry Co. Star & Sunburst Sad Iron Trivet
In 1888 they were casting trivets. By 1921 they were Perfection Stove Company. This star and sunburst trivet — patented 1891, just three years after the Cleveland Foundry Co.'s founding — is where one of America's great heating appliance brands began. Twelve dollars and fifty cents.
Superior Foundry Inc. Miniature Cast Iron Melting Bowl
Superior Foundry of Cleveland was no minor operation — two of its executives served as president of the American Foundry Society. Yet today its products are described as "very difficult to find." This miniature melting bowl keeps the record.
Akron Brass Mfg. No. 10 Hydrant Spanner Wrench
The firefighter's Swiss Army knife. This 1925 No. 10 spanner wrench from Akron Brass in Wooster, Ohio opened hydrants, tightened hose couplings, and started a century-long legacy — from B.F. Goodrich employees to the company that rushed equipment to Ground Zero.
Lake City Malleable Co. No. 5 Lead Casting Ladle
This No. 5 casting ladle carries Cleveland's name on its handle — made by The Lake City Malleable Co., a Cuyahoga County foundry known for industrial ladles, kitchen utensils, and elegantly cast advertising figurines.
Foster Stove Company No. 8 Chicken Fryer
This deep-sided No. 8 chicken fryer from Foster Stove Company of Ironton, Ohio completes the Favorite corporate lineage in the SSC collection — from Columbus Hollow Ware through Favorite Piqua Ware, Miami, Puritan, and now Foster.
The Schill Brothers Co. Cast Iron Stove Emblem
A cast iron stove and furnace identification emblem from The Schill Brothers Co. of Crestline, Ohio — a documented manufacturer founded in 1892, referenced in the trade press through the early 1920s. The elongated oval form bears raised lettering reading "THE SCHILL BROTHERS CO / CRESTLINE, OHIO" with a single central mounting hole. SSC Catalog No. SSC-SCHILL-EMBLEM-c1900-001. The SSC collection's first piece from Crawford County.
Brand’s Famous Furnaces Cast Iron Nameplate
A rare c. 1880–1905 cast iron furnace nameplate bearing the trade mark of Brand's Famous Furnaces — "The Leading Brand" — in Gothic arch form with flame finial, chain-link ornament, and keyhole mounting slots. The manufacturer is undocumented in standard reference sources, making this piece both a physical artifact and an open research question. SSC Catalog No. SSC-BRAND-PLATE-c1890-001.
M. Hose & Lyon Cast Iron LadlePatented Smelting & Pouring Ladle — PAT'D AUG. 15, 1871
Some cast iron pieces carry a cookware pedigree. This one carries a patent date.
The M. Hose & Lyon smelting ladle — cast in Dayton, Ohio and patented August 15, 1871 — is a primary-source document of Ohio's mid-19th century industrial iron trade. Embossed in raised block capitals along the full length of its handle: M HOSE & LYON / DAYTON O / PAT'D AUG 15 / 1871. The mark is crisp. The iron is sound. The piece is 154 years old.
The patented design solved a real problem. Standard smelting ladles of the era had a single pour spout — to redirect the flow, the operator had to rotate the ladle over open flame with liquid metal in the bowl. The Hose & Lyon solution was three equidistant spouts cast around the bowl rim, so any one could be oriented toward the target without shifting the grip. It was practical, elegant, and worth the trip to the Patent Office.
Dayton in 1871 was already one of the most inventive cities in America — the foundry and machine shop culture of the Miami Valley was two generations deep before NCR and the Wright brothers made it famous. M. Hose & Lyon worked in that world. This ladle is what that world made.
The trade it served is gone. The tool is here.
Union Mfg Co Cast Iron Cover / Face Plate
Toledo, Ohio cast its iron with industrial purpose. This Union Mfg Co circular cover plate — 7¾ inches of gray iron marked UNION MFG CO · TOLEDO O in crisp raised relief around the rim — is not cookware. It is the other side of the Ohio foundry record: the fittings, covers, and closures that sealed furnace ports, boiler inspection openings, and gas line flanges in the buildings of a city that grew from 31,000 people in 1880 to over 168,000 by 1910. Somebody cast this piece in Toledo, bolted it over an opening, and left it to do its work. The Union Mfg Co foundry that made it has left almost no trace in the historical record. This cover plate survives to say it was there.
Ahrens & Arnold No. 3 Skillet — Wapakoneta Mark
Ahrens & Arnold operated in Wapakoneta, Ohio, for only a few years in the late 1920s — founded by former Wapak Hollow Ware employees after that foundry's closure, documented in almost no historical record, and known to collectors today through a handful of surviving pieces. This No. 3 cast iron skillet carries the full A&A marking layout in exceptional condition: the CAST · IRON · SKILLET arc with raised dot word separators, the AA arrow emblem, and the WAPAKONETA / OHIO. origin text with its characteristic terminal period — every authentication marker present and clearly legible. One of the rarest named makers in the American cast iron corpus, now documented in the SSC collection alongside its Wapak Indian Head No. 3 counterpart to tell the complete Wapakoneta story.
Wapak No. 3 Skillet — Indian Head Mark
Every Ohio foundry in the SSC collection marks its iron with text or geometry — an arc, a cartouche, a diamond. Wapak chose a face. The Indian Head medallion centered on this No. 3 base — a Native American figure in feathered headdress, cast in profile, surrounded by the company inscription — is the most visually distinctive mark in the Ohio foundry corpus. This No. 3 carries it in exceptional condition: headdress feather detail preserved, facial profile clear, inscription readable. It is the finest-condition marked piece in the SSC collection, the first Wapak entry, and the highest single-piece acquisition to date. Some iron earns its price