John Morgan came from a long line of glass craftsmen dating back to his great-great uncle, George Morgan, who came to America from Wales in 1832 to establish a stained glass business with his brothers. Family documents indicate that several of the first-generation Morgans were killed by falling from scaffolding while installing windows in a church.
The business was passed down from father to son until it reached John’s father, George, who changed the focus from stained glass to glass bending and moved the shop to Metropolitan Avenue in Brooklyn in 1916. John inherited the business and continued specialized glass bending for custom lighting, antique restorations, and other custom designs until 1985, when Morgan & Co. was closed. John, at age 57, retired to Florida and was killed in a car accident in 1992.
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In the late 1980’s, when Flickinger artisans had little experience, John was a guiding force, showing us, on a job-by-job basis, how to bend glass. Thousands of the Morgan steel molds, some dating back to the 1830’s, are in everyday use at Flickinger Glassworks, Inc.