The industrial pottery at Abingdon, Illinois, made artware from 1934 to 1950 before returning to its mainstay, plum-bingware or sanitary-ware, as it was called at "The Pottery." Yankee ingenuity was used to cope with the Great Depression when managers came up with the idea of making artware using their usual "industrial strength" materials and processes. This decision resulted in artware with unusually strong bodies and glazes. For the veteran collector of Abingdon Pottery as well as the novice, this is an Encyclopedia of Shapes, a Dictionary of Colors, a Holy Grail of Collecting, richly illustrated in over 700 photographs and painstakingly researched. It also has a detailed value guide according to mold number and mold type.