Keith,

I dunno about these being used so-much for stimulating hens to lay more 
eggs ... nor when exactly they began to be made for commerce ... but my 
grand-parents used them for snake-control  (and their parents before 
them, certainly before the 1880, I'd opine) ... specifically controlling 
the rat-snake (called chicken snakes in east-Texas). One of these big 
snakes could seem to find its way into the tightest chicken-coops (I've 
personally witnessed them wriggling through the tiniest knot holes in 
pine planks), and greedily gobble-up a whole clutch (or two) of eggs in 
a single meal. They easily constrict and crush the shells of the 
(natural) eggs and make-away with a protein-rich meal, thru the same 
narrow opening with which they made ingress, but if they make the fatal 
mistake of swallowing one of the trick glass eggs, then its curtains for 
Mr. Snake! the next time grand-mother arrives to gather eggs. His 
front-half is dangling through the hole or crack where he made ingress, 
wildly wriggling trying to getaway (or hanging limply having already 
exhausted himself from hours of futilely struggling beforehand), 
prevented from it by the huge undesolvable and unbreakable bulge in his 
body, and with one deft swipe of her hoe, grand-mother slices-him-in-two.

I've seen this little drama repeated on several occasions occasions, 
being tasked with retrieval (and cleaning) of the glass-egg from the 
bisected snake's innards, and return of it to the nest nearest the end 
where it was felt the next snake might gain entrance ... for there was 
ALWAYS a next snake... and one did not have to await long for him to 
show-up.

Regards,
Bob Skiles

On 8/7/2015 1:08 PM, Keith Doms wrote:
> Hello,
>                  We recently discovered a blown milk glass egg.   It appears to be a dummy egg that was used it encourage chickens to lay.  My informants tell me that door knobs and darning eggs were also used.  It comes from a midden that dates between 1880 and 1910.  The little research I have been able to do has not answered the following questions.  1. When did they start making blown eggs?  2. How far did the practice of artificial eggs to induce laying go back? 3.  Does anyone know of an advertisement for these things.
>
> Keith R. Doms
> Newlin Grist Mill
> Site Manager
> 219 S. Cheyney Rd.
> Glen Mills, PA  19342
> (610) 459-2359
> [log in to unmask]<mailto:[log in to unmask]>
>