Kilner jar The company was forced to close down to convert to gas furnaces and struggled along for a 66 years despite 3,000 people losing their jobs. In 1937, there was a bankruptcy sale, in which the patent rights to the "Kilner Jar" were sold to the United Glass Bottle company along with the rights to the very similar "Mason" jar that had also been made by Kilner. In 2003, The Rayware Group purchased the design, patent and trademark of the original Kilner jar and continues to produce them today in China. A more detailed history of the companies by the Society
John S. Mason John S. Mason John Sanford Mason (August 21, 1824 – November 29, 1897) was a career officer in the United States Army who served as a general in the Union Army during the American Civil War. John S. Mason was born in Steubenville, Ohio, in the late summer of 1824. His father was a prominent physician who had been a military surgeon during the War of 1812. He was educated in the local schools began his college studies at Kenyon College in Gambier. In the winter of 1842, he transferred to Washington College in Pennsylvania. However, he withdrew when he