Member Debbie Marciewicz owned a similar flask which was one of Bob’s favorite stoneware pieces. The difference is that hers is marked G.M. instead of L.M. She provided photos. Redwing stoneware expert and member Al Kohlman said that there are perhaps a dozen other Redwing canteen varieties. The Pierron mini-canteen is probably the most desirable of the category.
The mystery around this piece is the question of who was G.M. Pierron. Louis M. Pierron is the well known successor to Charles Hermann & Co. stoneware manufacturing company based in Milwaukee. It is also well known that Louis was a Redwing dealer and jobber at that time. Perhaps G.M. was a brother, son or another relative in the tavern or stoneware retailing business. These pieces were obviously ordered and made about the same time. Henry Hecker checked the city directories for the time and no one with those initials turned up. He also tried Ascestry.com without success. William Pierron was in the tavern business and could have ordered a piece like this but the initials don’t match.
To get a definitive answer I shook the family tree. Peter Thornquist is a descendant of Louis Pierron. He said Louis had a brother named William but was unaware of anyone with the initials G.M. He then checked with George Roemer whose wife is a direct descendant with knowledge of the family tree. They had no evidence that there was a G.M. either.
The answer to the mystery becomes more apparent when you look carefully that with G and the M on the two varieties. It was most likely a typographical error. When Louis received the batch he demanded that Redwing remake them. Redwing made two modifications to the G to turn it into an L. They extended the vertical line in the lower left and removed the curl in the upper right. Given the typeface it came out looking like a respectable L, despite the presence of vehicle line in the lower right that should not be there regardless of the font. Louis’s signature may have contributed to the error.
