Another Little Known Alberta Pottery Company

Provincial Industrial Enterprises (P.I.E.) 1939 is a pottery company from Medicine Hat that operated for a very short time, before Hop Yuill took over Wyatt's Alberta Potteries Limited the plant was occupied by P.I.E.

There is not much information available about this company as it appears no one has done much research to this point in time, perhaps because it was short lived there is not a whole lot of interest in the company or perhaps there is not much information to be found on the company.  What ever the reason there is very little information to be found.

P.I.E. starting operating in 1939 for a short time and produced a number of items including vases, jardinieres, bulb bowls, cream pitcher and sugar bowl and a mixing bowl just to name a few.  Some of the pieces were decorated with the Dutch Windmill scene, others a sailboat scene.

No one knows why the company was so short lived and if the records survived no one knows who has them or where they may be.  Either way the P.I.E. pieces are difficult to find and often will show up in the strangest of places and without research not many people know the significance of the pottery.

In the "Kilns of South Eastern Alberta" the author Ron Getty states:  "Whatever the reasons there is no doubt in my mind that this small factory could not effectively compete with the two larger ones in Medicine Hat.  Its product line was not different enough from Medalta's or Medicine Hat Potteries' to fill a niche in the market.  So after being open for less than a year, they closed."

It is interesting to note that many of the vase styles were made by Medalta,  Medicine Hat Potteries and P.I.E.  There have been vases found in collections that have had stamps from two different companies and decorated in a style usually found by a third company.  Medicine Hat, although a good sized city, had a closely knit pottery production occupying different factories and producing products similar to each other, often with the employees from one pottery moving to work in a different one.  Perhaps this is why the companies have similar  styles or perhaps it is molds left behind when one company closed and another one took over the factory, we may never know for certain.  It is these things that keep us interested and always looking to find pieces, talking to people and doing some traveling.

We only have two pieces of P.I.E. in our collection and in both cases we were very fortunate to find them in good condition, although the painting one on is quite faded.  It has been fun looking for other pieces to add.

Here is a webpage with more information:   https://journals.lib.unb.ca/index.php/MCR/article/view/17156/22857

Once again the photos are pieces in our collection, I have also included photos of the stamps on each piece.

And the Search Continues.....