What's Up Me Old China?

The shocking news has been revealed that the great ceramic glass conglomerate Wedgewood Waterford, also makers of Royal Doulton, is under the hands of receivers. Apparently around 2,700 jobs are risk if the whole box and dice goes under, but
"Politicians on both sides of the Irish Sea warned that the collapse of the company had severe implications for communities where china and glass have been manufactured for generations. The mayor of Waterford said it would be a "national disaster" for Ireland if production at the crystal factory ceased."
These Iconic brands and the centuries of fine artisanship can't be lost in a pile of debts and cheap glassware from the developing world can they?

Old Josiah Wedgewood (pictured) started knocking out pottery in 1759 and Waterford crystal kicked off in 1783, such history predates moments in time like The French Revolution, The First Irish Rebellion and the invasion of Australia by the British Fleet which not surprisingly was carrying Irish Rebels and other poor, wretched refuse they couldn't send to America since they got kicked out in the War of Independance, somewhere in there as well was the creation of the first batch of Guinness Ale, that surely ranks as one of THE defining points in the 18th century, actually some historians would tell you that in fact the Irish Rebellion was a Guinness fuelled pub fight that got a bit serious, hey don't quote me but Donnybrook is a suburb of Dublin, so the English Lords should have expected a fight one day.

Anyway, I didn't establish a great connection to Wedgewood until I met my wife, who "embraced the temporary madness" (her words), when she started buying Wedgewood dinner sets and canteens of cutlery (yes they make them as well) and I really got a taste of the finer things in life or at least I got what good plates and knives were all about.
Another memory from my childhood was my Nanna's collection of Royal Doulton figurines and her particular love of the Persian poet Omar Khayyam, who looked really profound sitting around as a 6-inch porcelain.

What might he have said about this great modern tragedy, perhaps something like,
"For in the Market-place, one Dusk of Day,
I watch'd the Potter thumping his wet Clay,
And with its all obliterated Tongue
It murmur'd, Gently, Brother, gently, pray!'

The Yanks have just pitched a Waterford Crystal ball — 12 feet in diameter, weighing nearly 12,000 pounds, and covered with 2,668 Waterford Crystal triangles, in Times Square, surely they couldn't let such an institution as this fall prey to market conditions that they themselves created, oh no, Omar forbid!

So stand by, and picture this, production of quality china going back to the Chinese ... who'd have thought that possible after the Opium Wars, not this student of history, but then "Top Gun" Tom has just released another woeful Nazi biopic, so anything is possible in this current climate.