Interesting and logical; on the other hand, that might be looking at things through 21st century glasses. Wagner in the early 1890s wouldn't have been seen as a competitor, rather as a startup. And I don't really know how businesses saw other businesses in other states as competitors at that time. I do find it interesting that so many of the foundries at the time (turn of the century-ish) produced Erie clones (Wagner, Favorite, Wapak, etc.) and that (as far as I know) very few clones were made of Griswold's later skillets, at least not ones that aren't obvious and made by small foundries. It suggests to me that either all of these early manufacturers copied Griswold's Erie skillets (particularly the first 3 series or so) which would be very logical and didn't bother changing their skillets as Griswold evolved (as many of them continued to produce outside heat ring, Erie-like skillets well after Griswold was producing the skillets we think of as Gris skillets today) or that Griswold at one point sold old patterns to other foundries and then stopped that practice as they realized they were helping their competitors. If the former case is correct as Doug posits then it would be really cool to find out if there were ever any cease and desist letters or other court action brought by Griswold against the other manufacturers.
If someone can give me a measurement on a #11 Erie we can figure it out!
Oh, also, the blue book doesn't list the earliest Wagner skillets like mine. It gives ~$110 for the slightly later Wagner, Sidney O skillets. Any idea on value for the skillet? I'm assuming about the same, but I'd like to know what anyone has seen these at recently. Like I said, I couldn't find any sold examples on the Bay.
image by twillightkids, on Flickr