{"id":41191,"date":"2016-05-18T08:56:10","date_gmt":"2016-05-18T12:56:10","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/webapp2.wright.edu\/web1\/newsroom\/?p=41191"},"modified":"2022-09-26T10:45:35","modified_gmt":"2022-09-26T14:45:35","slug":"business-is-hopping","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/webapp2.wright.edu\/web1\/newsroom\/2016\/05\/18\/business-is-hopping\/","title":{"rendered":"Business is hopping"},"content":{"rendered":"
\"Wright<\/a>

Wright State alumna Janice Hester ’77 launched a successful business making grinning, bug-eyed ceramic frogs. (Photos by Will Jones)<\/p><\/div>\n

We\u2019ve all seen them. Grinning, bug-eyed ceramic frogs playing poker, riding motorcycles and even banging the drums.<\/p>\n

The frogs can be found on desks, bookcases and nightstands in all 50 states. Thousands and thousands of them have been handcrafted over the years. And it\u2019s all because of Wright State University alumna Janice Hester, who invented them, made them and sold them.<\/p>\n

\u201cIt just took off,\u201d said the 74-year-old Hester, who still lives in the Kettering home in which she grew up.<\/p>\n

A few ceramic frogs still hang out at the house.<\/p>\n

There is an award-winning motorcycle gang of frogs; car-driving frogs; poker-playing frogs, one chomping on a cigar; a drum-playing frog; and even Christmas tree-decorating frogs. The most popular frog, says Hester, is one shrugging its shoulders and saying \u201cWhatever.\u201d<\/p>\n

Hester\u2019s amphibious career did not begin early. After graduating from Fairmont High School in 1961, she spent the following 10 years working at NCR Corp., where she helped assemble cash registers.<\/p>\n

She finally decided to enroll at Wright State in hopes of becoming an art teacher.<\/p>\n

\u201cI liked art, and I wanted to do something besides work in a factory,\u201d she said.<\/p>\n

After coming to Wright State, she fell in love with clay, molding shapes and forms with her hands.<\/p>\n

\"Business<\/a>\u201cThat was my cup of tea,\u201d she said.<\/p>\n

In the summers, Hester and her family would go to their summer home in Albany, Kentucky, just north of the Tennessee border. She spent a lot of time at a nearby lake, which was thick with frogs.<\/p>\n

Hester began crafting frogs out of clay, but she personified them \u2014 having them do human-like things.<\/p>\n

\u201cI would be down there at the lake making frogs,\u201d she said. \u201cIt was a natural thing, playing with shapes.\u201d<\/p>\n

After Hester began selling her frogs at arts and crafts shows, she was encouraged to form a company to make and sell the frogs commercially. So she founded the Hester Co., and she and her mother began making frogs in the basement.<\/p>\n

\u201cWe would make little batches of them,\u201d she said. \u201cMaybe in one day we would make 30 frogs.\u201d<\/p>\n

After the frogs were fired and glazed in a kiln, they were sold in gold boxes with brown velour lids.<\/p>\n

\u201cIt was something fancy for being a little frog,\u201d she said.<\/p>\n

Hester graduated from Wright State in 1977 with her bachelor\u2019s degree in art education.<\/p>\n

\u201cI was going to teach art, but my little company was doing so well that I just kept doing that,\u201d she said.<\/p>\n

Hester said she learned a lot at Wright State about forms and shape and believes her education made her more successful than she would have been.<\/p>\n

At Wright State, Hester met fellow art student Mona Royer, who is currently a professional artist living in Washington, D.C. The two became good friends and even traveled around Europe together following graduation.<\/p>\n

\"Business<\/a>\u201cHer work is fun and witty and has been sold everywhere,\u201d Royer said of Hester. \u201cAgents, reps, galleries and shows.\u201d<\/p>\n

Hester retired a couple of years ago, so her company no longer exists. But she still sells her frogs at craft shows. She even gets Christmas cards from a Hamilton man who bought his first Hester frog as a boy.<\/p>\n

\u201cIt\u2019s been a good run, but I kind of burned out. Made enough frogs,\u201d Hester said. \u201cI\u2019ve started doing watercolors instead.\u201d<\/p>\n

Hester plans to sell her frogs at the following craft shows: Lakota West High School on Oct. 1-2; Lakota East High School on Nov. 12-13; and Ryle High School in Union, Kentucky, on Nov. 18-19.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Wright State alumna Janice Hester ran a successful business making popular, grinning, bug-eyed ceramic frogs. Continue reading →<\/span><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":17,"featured_media":41203,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[722,733,4299,2037,4859,725,747,715],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-41191","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-academics","category-alumni","category-alumni-profile","category-arts-scene","category-fine-and-performing-arts","category-home-news-sidebar","category-liberal-arts","category-news"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/webapp2.wright.edu\/web1\/newsroom\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/41191","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/webapp2.wright.edu\/web1\/newsroom\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/webapp2.wright.edu\/web1\/newsroom\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/webapp2.wright.edu\/web1\/newsroom\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/17"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/webapp2.wright.edu\/web1\/newsroom\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=41191"}],"version-history":[{"count":6,"href":"https:\/\/webapp2.wright.edu\/web1\/newsroom\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/41191\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":41221,"href":"https:\/\/webapp2.wright.edu\/web1\/newsroom\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/41191\/revisions\/41221"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/webapp2.wright.edu\/web1\/newsroom\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/41203"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/webapp2.wright.edu\/web1\/newsroom\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=41191"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/webapp2.wright.edu\/web1\/newsroom\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=41191"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/webapp2.wright.edu\/web1\/newsroom\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=41191"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}