stumpknocker
Posts: 324
Joined: 1/6/2010
Status: offline
|
Title: Another Bottle Mystery Solved
By: Tod von Mechow
At big bottle shows, there are often many bottles a collector can choose from to add to their collection. There is often an overwhelming number of tables and bottles wall to wall. You are just lucky to get through it all and the show is over. Small shows on the other hand don’t have as many dealers or bottles, but they often turn up hidden treasures for the collector. At a smaller show you have time to inspect the tables more carefully and look at bottles and that is when treasures are found.
This is a tale about a mystery and how it was solved via a small show. The Big Baltimore Bottle Show is followed by the much smaller Bux-Mont Bottles show in Tylersport Pennsylvania . I did the Baltimore Show and it was a blur. I did find two very important Roussel soda bottles for my collection that were a once in a lifetime purchase. These were added to my collection of pontiled Philadelphia soda and beer bottles. I also collect to soda bottles from Philadelphia that are not pontiled. These include bottles with odd closures, odd colors, embossed product names, and pictures. If I cannot find a pontiled soda or beer to add to the collection at a show, I can often find one of these bottles to add to my collection.
The picture bottles are the easiest to find. There are over 5,000 different pre-crown soda and beer bottles for Philadelphia and there are many with pictures. Hutches, blobs, weiss beers, ginger ales, porters are all known with pictures. There are pictures of bartenders, lions, stars, carriages, horns, lyres, hands, bells, boxes, eagles, brewing kettles and the list goes on and on. One of the most common picture bottles that occurs in many different shapes and sizes are those from the Pennsylvania Bottling And Supply Company. The picture on these bottles appears to be some sort of bottle stopper. I have seen it identified as a Hutchinson stopper but it definitely is not. I have speculated for years what this picture was to represent. It definitely was not a stopper that was used on the company’s bottles. All those that I have ever seen have been the traditional lightning, Hutter porcelain, Hutchinson , or crown closures. It has been a mystery to me for over twenty-five years.
Enter the Bux-Mont show. After my purchases in Baltimore , I was cash strapped. There were some nice pontiled Philadelphia soda and beer bottles at the show, but I had them all. I was really searching the tables hard to find something less expensive for my collection. I did find bottles for a couple of friends tucked in amongst the neat rows of bottles and under tables in boxes. I never have time to look in boxes under tables at the big shows. Then I saw it. It must have been on my third walk around. I looked like any other 1890 Hutch from Philadelphia , there are hundreds, but this was different. Inside where the Hutch stopper should have been was a black hard rubber stopper that looked similar to a gravitating stopper. The name on the bottle was George W. Tucker. I had found a new closure bottle with an unknown closure to add to my collection.
The stopper looked familiar to me. I had seen an ad in the early 1890’s for William Roorbach for a bottle stopper in the Philadelphia Directories. Roorbach had a couple of patents in the mid 1880s for soda bottle stoppers. Sheldon Twitchell & Brother popularized this stopper as the “Twitchell Floating Ball Stopper.” These bottles have a wide groove in the lip for a rubber gasket and hollow hard rubber ball that sealed the bottle. They often have the “PATENTED FEB 20, 1883 , JUNE 28, 85 & AUG 4, 85 ” embossing near the base or “FBS” for floating ball stopper embossed on the base. These bottles were used from 1885 to about 1905 and are found all over the United States . Well my database has nearly fifty examples of them from fifteen different states. The 1883 patent on these bottles is actually a Codd like bottle. Bottles with this patent closure are rare and are mostly from the Philadelphia area. My database has six different named examples.
While at the show, I showed this stopper to David Graci, Mr.. Stoneware bottles and also Mr.. Closure. David is collecting and researching soda and beer closures from around the world. His book on American stoneware bottles is the bible. He had not seen this closure before. But he did say something that struck me. He said it looks like the picture on the Pennsylvania Bottling And Supply Company bottles.
When I got home, I searched for that Roorbach ad. I found it in the 1893 Boyd’s business directory for Philadelphia . The ad touted “PATENT Self-Closing Stopper Is Clean, Simple, Durable and the Best Stopper yet produced for Sealing Carbonated Beverages. Circular of explanation sent on application. 205 N. THIRD ST .” I’d love to have a copy of that circular. The stopper in the picture was identical to the one in the Tucker bottle. Even down to the groove in the side of it. I had found the first known example of this Roorbach patent stopper. I have examples of his earlier 1883 and 1885 patent stoppers. That makes three patented stoppers from the same guy. What a find and it just kept getting better.
I emailed David and asked if he had a copy of the Roorbach patent. He said he did and sent me a copy of it. I anxiously waited for it in the mail. Finally the letter arrived. Inside was a copy of the patent. The patent was filed in 1889 and renewed in 1890. That was odd. The Roorbach ad was from nearly four years later. Why was he still trying to peddle a stopper four years after it was invented? Especially for a stopper that to now appears to only have one buyer. But wait there was a co-filer on the patent with Roorbach. It was none other than George W. Tucker! The name embossed on the bottle that I had found.
Who was George W. Tucker? He was first listed in the Philadelphia directories in 1888 as a bottler and producer of mineral water at 2426 and 2428 Hancock Street . This is in the Kensington section of Philadelphia . He hit the directories in a big way by not only listing but also in placing an ad touting his Birch Beer, the acme of perfection, as well as tonic beer, ginger ale, pear cider, English lemonade, horehound beer, sarsaparilla, mineral waters, pop beer, iron tonic and cream mead. A similar ad appeared in Boyd’s 1889 Philadelphia Directory. His listing in 1890 did not include an ad. Business must have been getting bad. A search of the database did not reveal any other firms located at Tucker’s address. There is no listing for George W. Tucker in 1891, but there is for Tucker Brothers at 2921 Kensington Avenue as bottlers. That is not too far from George W.’s original address. Tucker Brothers was not listed in the 1893 Directory. I do not have listing for the 1892. So I searched my database to see if any other firms were located at 2921 Kensington Avenue .
You won’t believe what I found. The Pennsylvania Bottling And Supply Company succeeded Tucker Brothers at some time during 1892! This company was listed at 2921 Kensington Avenue and at 155 Richmond . A search on the 155 Richmond Street address turned up Nennich & Wiest, who were listed at 151 to 155 Richmond starting in 1888 and ending with the formation of The Pennsylvania Bottling And Supply Company. They were first listed in 1887 at 868 North Fourth Street . Nennich & Wiest were successful bottlers, whose bottles are plentiful. About 1904 the Pennsylvania Bottling And Supply Company sold the Richmond Street business to Jacob Heilmann, another successful bottler. Jacob took over the business of Casper Heilmann starting in 1886. This business was located at 1011 Dauphin and 1008 Dacota Streets. Casper was first listed in 1874 as a bottler at the 1011 Dauphin Street address. About 1908, the Pennsylvania Bottling And Supply Company opened a branch office at 14 Market Street in Camden , New Jersey . They were still listed in 1914, the last year that I have for a Philadelphia directory.
From this information I was able to infer that Tucker Brothers and Nennich & Wiest formed the Pennsylvania Bottling And Supply Company and choose as their trademark the stopper that was patented by William L. Roorbach and George W. Tucker four years before. That year is also the year that Roorbach started to advertise the stopper. The mystery is solved. Now I wonder if there are any Pennsylvania Bottling And Supply Company or Tucker Brothers’ bottles with the Roorbach-Tucker patent stopper? I have another mystery and search. I’ll be sure to hit some more of those small shows and maybe I will find some.
 Attachment (1)
|
Pennsyvania Bottling & Supply Logo - 
New Messages
No New Messages
Hot Topic w/ New Messages
Hot Topic w/o New Messages
Locked w/ New Messages
Locked w/o New Messages
Post New Thread