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  1. J

    Clear pontil bottle

    Though this bottle is a clear not embossed bottle I've kept it many years and find it very interesting. Most patent medicine and common glass bottles before 1870 are made of aqua glass, the cheapest glass to produce. However, this patent medicine or perfume is a nice quality clear flint glass...
  2. J

    My first bottle find, thanks to my grandmother

    A favorite pastime visiting my grandmother during the 1950s was looking through her old trunk of family stuff. That probably inspired a lifelong interest in history. At about 12 years old she gave me a tin type photo of her uncle Elijah Holder in his Confederate uniform who fought at the battle...
  3. J

    Aqua sodas are interesting too....

    Colored bottles are the bottles most desired by collectors. However, over the years I've come to appreciate aqua glass for it's unique qualities too. Pictured are four aqua sodas from my collection; Field and Co 1866, N Richardson and Son Trenton, NJ, T & W, New York and a Wm Eagle New York...
  4. J

    Blue free blown bottle, South Jersey?

    Digging at the site of the old Dayton, NJ hotel many years ago my wife and I found this free blown blue pontil bottle which is probably a cologne. The intense blue color reminds me of South Jersey blown glass of the 1850s. That this paper thin glass survived in such beautiful condition after...
  5. J

    EL Kerns, King of Trenton, NJ bottlers

    A couple of years ago I dug this EL Kerns soda bottle near Trenton, NJ. I first discovered Kerns soda when I moved to NJ in 1970. Harold's store in Cranbury had been selling Kerns soda since Harold O'Neil's father opened the store in 1910. The EL Kerns business went out of business about 1980...
  6. J

    Finds reveal local Jewish history

    I obtained this O Nikolsky and Goldman Brothers Hutchison bottle last year along with the Fishman & Co crown top. The early brewers and bottles of Trenton, NJ were first and second generation German and Irish immigrants. However, from 1880 through the early 1900s Italian and Jewish immigrants...
  7. J

    Early pottery bottles on construction sites

    A couple of years ago driving through New Brunswick, NJ I passed a high mound of dirt on a construction site along the street by the bridge crossing the Raritan River downtown. There had originally been a ferry in that location during Dutch settlement times and an old Inn (The Indian Queen I...
  8. J

    Visit to friend nets good local bottles

    Drove down to the dark depths of South Jersey to visit a fellow bottle collector today. He always has plenty of interesting new finds to show when I visit; This time several good bottles found at a local flea market and a a few nice finds at a consignment shop near Trenton. On the way back I...
  9. J

    To clean or not to clean?

    Anyone who has watched Antiques Road Show has seen someone's appraisal of their Colonial highboy go from 30,000 to 5,000 because someone had it stripped/refinished. When I first began going to flea markets and auctions during the 1970s the rule was if an old piece of furniture had the original...
  10. J

    George Schaumloeffell and dating bottles

    A friend gave me this George Schaumloeffell bottle dug in Trenton, NJ last year. George was a German immigrant who migrated in 1882. He became one of the more successful later German brewers and bottlers in Trenton, NJ, his business lasting up to prohibition. What's more interesting about this...
  11. J

    Mystery of the Blue Rue and the Morton Mead

    Years ago an old time collector told me there was a blue MA Rue Cranbury NJ bottle. Though none have materialized I've learned to expect anything. There's thousands, maybe millions of old bottles left in the ground so the possibilities are unlimited. The closest thing I've found is the pictured...
  12. J

    A walk in the woods, Morton and Richardson

    Walking in the woods one day I noticed the bottom of this bottle sticking out of the leaves and dirt. I kicked what I expected to be a shard but to my surprise the shard was solidly embedded in the ground. I was soon removing a complete Morton and Richardson green bottle. Morton and Richardson...
  13. J

    Benjamin P Reeder

    Bottle I dug near Trenton a couple of years ago. Benjamin P Reeder is the only Trenton bottler I've researched who was a Trenton area native. He was born in Ewing, a suburb of Trenton, NJ in 1852. His entry into the bottling business began with his marriage into the Moses Johnson family, local...
  14. J

    It's a cyber world

    Why not a cyber collection? No, cracks, stain, chips, etc. Always a perfect bottle.
  15. J

    Unexpected finds

    A few members of this forum have asked me whether I find bottles from their area here. Generally the answer is rarely. But occasionally unexpected finds occur. For instance the Zuckerman, Pawtuckett, Rhode Island blob top bottle dug in Trenton last year. Very, unusual!
  16. J

    Mystery bottle???

    I dug this fragment of what appears to be an 1870 to 1880 Trenton, NJ soda/beer embossed "Thomas & C??????". The writing at the bottom starts "T". I assume Trenton, NJ since most of the bottles from that site were from Trenton. I have not been able to find any listing for this bottler in...
  17. J

    Digging at home and Irish Immigrants

    We moved into this old farm house about twenty years ago. Pieces of pontil medicines and sodas occasionally turn when I till the garden behind the house. Being a bottle collector and nature enthusiast I began exploring the wooded areas surrounding the house. I can look out the upstairs window...
  18. J

    Bottlers, gangsters and Kingston, NJ

    For the sake of Ken Burns prohibition documentary I'll tell this interesting local story: Leo Salamanda was an Italian immigrant and Trenton bottler whose family were prominent liquor distributors in the early 1900s. Leo made the NY Times when he was killed in a shootout with Newark gangsters...
  19. J

    Charles H Richardson and a great bottle dump

    A couple of years ago I decided to quit bottle collecting, sold most of my bottles and thought that was the end of it. One of the buyers was a local collector who didn't dig. I volunteered to take him out digging and on our first trip we found the dream bottle dump. What was amazing is the...
  20. J

    The Elusive Mr Rue ....

    Last winter I received an email from a friend who lives here in Cranbury, NJ. He said he had found an old M.A. Rue bottle. I was shocked, because he's not a bottle collector. I was surprised he even knew of MA Rue. About a week later I stopped by his house to see the bottle and he showed me a...

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