A SODA POP STORY

[SODAPOPBOB]

And here we have a (Root) Birmingham, Alabama straight-sided Coca Cola bottle with a "Crown-Closure."

Question: Which of the two bottles was produced first? The Hutchinson or the Crown?

 

[GACDIG]

You are very right with the lable. Here are several of my coke and one with the original lable.

 

[SODAPOPBOB]

Glenn ~

Thanks for the reply. But your link did not post properly. Perhaps you could redo it. But please be sure to seperate it from the rest of your text as it will "black out" if it connects.

Thanks,

SPBOB

P.S. ~

Got it! You must have been editing while I was posting. Thanks.

 

[GACDIG]

Other pic of cokes, the one with lable is a rare Toledo, Ohio with a diamond side Coke.

 

[GACDIG]

pic diamond

 

[SODAPOPBOB]

Glenn ~

Thanks again for the photos. Those are great bottles and true keepers. As we all know, the one's with paper labels are hard to come by.

I realize this may seem like I'm some kind of Coca Cola expert. But the truth is I'm not. I just get off on tangents like this once in awhile for the fun of it. However, I did use to collect nothing but Coca Cola back in the 1970s and 80s. But around 1992 I sold my entire collection to another collector. I had dozens and dozens of go-with items like signs, cooler, openers, ads, etc; etc. I even had every National Geographic magazine (back cover) Santa Claus ad that was ever published. I believe it totaled about 150 individual magazines, which weigh a ton and was a lot for me to pack around in those days. I don't regret selling the majority of the collection, (I got a pretty penny for it), but I do miss the numerous bottles and wish now I had kept them.

~ * ~

And now, back to the Hutch vs. the Crown bottles. According to Bill Porter and other advanced Coca Cola researchers, (who have done extensive research on the Birmingham/Root bottles), the Hutchinson was produced first (or contemporaneously) with the Crown. Meaning they "may have" been produced at or near the same time, but that the Hutchinson was by no means the absolute "first," with a 99.9% likelihood that the Hutch came after the Crown. According to Bill Porter, whose opinion I highly respect and accept, and who has been researching Coca Cola since the 1970s, claims the numbers on the two bottles in question are the defining pieces of evidence to substantiate this sometimes challenged claim. Please note this pertains to the Birmingham/Root bottles only, and does not suggest that all early Coca Cola bottles fall under this same distinction. You will have to ask Bill yourself regarding the Biedenharn Candy Co. Hutchinson bottle, as I do not have the answer to that particular question at present.

The Root number on the Birmingham/Hutchinson bottle is 405
The Root number on the Birmingham/Crown bottle is 380

Again, according to Bill Porter, these numbers indicate the Crown bottle was produced first. But please don't ask me why they would produce a Hutch first and a Crown second, because I don't have that answer either. It seems illogical to me, but that's what the "experts" say.

Thanks again,

SPBOB

 

[celerycola]

The Birmingham ROOT bottles came after the D.O.C. bottles (crown and Hutchinson).

Hutchinsons and crowns were used concurrently in Birmingham. Hutchinsons were introduced by Crawford Johnson after he purchased the Birmingham plant from Joseph Whitehead of Atlanta in February, 1902. The plant had opened in 1901 as a branch of the Atlanta plant and used crowns exclusively the first year.

The Hutchinsons were not used for Coca-Cola in Birmingham even though they had the script logo. They were used solely for soda water. Probably the only Hutchinsons ever used for Coca-Cola were the 1899 block letter bottles from Atlanta and Chattanooga. The rubber seals on the Hutchinson stoppers imparted a bad taste to the Coca-Cola so crown bottles were necessary.

 

[SODAPOPBOB]

celery ~

Thanks. I am learning a lot from this. Now if my 109 year old brain can just remember it all, I will be doing okay. Lol [&:]

I do not currently have a photo of either the Atlanta or Chattanooga bottles, but I did have this (with text) from Reggie Lynch's website.

By the way, I am completing/editing some additional pages on my "Soda Pop Story" to help fill in the time gaps between the early 1920s and the present. It tells in more detail what my "character" did during this time period, and how he eventually ended up with 7,264 paper label bottles. Mostly fiction, of course, but it should be a fun read for those who enjoy this sort of thing. It's too bad this site doesn't also include comic books. I have a great 150 page story I wrote a couple of years ago about a guy who finds a mint condition "Action Comics no. 1" Superman comic at a yard sale that he only paid a couple of dollars for, and ends up selling it for a whopping million dollars! The story even involves a couple of murders along the way. But none of that fits here, so I will skip it.

SPBOB

Text from Reggie's site that accompanied the bottle shown below.

BIEDENHARN CANDY CO. VICKSBURG MISS
The Biedenharn Hutchinson-style bottle is accepted as being the first to ever contain Coke after Joe Biedenharn started filling them with Coca-Cola in 1894. The ROOT bottles (i.e. have "ROOT 471 on the foot) were made after Nov 1901 since that is when ROOT Glass Works was first started. The most valuable hutches are embossed with Coca-Cola.

And the photo of the bottle itself ...

 

[celerycola]

ORIGINAL: SODAPOPBOB

BIEDENHARN CANDY CO. VICKSBURG MISS
The Biedenharn Hutchinson-style bottle is accepted as being the first to ever contain Coke after Joe Biedenharn started filling them with Coca-Cola in 1894. The ROOT bottles (i.e. have "ROOT 471 on the foot) were made after Nov 1901 since that is when ROOT Glass Works was first started.

SPB,

There are two documented bottlers of Coca-Cola years before Biedenharn. The first was Woolfolk Walker who was a partner in the Coca-Cola business in 1887. He used Hutchinson bottles filled using a Matthews Bottling Apparatus in a shed behind 107 Marietta Street where Doc Pemberton mixed the Coca-Cola syrup. That operation was sold to Hagan Brothers in 1888 who operated as Capital City Bottling Works. Like the Biedenharn these Hutchinsons do not have the Coca-Cola trade mark.

 

[SODAPOPBOB]

celery ~

Thanks again. I will log that info in my brain file. I bet I'm not the only one who didn't know this about Coca Cola's first two bottler's. Good stuff!

SPBOB