Columbia Eagle

[baltbottles]

Here is a picture of a shard of a GI-119 Columbia Eagle dug in west Baltimore in a dense amber shading to yellow. I also have a large chunk of a blue example around here some place but can't find it.

Chris

 

[baltbottles]

Here is a picture of most of a GI-117 in yellow green that was dug in fells point. I think this one is now in the bottom of my friends fish tank. lol

Chris

 

[baltbottles]

The GI-119 mold shows up regularly in Baltimore privies and I have wondered if it wasn't a locally produced knockoff of the Philadelphia made flasks.

Chris

 

[earlyglass]

Chris,

Those two colors are amazing. Pull that one out of the fish bowl and on to your shelf! If a perfect example in that color could be $80,000... shouldn't 3/4 of a flask be worth $60,000! [] Yeah, that logic just doesn't apply here, but it is certainly of value.

The information collected by McKearin is sketchy, and there isn't a firm attribution, just a possible attribution to the Union Glass Works in Kensington. There are design differences in all of the 6 molds (117-122). Highly likely that other glasshouses followed suit to this contemporary design. It certainly seems to be worth investigation, as this group of flasks is very well-known by collectors, but not well-documented.

Thanks for sharing those great shards!! I don't think I could pull myself out of a hole knowing that those missing pieces are down there somewhere. I am sure you went through that pain looking for them.

Mike

 

[cobaltbot]

Wow, very nice - lucky fish. No doubt a few of these lay at the bottom of nature's fishtank as well. Could the molds have gone to Baltimore when Kennsington temporarily closed in 1844? Here's an interesting article by Kevin Sives I found when researching my find:

http://www.glswrk-auction.com/148.htm

 

[baltbottles]

I was over my friends house he has a couple Columbia / Eagles I snapped a pic of his Green GI-119 for the forum. He dug it in Baltimore quite a few years ago.

Chris

 

[downeastdigger]

wow, I'm droolin all over my keyboard here. What awesome shards

 

[sandchip]

Holy cow, what great stuff ya'll.

 

[Steve/sewell]

BINGO!!!! Mystery solved by forum member OhioSulator last evening Greg . I heard you are not feeling well and thought this information would help cheer you up. Gary is going to email you to alert you to this post. I look forward to hearing from you again, I hope you feel better in the coming days.We need to get together in person, Hope you see this soon.

Ok here goes..... Last evening forum member OhioSulator posted his GI-121 B & W Columbia/Eagle Flask. I added to it and showed him two of my columbia flasks. Here is a link to his post

https://www.antique-bottles.net/forum/GI-121-Columbia-bust-%2F-eagle-B%26W/m-517807/tm.htm

On his flask is a tag which reads Burgin and Wood just two names right nothing special, could be a liquor proprietor or a famous person ect,but more then likely as seen on other historical flasks like the early Coventry Connecticut ones of S & S and S & C and the Keene produced ones with the initials with J-P and J-S the B & W was undoubtedly a glass works or owner or owners of one. So today while at work I started thinking about the name Burgin and Wood I knew I had read the name some where, I felt like Jim Carey in Pet detective Burgin and Wood Wood and Burgin Finkel is Einhorn Einhorn is Finkel over and over again [][]I was becoming more and more confident that the letters were intials of someone who owned a glass factory or the initials were the name of a particular glass works . I have been wrapped up in a Dyott moment for the last couple of days you should check out my posts Greg in the historical section of this forum where I usually post.,All of a sudden it hit me a little bit ago this evening as to who Burgin and Wood were. I posted in this link a while back on this forum about James Lees first glass venture on the outskirts of Millville... https://www.antique-bottles.net/forum/m-410637/mpage-1/tm.htm#411383

In the link the following information was written by me how could I have forgotten this

Millville's first glass works were started in 1806 by James lee.Lee originally named the factory Glasstown.The original factory made window glass, and it later expanded to making bottles in 1809, presumably vials and junk bottle (common Farmer bottles). James was the son of Francis Lee who came from Belfast, Ireland, to Pennsylvania. In 1799 James Lee built a glass factory in Port Elizabeth New Jersey he called the Eagle Glass Works. He then left Port Elizabeth and established the factory here in Millville in 1806.
A gentleman from the early days describes Lee as a promoter who abandoned one newly established enterprise after another. Lucius Elmer describes Lee as "an active enterprising man, too spasmodic in his efforts to succeed well." By 1814 Lee sold his Millville factory to Gideon Scull. In 1814 he moved to Bridgeton and built a saw mill (originally planned to be a paper mill), a general store and a raceway from the new mill dam on the Cohansey river. In 1817 Lee and his family moved to Cincinnati after a short stay to Maysville, Kentucky. He died in New Orleans in 1824.

The bottle shown here was found on the site of James Lee's Glasstown glass works in 1984 by a backhoe operator friend of mine named Ed Fredricks.Ed was grading an area at the end of Buck Street near present day Rte. 49 behind the American Legion hall near the river for a future boat slip when a lot of broken glass cullet and other factory remnants were being found in large amounts.This bottle survived and is a very pretty pale aquamarine in color very typical of the sand from Cumberland county that to this day is some of the purest in the world.
A lot of the sand from here was shipped as far away as New England in the early 1800s.Ed has given me quite a few old bottles over the years as he is constantly digging foundations, swimming pools,sidewalks,driveways ect. I am very great full to Ed for all of the bottles I have received from him over the last thirty years.This bottle is very small for a vial standing just two and a half inches tall and three quarters of an inch in diameter.The walls of the glass are very thin but the flared lip is intact. I also have shards and cullet from the site I just cant seem to be able to locate them right now for this post.When I find them I will add them to this information.

In 1827, the company had three owners: Dr. George Burgin, Richard L. Wood, and Joel Bodine. Bodine left the company in 1829 and the company name changed to Burgin & Wood. With the addition of a new partner in 1833, the company?s name changed again to Burgin, Wood & Pearsall. At this time, the factory produced glass bottles using molds made out of clay.
Glasstown was purchased in 1836 by another company that changed the name to Scattergood, Booth, and Company. Following this transition of owners, Scattergood married a woman named Sarah Whitall. Sarah was the sister of Captain John Whitall, a major investor in the Glasstown factory. When Captain Whitall moved to Philadelphia with his new wife, Mary Tatum, he left the factory under his brother?s management. For the next three years, Captain Whitall?s brother, Israel Franklin Whitall, served as manager of the company .

By 1845 Scattergood no longer worked at Glasstown and the name was changed to Whitall, Brother, and Company.Israel Whitall became ill and ceased to work for the company after 1857 and a new partner a man named Edward Tatum became one of the owners. At this time, the company became Whitall Tatum and Company. The company quickly became very successful and additional space and buildings were needed and the company expanded northward up Buck street.. The company opened An office in New York and was managed by C.A. Tatum.

Whitall Tatum was one of the first glass factories to establish a laboratory. Here they tested different procedures and combinations of materials used in glass production . By 1899, business was booming and the Whitall Tatum Company had over four hundred employees at their Glasstown factory and over one thousand at their lower works division. As a result of their success, Millville, New Jersey became famous for glass working. I know the bottle could have come from anyone really over the last 175 years but it was found at the original glass works site and in an area which produced the same colored shards and broken tops like this one.This bottle also has a lean to one side.I wonder if it was a reject and sent to the cullet heap


Thank you forum member Ohiosulator for posting your flask last evening,you have answered Greg Wells ( Potstones ) two year old question and answered it for me and anyone else with one of these flasks.Thanks a million , this is what makes this forum a valuable source of information and why when I post my long dribble I hope it can come back and help someone with a question about his or her bottle.In this case it ended up helping me of all people. You have to ask yourself now was the GI-122 which is the exact same mold minus the B & W made slightly earlier or later then this one.... Just another Bottle mystery as Red Matthews likes to say[]