Common or Not?

[WhiteLighting]

well after much reading and discussion of this subject on bottles,...
I have personaly found out that certin bottles are rare in my area to where bottles in your area are common ,
An example is "log cabin bitters/Drakes" now i have not seen one for sale or found one diggn hear in NY,and also Saratoga Min bottles are hard to come by and i live a county away from the Springs...

I think we all need to sit down a take a closer look at what we call common and rare,I seen a Apple Green "not full green" Pinkman's bottle sell for under 20 bucks on a certin auction site..e,bay,..
now that is listed for over 1,000USD -but also i have a apple green type not clear!,with disc type lip as described in books but the clear type i have not found 1!,...
Now "yes i just woke up abit ago" and this might be hard to read/figure out what im tryin to accomplish here --- so in laymans terms -
Whats rare in your part of the world and i will compare it to the Freq of that type showing up where i am....this is a experiment and would like all to voice thier opinions on whats rare and whats common,how much would you pay for a certin type and what you find diggn,
I think this would be the right forum for this subject,but if not MOD put in the rightplace if you can...
Thanks all,lookin forward to your answers!!!
W.L.

 

[littlebit56]

Hey WhiteLightning. We are in the same boat. My Mom collected bottles for years and although she had a lot of worthless ones (unlabled..unmarked...etc) she seems to have some that were only common in Indiana. I have no idea how to find out how common they even are, since no info is available on many of them. I have seen a couple of them on E.Bay and even though they could be collectable they haven't been seeling like hotcakes.[]

I would really like to post to Diggers site but it seems to take him a very long time to post an answer. I know he must get millions of inquiries and i would be a small fish in the big sea and i guess i'm just too eager to see if she wasted her time or not.

I have kind of been getting the "itch" to go out and look for dumps but then again, there's a million to one chance of finding anything of value....Said i wouldn't catch the bug, but then; i always say "never say never".

Thanks for starting this post. I'm looking forward to see what others think of this question/problem.

littlebit56

 

[ronvae]

Most of the 1800s & early 1900s bottles I find were made in this state. Sometimes I know that because I know the history of the bottling company itself. Other times, they actually list a full street address, usually within 20-30 miles of where they are found. Sometimes, they list a bottling company that no one has ever heard of, and we can't find any history on, but the bottle itself says the company was in a local city. That's really weird. When you can be standing in the city where the bottle was made, and there is not one single scrap of information on the company--as if it never existed.

Starting in about the 1920s, though, I find bottles from Illinois, Indiana, Wisconsin, even some from New York or California. I think people just couldn't get products from far away easily & cheaply, until about the 1920s--then, the economy must've gone national--maybe because of railroads? Or highways? Or just more money? [8|]

 

[GuntherHess]

Don't make the common mistake of assuming just because a bottle is rare, that it is valuable. Rarity is only one of the factors that determines value. I have seen apparently unique pharamacy bottles sell for a couple dollars. Fairly common bottles like the Lockport Merchant's bottles consistantly sell for big bucks.
Sorry if I'm stating the obvious, I do that sometimes.

 

[littlebit56]

Ronvae, that's what i'm talkin bout! I have tried everything (i can think of) to find at least one of the bottling companies that i have bottles for; and i even went to the Secretary of State's web site. No luck. I could understand one of them not being listed but all three? Maybe they only list registered businesses for a certain length of time; after that the name goes up for grabs again. Do you think that might be the case? If i still lived in Indiana i would go to the public library in Lafayette and see if they have info on any of them. But, i can't do that right now, so am just trying to get 411 online about the companies. All three of them are about 61/2 ozs. I think they quit making that size some time in the 50s-60s. But the color (green/lt green) is older than that i would think and the lip is probably applied on each.

I guess it might help to read the history of soda bottling period to find out when they stopped using those heavy bottles and started labeling the contents on them (like pepsi, coke rootbeer, etc) and made them hold more. Anyone have any ideas where an interested person might get that information? Actually, a site like that might tell more about all the companies. Perhaps i'll do a search and see what i can find. I'll share any info i get on it.

littlebit56

 

[bearswede]

Don't worry, Matt... Sometimes we all need a little reminding...


Ron

 

[GuntherHess]

My unofficial definition of a 'rare' bottle.
If you see more than one of them sell in a year its probably not rare.
If you have not seen one sell in 10 years then its probably rare.
Anyone else want to try?

 

[baltbottles]

Hey Matt,

Thats a pretty good definition of rare to me. That can be a bit misleading as some bottles rarely make it to auction. They almost always sell privately. Or the same example of a very rare bottle could change hands 2 or 3 times in a year. I've seen this happen a few times.

Chris

 

[Gunsmoke47]

Now guys, every other bottle made is rare! If you don't believe me , check out Ebay. Why just earlier tonight I had a chance to pick up a rare Civil War era, clear, smooth base , non embossed medicine for 9.99. Time ran out on me while I was using the bathroom DARN IT! But my hopes are I can pick one up tomorrow![]

 

[GuntherHess]

Gunsmoke, You would do better to save up your money to buy that grilled cheese sandwhich with the image of the virgin mary on it. Ebay has something for everyone...unfortunately.