Dump Discoveries - Two separate dumps, one location - one 1920s/30s, one 40s-60s

[CanadianBottles]

Got out for a very wet, muddy session this past week - needed to get out after weeks of very poor weather. Some nice finds this time too - here are some of the best!
Two Father John's Medicines (two sizes), A "Linit", "Perma Starch", and LESTOIL at the back. The one on the right is a Pierre Smirnoff with an embossed crown.
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Took a few porcelain pieces too. I think the shark/whale was a salt shaker or toy of some sort - the woman figurine was a part of a larger piece. I'm stumped on the dog - made in Japan by Alco, but other examples are planters or pencil holders - which doesn't make sense here.
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I've been searching for one of these Elm City Beverages that was whole - theACL is pretty beat, but nice to finally find one. Is the F.A. Richter & Co. a late throw away - I normally don't find cork tops in this dump. The last is a different variant of a Bayer Aspirin than one I've seen - "The Bayer Company Div" on the sides.
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I was so certain that the dog was a pipe holder, but apparently it's actually a letter holder. It used to have a metal spring fitted into that slot on the back which you could put letters in:

Vtg 5 “ Tall Black Postal Poodle Letter Pen Holder Coil JAPAN Retro Desk Office | eBay

Its features include a coil holder and it is suitable for use as a desk or office decoration. The item is listed under Collectibles, Animals, Dogs, and Poodle categories. Buy this beautiful item now and add it to your collection!

www.ebay.com

 

[Sitcoms]

I was so certain that the dog was a pipe holder, but apparently it's actually a letter holder. It used to have a metal spring fitted into that slot on the back which you could put letters in:
View attachment 254467

Vtg 5 “ Tall Black Postal Poodle Letter Pen Holder Coil JAPAN Retro Desk Office | eBay

Its features include a coil holder and it is suitable for use as a desk or office decoration. The item is listed under Collectibles, Animals, Dogs, and Poodle categories. Buy this beautiful item now and add it to your collection!

www.ebay.com

Ah! It seems they made a ton of different styles of this, with various minor applications. I'm sure I could find a replacement spring - the piece is otherwise in great conditions aside from a little rust staining in a few spots. Thanks for finding this!

 

[Sitcoms]

With the last week off I was able to visit this site a few times, though early in the week finds were minimal as I was confined to the more modern dump - the standard Vicks and Noxzema jars, national-brand sodas (Nesbitt's, KIST, Pepsi), and other strange shape/design bottles that I end up taking. Didn't take many pictures of those as there wasn't much to get excited about.

The river where the 20s-30s dump is has been running very high following a very wet winter, with a few late winter/early spring snow storms. Finally the end of this past week the levels had receded enough that I dared enter the waters (and very quickly filled my waders with water). Even after getting soaked I trudge on, and it seems it was well worth it! Here are a few of my better finds:

T. Elsmore & Son, Tunstall, England. The design is a classic Aesthetic Movement design, dating back to 1878. This is a later re-manufacture of the design, I'd guess ~1915?

Grindley Hotel Ware, Shandon, England. They used this name/stamp until January of 1933.

Hard to see this one, but it's a Greenwood Co. of Trenton, NJ dish. Maybe used for soap or something similar - it was also hotel ware.

 

[Sitcoms]

Continued:

T. Noonan & Co., Boston, Mass. Some kind of hair/barber product.

Bunch of common jars - French's, unbranded ink, Carter's ink (about 1/4 full), and a Vaseline.

this, by far, was the find of the day! After posting on a local group I was informed that this is a pretty rare bottle, and directed to a Pepsi bottle collector's page. This bottle is ranked as a rarity 4 in the collector's guide, produced between 1908 and 1910.

 

[swalker1867]

got a local river in Oakdale Ca called the Stanislaus! The bridge that crosses has been a bridge since around 1890 the River had a barge that crossed the river before that. The reason i mention this is i have never thought of bottle digging the river where the bridge crosses before! Hell of a idea, Ill ry it out next time we run low on water here in ca. Good day to you and i'm watching!

 

[willong]

Quite the assortment of old goodies you are finding in those two dumps Sitcoms!

I find the enameled Gulf sign, souvenir tea cup, T. Noonan & Co. toiletry, the amber Pepsi of course, the letter-holder dog and others quite interesting.

Others items are a nostalgia trip for me as I consumed or used the products they one contained more than a half-century ago.

The Bubble Up bottle--I'm surprised you didn't find an RC Cola bottle to go with it--reminded me that I've long sought bargains. Both Bubble Up and RC Cola soft drinks were sold in 16-ounce containers for the same price (15 cents, plus 3 cents bottle deposit) as the more popular 7 Up and Coca-Cola sodas that contained 12 ounces or less when I was a kid. I would scour several blocks of my rural neighborhood looking for deposit bottles discarded along the roadside. On a good day, I might find half-a-dozen; then, off to the little corner grocery store* that was less than a block from my parents' house to redeem the deposit value in the form of a fresh soda!

Not recognizing the shape for what it represents--guess I interpreted it as an Art Deco architectural theme--I zoomed right past the Mercury Capsule token on my first scrolling. I'm embarrassed by that because I was quite the space nerd at the time!

* That store was already operating for years when we moved into the neighborhood in 1958. What surprises me is that it is still there in the latest satellite imagery!

See the "Corner Market" above at intersection of Arrow Route (old Route 66) and Calabash Avenue. That tan roof to left of bottom of image is the house my dad bought new in 1958. Together with two acres of land, it cost him $10 K as I recall. While just north of the Kaiser Steel Plant, the area was scattered homes among many poultry farms ("Egg ranches" we called them) and vacant fields. It's all shipping and industrial/commercial firms now. I'm glad we got out of there in 1967!

 

[CanadianBottles]

Looks like you're into a great spot there! And likely older than you initially thought as well, since it looks like you've got a couple of BIM bottles. Possible they could be late throws but seems more likely the dump dates back to at least the 1910s.

 

[Sitcoms]

Looks like you're into a great spot there! And likely older than you initially thought as well, since it looks like you've got a couple of BIM bottles. Possible they could be late throws but seems more likely the dump dates back to at least the 1910s.

Seems to be se - the bridge that spanned this spot had been here since at least the 1870s or 1880s, so very possible that older layers are washing out - next to this bottle was an aqua blob top soda - sadly with a hole punched out of the back and a slick (with just the "this bottle not to be resold" wording).. We've had some serious rain and lots of high water levels over the last 6 months, and it's changed the bathymetry of a lot of the rivers here. Hopefully more items of this age bracket to come!

 

[Sitcoms]

Well, I've definitely started getting to a deeper layer than I previously thought at this dump! Had a great conversation with the landowner prior to my dig about what I had been finding since I last spoke to him, and then went out and had a pretty great dig at the spot! This dig included two firsts for me - my first poison bottle and my first local med! I don't have any pictures of the bottles cleaned up yet (they'll require a run through CLR - the dump is very iron heavy), but they've all been washed of the mud and grime.

This was my final pile of keepers. Most of the top and right side are slicks, but I find other uses or resell them usually.

One of two Maine sodas on the day -this one has a rubber stopper inside of it. Mineral Spring Soda Co., Waterville, ME. From what I can find they were around into at least the late 40s and early 50s.

The other Maine soda- Forest City Bottling Co. (F.C.B.C), Portland, ME. They incorporated in 1915 with a capital of $5,000, headed by president Samuel N. Wolf, clerk H.C. Sullivan, Treasurer Frank Wolman, and directors S.N. Wolf, Frank Wolman, and Arthur Davidson (per American Carbonator and American Bottler, Vol. 35).

Keeping with the soda theme - love me a good art deco bottle!

This is the second full whiskey bottle that I've pulled from this dump, the other being a H.W. Huguley whiskey. I have no idea if this is the original contents, something that was later rebottled into it, or something else. There is absolutely no embossing on this bottle - no makers mark or mold numbers of any kind.

I was stumped by this one when I found it - I believe it's glass, and almost looks like the same glass as a marble. Others I've talked to believe these were a cosmetics bottle (shampoo, soap, etc.), and once again there are 0 makers marks or mold numbers on this bottle.

 

[Sitcoms]

Unfortunately neither one of these very similar bottles made it out whole. I didn't realize it when I dug it, but the "Direct Importing Co." bottle has a corner busted out that had since been filled in with a rust/mud combination, and wasn't found until I started poking around the insides with my brushes to try and clean it. The "Direct Coffee Co." bottle unfortunately cracked after cleaning, I'm assuming due to temperature changes.

I know this is sort of the standard local druggist bottle, but this is the first ever truly local med I've ever found (I've found some Mrs. Dinsmore's Cough Elixir of Auburn, Me before, but that was sold across a wider area). From my limited research he was in business as early as the late 1880s.

To make an already great dig better, this guy was hiding in plain sight! I first noticed this bottle in my tailings pile, and did not see the embossing - I thought it was just a slick mini amber med (of which I've found several in this dump), but put it in my "keepers" pile. While I was packing up for the day I turned the bottle over and saw the skull and crossbones - and believe me that I let out an audible gasp. This is the first poison I've ever dug, and a skull and crossbones to boot!

Now that we've got all the excitement out, here's a few more mundane things - a Larkin Co. of Buffalo NY jar - this was a huge company that specialized in soaps, but sold other similar products and eventually branched into pottery and breads.

A couple more pieces of hotel ware - this layer was packed with broken dishes, bowls, shot glasses, drinking glasses, etc. I assume a hotel or bar nearby dumped their trash at this spot - I believe these are butter slices/pat holders, but may be something else.

There's always a bit of excitment when something gold jumps out of the dark brown mud - this time a pretty ornate local by the Eagle Lock Co. of Terryville, CT. I've found a few of their locks before, but this one is more ornate than others I have. Hoping this one cleans up well!

The last one I took an individual photograph of was this great glass dome. I'm not sure if this was some sort of cloche, bowl top, or something else. Looks even better cleaned up, let me tell you!

In addition to these I took a good helping of art deco styled jars, slick perfumes/meds, and any mini bottles. A few really common embossed ones came from this group too - mainly a Cheseborough MFG Co jar (Vaseline), two sizes of Rawleigh's, a Sauer's Extracts, and another Ball Ideal mason jar. Hoping to get some further permissions on this property in the future!