Has anyone seen one of these?

[Len]

Hey Roy,

I think Online Bottles should offer 5 Gallon a contract.
Btw, my experience with the slug plates seems to be like yours. --I'd give Keuthen credit. He lasted a decade in one of the most competitive markets in the U.S.

 

[hemihampton]

He could of lasted longer then a decade. I didn't see all the Directory's so he could of been in Directory's before 1902 & after 1912. That time frame not real short compared to some others in the Bottling Business, be it Liquor or Beer or Soda.

 

[5 gallon collector]

Attaching the story to the bottle makes it so much more interesting, and a good deal of info is often available quite quickly -- thanks to the folks who have placed it online - sometimes for a fee, but much of it free.

I found William and Margaret in the 1900 census; attached. Clerk, wine store. At the address a butcher, tailor, clerks, barber, coachman.

Newspapers.com, checking just "Willam Keuthen", had just a single match -- inserted below -- New York Times, 1896, 'liquor dealer', same address as in 1900 and 1910 - 582 3rd Avenue. Not sure who was in trouble.

582 3rd Avenue housed 20 persons in 1900 and 45 people in 1910. I'd like to know what the building looked like. Perhaps there was a storefront, or several, with businesses, and apartments above. Or was it all residential, with the various places of business elsewhere? I don't know whether the fact that the address appears on the bottle means that the bottling was done there - that would be my assumption, but would running a distillery in an apartment building, if that it was, have been permitted?

I wonder what the (R.T.N.) stands for in the directory entry posted by a few frames ago, by hemihampton. Some aspect of the company? -- other entries have N.Y., dissolved, N.J., no inf., and T.N. -- perhaps where incorporated? I'm blanking on what R.T.N. might mean.

 

[5 gallon collector]

Looked at the Directory: (R.T.N.) stands for Registered Trade Name
If you google 582 Third Avenue, or google earth it, you will find that that section of Third Avenue has been mostly redeveloped, but there are still 4 of the older buildings left, with the old fire escapes -- 590 (NailOne/Dazzle), and 590+ (PapaSmoke Shop), ++(Tipsy Shanghai), +++(Caffe Venice, on the corner). I guess that 582 was just to the left of these, where the ~20 storey white-brick-front building is now, and would have been a similar 3-4-5-storey building. (Unless, over the years, the street numbering changed.) (I think that these 4 older structures would have been there in the 1910's, 20's. -- dating from the late 1800s.)

 

[john cheney]

I have a clear half pint flask that I have been trying to find any information on.
So far I haven't found anything.
I didn't expect it to be rare. Maybe someone else has one or can help me find any information on it.
Embossing reads,
1/2 PINT
FULL MEASURE
WM KEUTHEN
582 THIRD AVE
NEW YORK

Thanks, Roy

Roy, Don’t know dates on WMB Keuthen specifically but can give you some info. Bottle is a strap sided union oval flask. Product was almost certainly a whiskey. The embossed words FULL MEASURE were the registered trademark of a glass jobbing company called A.G. Smaller & Co when was first in NYC and then Boston. The started using that in 1891. I’ve never seen a New York strap sided union oval any later than 1910 so that would bracket your flask between 1891 and 1910. Because of the cross hindge mold marks on base it probably closer to 1890’s. If there are air vent marks on back shoulder of your flask (two or three small dots) it’s 1892 or after. There are hundreds of similar different flasks from NYC from same era. Top price for clear ones with just name and address about $45.00

 

[FreeRangeAsparagus]

Some really nice embossed western whiskey flasks exist, though I believe the majority of them originate from the gold rush era, which is a bit early for someone digging in western Washington logging camps. I have seen several photos of embossed flasks posted on Antique-Bottles.net, and I am curious how common or scarce, relatively speaking, the members here consider them to be in the regions they dig.

I dig a lot of plain "federal use prohibits" or "warranted flask" flasks out here in Massachusetts, but I'd say it's about 1 in 100 that the river spits out a heavily embossed flask with something interesting. I think the last one I found was last year, nothing from this year springs to mind.

 

[Roy]

Attaching the story to the bottle makes it so much more interesting, and a good deal of info is often available quite quickly -- thanks to the folks who have placed it online - sometimes for a fee, but much of it free.

I found William and Margaret in the 1900 census; attached. Clerk, wine store. At the address a butcher, tailor, clerks, barber, coachman.
View attachment 240770
Newspapers.com, checking just "Willam Keuthen", had just a single match -- inserted below -- New York Times, 1896, 'liquor dealer', same address as in 1900 and 1910 - 582 3rd Avenue. Not sure who was in trouble.
View attachment 240771

582 3rd Avenue housed 20 persons in 1900 and 45 people in 1910. I'd like to know what the building looked like. Perhaps there was a storefront, or several, with businesses, and apartments above. Or was it all residential, with the various places of business elsewhere? I don't know whether the fact that the address appears on the bottle means that the bottling was done there - that would be my assumption, but would running a distillery in an apartment building, if that it was, have been permitted?

I wonder what the (R.T.N.) stands for in the directory entry posted by a few frames ago, by hemihampton. Some aspect of the company? -- other entries have N.Y., dissolved, N.J., no inf., and T.N. -- perhaps where incorporated? I'm blanking on what R.T.N. might mean.

5 gallon collector
Again, Thank you.
Awesome detective work.....
Roy

 

[Roy]

Looked at the Directory: (R.T.N.) stands for Registered Trade Name
If you google 582 Third Avenue, or google earth it, you will find that that section of Third Avenue has been mostly redeveloped, but there are still 4 of the older buildings left, with the old fire escapes -- 590 (NailOne/Dazzle), and 590+ (PapaSmoke Shop), ++(Tipsy Shanghai), +++(Caffe Venice, on the corner). I guess that 582 was just to the left of these, where the ~20 storey white-brick-front building is now, and would have been a similar 3-4-5-storey building. (Unless, over the years, the street numbering changed.) (I think that these 4 older structures would have been there in the 1910's, 20's. -- dating from the late 1800s.)
View attachment 240776

That is fantastic, Registered Trade Name certainly makes sense to me.
Unlikely that very many pictures of the old building exist but I would guess it would look very similar to those in the picture from Google Earth.
Thank you.
Roy

 

[Roy]

Roy, Don’t know dates on WMB Keuthen specifically but can give you some info. Bottle is a strap sided union oval flask. Product was almost certainly a whiskey. The embossed words FULL MEASURE were the registered trademark of a glass jobbing company called A.G. Smaller & Co when was first in NYC and then Boston. The started using that in 1891. I’ve never seen a New York strap sided union oval any later than 1910 so that would bracket your flask between 1891 and 1910. Because of the cross hindge mold marks on base it probably closer to 1890’s. If there are air vent marks on back shoulder of your flask (two or three small dots) it’s 1892 or after. There are hundreds of similar different flasks from NYC from same era. Top price for clear ones with just name and address about $45.00

Hello John cheney ,
Thank you so much for all the information on New York flasks.
There are no vent marks that I can find anywhere on this flask. There are what could possibly be numbers in the circle on the bottom. I didn't mention them in the description of the bottle because they are not really readable. I think the first number could possibly be a 1 but I would not put any money on it.
A.G. Smaller & Co. must have been very active in those days because I've seen plenty of clear flasks with the FULL MEASURE on them. I dug this one somewhere in the neighborhood of 50 years ago and had completely forgotten it until I unwrapped it from the box it was stored in. I now know more about it than I ever thought I would and have to come up with a system to catalog all this information to preserve it.
Thank you. Roy

 

[willong]

If there are air vent marks on back shoulder of your flask (two or three small dots) it’s 1892 or after.

That's interesting. Is the air vent dating information peculiar to A.G. Smaller & Co bottles; or, is that a manufacturing technology that can be found among products from several glass houses but didn't exist prior to 1892?