Is this a pontil bottle age range?

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gdog68

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Curious if this is a pontil bottle. It is really warped in places.
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willong

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Your bottle was blown in a Post-bottom mold--that indentation on its base was formed by the post portion of the mold. It does not appear to have been pontil mounted during production, though it could be quite early. Some members here are adept researchers of product producers such as "Dr Kennedy" and might well narrow-down the production date for you.

Here's a quote from the SHA website concerning the type: "Post molds were used to produce just about any type of bottles, with the majority of use of these molds made between the 1850s and the early 1890s. However, similar to so many other aspects of historic bottle dating, there are exceptions or variations based on the type or style of bottle and even bottle size."

The lip finished appears to be merely tooled, rather than applied and tooled, from what I can discern in the photos, which leads me to quote another reference from the SHA (Society for Historical Archeology) website: "1. Small (generally 7-8" or less in height) druggist bottles of most shapes (square, round, rectangular, oval) were cup-bottom molded beginning by at least by the early 1860s and by the mid 1870s onwards were virtually exclusively cup-bottom molded. Post-bottom molded druggist bottles are very unusual, typically round, and usually date prior to the mid-1870s. (Interestingly, druggist/drugstore type bottles also have tooled finishes earlier than most other types of bottles.) Some of the earliest non-pontil scarred druggist bottles (1860s and early 1870s) appear to have been blown in molds with flat or no base plates (i.e., the two mold halves simply sat on the floor of the glass works) and have very flat bases with no indenting and sharp, almost non-existent heels (Kendrick 1968). ( These type molds are also considered cup-bottom molds.) These same general observations also hold for smaller patent/proprietary medicine bottles, smaller extract bottles, most smaller ink bottles (excluding bulk or master ink bottles), smaller cologne/perfumes, and small food bottles."

EDIT: I increased font size and changed color from the original in order to draw your attention to the most pertinent passage of the quotation above.

You can explore the information further at:
 
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moodorf

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the couple ads I've found have it at 1880's...not sure if that's right....
 
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