mold variations in Doyle's/Dr. Soule's

[bearswede]

Hey folks...

Does anyone out there have a handle on the mold variations concerning the "hop motif" on Doyle's and/or Dr. Soule's Hop Bitters? I confess, I never thought much about it before; and I've had a few of these bottles pass thru my hands in the past. I just purchased a nice yellow-amber Dr. Soule's, as well as a beautiful red-amber Doyle's... I've also been eying a couple of other Doyle's on ebay, when I started to notice the variability in the hop motif... It almost appears that the variation approaches infinity...

Any thoughts?

Ron

 

[BRIAN S.]

Hi Ron,
I have had a lot of Doyle's in the past and still have a few in my collection. I believe there's 21 different Hops & Leaves variants in the Doyle's line. And there are 4 different mold variants in the Doyle line up. 1. The common D 93 // s // DOYLES // HOP // BITTERS // 1872 // sp // sp // sp // motif hop berries with leaves //
2. The Extremely rare D 94 // s // DOYLES // HOP // BITTERS (curved) // 1872 // sp // sp // sp // motif hop berries and leaves // This mold variant is often refered to as the Doyle's that was blown in a Niagara Star Bitters mold.
3. The Extremely rare D 94.5 // s // DOYLES ( backwards ) // HOP // BITTERS // BITTERS // 1872 // sp // sp // sp // motif hop berries and leaves //
4. The Extremely rare D 95 // s // DOYLES (backwards) // DOYLES (backwards) // DOYLES (backwards) // DOYLES (backwards) // sp // sp // sp // motif hop berries with leaves // .
I have included a pic of the D 94 Doyles that is refered to as blown in the Niagara Star mold. It has the word BITTERS in a arch .
I don't think the Soule's line has near as many Hop berries and leaves variations as the Doyle's.
Doyle's have been one of my favorite Semi cabin Bitters and they come in many different colorations. They make a great grouping in a rainbow of colors.
Hope this helps , Brian
// = end on one side of bottle
// sp // = sunken panel - no lettering
// s // = lettering on shoulder

 

[BRIAN S.]

Doyle's many color variants

 

[BRIAN S.]

A colored trio

 

[idigjars]

Awesome Pics! Thanks for sharing! Paul []

 

[bearswede]

Hi Brian...

Thanks for the info and those fabulous pics!!!! What a beautiful display...

To simplify for now, and since color can be such a can of worms anyway, I would like to focus on the variability of the hop motif... I tried to zoom in on your photo of the 11, but I can't really tell... Are any of them exactly alike? And do we assume that each different hop rendition, no matter how slight the difference, necessarily means a different mold? Is there evidence of using a slug plate or some other means of applying a different hop rendition without employing a completely different mold?

Ron

 

[BRIAN S.]

Ron , Thanks ! It took a long time to put that grouping together .
Good question on the mold variants ! And , I really don't have an answer. I can't see any signs of a bottle being slug plated on any of the Doyle's . But that seems like a lot of mold making for all of the different motif of hop berries and leaves without slug plating. I believe in my pic of the grouping there are only 2 pairs that are alike in the motif . I myself didn't realize that there were so many variations in the motif until I gathered the grouping. I was grouping on color variants and noticed the motif differences. I also noticed that the D 93's ( the most common of the Doyle's molds ) that there was a difference in size that seemed to mostly be in the Green variants. With the Greens being a little larger in size , in width and in height. You can see what I'm talking about in the pic . The Doyle's on the left is the D 93 and the bottle on the right is also a D 93 but in Green. It seems that all the green ones ( well at least all I have seen ) are in this little larger size.
Maybe someone on the forum has an answer to the slug plate or not ? Bill ?
Brian

 

[drjhostetters]

Brian....

Excuse my ignorance...but am I to assume a "slug plate" would be a plate they would slip in the mold to repeat a pattern or lettering or such? Hopefully there are others out there who aren't sure of that terminology either so I won't feel like a dunce for not knowing for sure....[8D]...thanks.

Keep on findin'....

The Doc...[X(]

 

[drjhostetters]

P.S. ...

..beautiful collection..espicially the green uns...

Me again...

The Doc...[X(]

 

[bearswede]

Hey, Doc...

The most common use of slug plates was around the end of the 19th/beginning of the 20th century... Bottle manufacturing for the pharmacutical industry at least had achieved a degree of uniformity... and clarity... Manganese and selenium were being used to purge the aqua from the glass resulting in a "pure" product, enabling the consumer to see exactly what he or she was getting...

As a form of advertising, these bottles were customized so that every druggist could have his own personalized bottles... Thus, the slug plate! After a run of "Doc Slick's" bottles, his plate was replaced with "Dewey, Cheatum & Howes Druggists" plate for a new run...

There may have been other reasons for slug plates, but that was the usual practice...

Ron