Nathan Arbeiterman/Brooklyn Seltzer Bottle

[Knucksie1]

Hi~
Found this item and have some questions.....while I normally don't collect bottles, this just caught my eye for some reason and the information about this bottle is pretty scant, save for one that sold back in 2013.
So....this is what I know (and I am attaching images as well).....The name acid etched on this blue seltzer bottle is Nathan Arbeiterman/ Brooklyn. The bottle is about 12" tall. My best guess is that this bottle may be handblown. I do not see any evidence of any sort of seams. There also appear to be some bubbles in the bottom. It is also a flipping heavy bottle, weighing in at 3 1/4 lbs!
I believe I have found Nathan in the census records and between 1910 and 1920, he does seem to be in some sort of bottle business, although he is spelling him name as Arbeitman. He was born abt. 1880 and came to the US abt 1896.
Any light that can be shed as to how old this bottle might be and what is a bottle like this valued at? Could/would Nathan have his name etched on an older bottle? Thanks for the help!

John

 

[Dogo]

A few things to think about.
The glass is extremely heavy because the seltzer is filled under high pressure.
The bottles were designed to be returned and refilled until they broke.
Acid etched labels were apparently the cheapest to produce, they are most common.
A label with a zip code says the bottle was in use until fairly recently. I believe there are a few places left that still refill them.
The type of metal top on yours has been in use for a very long time, but new seltzers use a different style, so you have an old bottle.
Seltzers come in many styles and colors, and can make a great collection.

 

[Knucksie1]

hi~ Thanks for the info. I did not think about the pressure being a reason that the bottle was heavy...always good to learn something new. If you had to guess, how old do you think this bottle is? I know that's hard to do based on just photos. Thanks!

 

[CanadianBottles]

That's a nice seltzer! Based on the ones we get here, the etched label looks like the types that were in use around 1890-1930, so that's the right timeframe for your bottler. The fact that it has a zip code is interesting, I suspect that your bottle was in use for many decades, maybe 50 years or more. The bottles are so thick that they very rarely break, so as long as seltzer was still in demand they remained in use. Often the bottles would outlive the company, ending up used by other bottlers who put their own top and paper label on them instead. Here in Canada seltzer seems to have mostly disappeared by the 50s or so, but it never fully died in NYC. There's even one seltzer business that's still going, and their bottles are 90 years old and still in continuous use.

Out of Fizz, Brooklyn’s Senior Seltzer Man Passes the Torch

After nearly 60 years on the job, Eli Miller, 84, Brooklyn’s oldest seltzer man, has handed over his route to a young Brooklyn upstart.

web.archive.org

 

[Knucksie1]

hi~
Thanks for the reply and the link! I also think that this bottle was used for a long time as well. As I mentioned, I have little knowledge about bottles...just enough to be dangerous (lol).....I had always heard that bottles w/o seams were made before 1892 and that's what I am trying to determine about this seltzer bottle....Thanks again!!!

John

 

[CanadianBottles]

hi~
Thanks for the reply and the link! I also think that this bottle was used for a long time as well. As I mentioned, I have little knowledge about bottles...just enough to be dangerous (lol).....I had always heard that bottles w/o seams were made before 1892 and that's what I am trying to determine about this seltzer bottle....Thanks again!!!

John

Yeah that 1892 part isn't exactly true (I have no idea where that year came from - I assume someone just made it up). Bottles had seams far further back than that, at least to the early 19th century if not earlier. Bottles without seams were also made commercially well into the 20th century outside of North America. Specialty bottles like seltzers continued to be made by hand longer than mass-produced bottles as well, and of course decorative glass still is made by hand. When US glass factories stopped producing hand-made seltzer bottles they could still be ordered from European glassmakers.
In general if you hear someone say that a type of bottle has to date from before a specific year it's not true, unless they're talking about a specific company where they immediately switched production to a new design all at once or went out of business. Some inventions obviously meant that a bottle has to date from after a specific year, such as 1903 for a bottle made on an Owens machine or 1892 for a crown top bottle, but a new invention didn't suddenly replace all the older manufacturing methods. It's not like when January 1, 1903 rolled around every glass factory said "Alright everyone, it's 1903, time to completely stop making bottles the way we always have and learn to use these new machines!" In reality there's generally around a 20-year period where old designs are gradually phased out and new designs phased in, and that's just for North America. In some other places the change-over took much longer.

 

[Knucksie1]

Appreciate the feedback and insight!

 

[Dogo]

Kanuksie1 said it just right. There are books on glassworks that will claim to know exactly when certain marks were in use, and they would be the closest for dating the bottle, but I sure no company threw out all their old molds at the same time. Those molds were expensive to make and they would keep those for repeat customers.

 

[epackage]

1910-20's seltzer, earlier seltzers would have had a footed base...