New member with SCA q's and lots of photos.

[EfEmDee]

Hey folks!

New to the board, and to fruit jar collecting. Thanks in advance for any advice/help!

A few weeks ago, a neighbor was nice enough to sell my wife and I about two dozen milk crates full of jars for some upcoming canning adventures (we just moved into a house with a small orchard and berry batches, and he has quite literally hundreds of crates of jars). She did some quick ebay searching, and said "Wow honey, some of these jars are pretty old.. I wonder if there are collectors for them?" What followed was yours truly immersing himself into the wonderful world of fruit jar collecting. []

I know I need to get a redbook, and I'm currently awaiting my login over at the Ball Jar CCC. In the mean time, I've got some stuff to share, and a few questions. First, the jars that caught our eye right off the bat:

Left to right:
1/2 Gallon Offset Perfect Mason in Ball Blue(~1914)
Quart Offset Perfect Mason in Ball Blue (~1914)
Pint Mason (shoulder seal) just a bit more aqua/green than the PM's next to it (~ 1910)

I believe I have the descriptions/dates right, but PLEASE correct me if I get them wrong.

Next, a group of what should be mostly clear glass:

Left to right:
Ball Perfect Mason Pint: Round, Sure-Grip lines, Undropped A, Underlined. This should date from between 1933-42
Drey Perfect Mason Quart: circa 1925?
Ball Perfect Mason Quart: Round, Sure-Grip, Undropped A, Non-underlined. circa 1933
Ball Perfect Mason Quart: Round, Sure-Grip, Undropped A, Underlined. circa 1933-42
AnchorHocking Bicentennial Quart (for color comparison)

Here they are in reverse:

Here's the pint in direct comparison to modern (1976) clear glass:

Here's that some pint in the middle of the group, flanked by the underlined quart (post '33) on the left, and the non-underlined quart (~ '33) on the right. Drey quart is far right, AH Bicentennial on the left:

Closer view of the three Perfect Mason jars:

Now here they are in order of color, darkest pink to a very light blue to clear (keep scrolling before calling me names []):

The pint appears in the photo above to be lighter than the Drey, but I can only say that it must be because of the thickness of the Drey's glass.

Here are the same two before I cleaned them:

So here's my question:

How in the heck can I have glass that is SCA/Pink from later than 1933? [&:]

The pink tones in the Drey, the pint PM, and one of the quart PM's are absolutely unmistakable, however all but the Drey date from well after 1923, and theoretically from at least 1933, judging by the Sure-Grip ribs. I'm pretty sure I read that Manganese is what causes SCA to appear, but that it shouldn't show in glass made after about 1915 or so. I'm not crazy, am I?

Again, thanks in advance for the answers!

-Kris

 

[GuntherHess]

I'm not a jar expert so all I can say is all those jars appear to be machine made and made after 1900. Its generally accepted that manganese use mostly stopped during WWI but there was no official cut off date. Also recylcled/remelted glass could have been used, other impurities like selenium, who knows it wasnt a perfect science.

 

[EfEmDee]

ORIGINAL: GuntherHess
...Its generally accepted that manganese use mostly stopped during WWI but there was no official cut off date. Also recylcled/remelted glass could have been used, other impurities like selenium, who knows it wasnt a perfect science.

Thanks, Gunther. If I've done my homework, Selenium should color the glass more yellow/green than pink. The little Pint Perfect Mason has quite a pink (or is it "puce"?) hue to it.

Since the photos above didn't quite show what I wanted, here are a few more, with a similarly-dated Pint Perfect Mason (both Miller machine-made, with conentric circles and the "centipede" running through the ejection mark):

 

[capsoda]

Most of the jars you have there are worth a buck at best and some as high as 4 or 5 bucks. I would can with them. You can also go to flea markets and find tons of old canning tools and gizmos. It makes canning fun.

 

[GuntherHess]

Ya I think selenium can make them sort of a gray or yellowish tint.
How exactly were you dating the jars?

 

[EfEmDee]

ORIGINAL: capsoda
Most of the jars you have there are worth a buck at best and some as high as 4 or 5 bucks. I would can with them. You can also go to flea markets and find tons of old canning tools and gizmos. It makes canning fun.

I wasn't planning on making any money with these, given that most seem to be pretty common (including the Ball Blue Offset PMs). I think I've been bit by the "collecting" bug, however.

Considering I paid $1 per crate for these (along with the mundane 70's-vintage canning supplies), I suppose I'll make out no matter what I do. []

ORIGINAL: GuntherHess
How exactly were you dating the jars?

I put together my own little chart based on the dates found here:
http://home.earthlink.net/~raclay/DatingBalljars.HTML

For instance: The oddball-colored jar should date from somewhere between 1933 and 1942 based on

1) Ball logo. An undropped "a", and an underline was used from 1933-1960.
2) Brockway Sure-Grip lines. Ball jars don't have them until 1933.
3) Volume measurements (or lack thereof). Ball didn't start using them until 1956.
4) Shape. This jar is round, rather than the "rounded square" used after 1942.

So from the four clues above, the jar dates from sometime after 1933, but before 1942. I have no clue what the redbook # is. The color, however, is the big head scratcher.

Based on the descriptions and photos I've seen online of "Sun Colored Amethyst", the color of this jar definately fits. I guess my problem/question/whatever relates to the fact that SCA is caused by the presence of Manganese, and there shouldn't be much (or any) past WWI. The really weird thing is I have several jars that date to the same time period in both pint and quart sizes, and all but two exhibit some degree of light SCA coloring (the others are just much more subtle).

I highly doubt that any of these have been irradiated, and at $0.05 per jar average, I don't think my neighbor is looking to fleece me as a noob collector. []

 

[RICKJJ59W]

SickRick says..............................WOW and thats all he says[8D]

 

[RICKJJ59W]

Me like puce[8D]

 

[capsoda]

A buck a crate was a steal. I bought my mom a plastic garbage can full like that a few years back. Sometime the great deals fall on you and other times you can't get a break. you got a great deal.

I have a Kerr Big Mouth in my fruit jar collection that has a gold hue to it. i figured it was probably selenium. That the kind of thing that makes a common jar collectable to me. I have many one to five dollar jars in my collection and several of the ones you are showing.

 

[GuntherHess]

I have a few up above the basement stairs that have probably been there since the 30s.
Looks like cherries or somethin in them. i'm a bit scared to fool with them...leave sleeping dogs lie...[]