Patent Medicine from Lake City Florida?

[oldscion]

Hello everyone,

First of all let me express my thanks to the folks who run this site and all who post here for your invaluable knowledge. I grew up on a North Florida homestead that
has been in one family since the 1850s, the local dump site, the general store, and the road to town ran through it and I have found many mysterious(to me) bottles through the years. This one I found next to where I suspect was a general store, as I found shattered glass that looked like perfume container with the words "Paris France" on it and many other things. This bottle showed up after a hard rain storm last year in that area. All I could see was a bottle lip exposed and I had to dig it out and when it emerged I was amazed. It had the name of the biggest town in our county on it, and I figured it was a pharmacist concoction. Are these bottles fairly common? Should I dig more of this area? I plan on cataloging and storing everything I find around here, as I'm the only one able to do this and I want to leave some record for any family that comes after me.

Sincerely,
Old Scion

 

[CanadianBottles]

Welcome to the forum, and nice find! That's probably a pretty good one, druggist bottles (I wouldn't call it a patent medicine, chances are it held something of actual medicinal value) are typically quite sought after by local collectors and can often be very rare. I think Florida bottles in general tend to be quite sought after as well, any region where the population greatly increased in the 20th century will usually have quite collectible bottles. Hopefully someone more familiar with Florida bottles will come along and be able to tell you more about this specific one.

As for digging more in the area, I think that's a pretty good sign that you've got a worthwhile turn of the 20th century dump there which is definitely worth digging out. There's a good chance that there's plenty more in there.

 

[Hogtown Hunter]

Hey Neighbor,
I'm just south of you near Gainesville. Very cool piece of history you found. I tried to Google search your bottle and can't find any other bottles or any info on the drugstore either. Must be pretty rare. I'm sure the Lake City Historical Society would have some background on the store or George Price if you're interested in it. Have you tried probing around to see if there's more. Like above post said you probably have a very early 1900s dump. Good luck.

 

[Hogtown Hunter]

By the way. I collect Palatka, Fl bottles. If you run across a City Drug Store medicine bottle like picture I'll buy it from you. My dad worked there in the 70s. Would love to add to collection.

 

[oldscion]

10-4 Hogtown, thanks for the info! It's really cool to see other pieces around here so similar. I've been out probing today, found some glass and marked off another area.