Pls help Grover Cleveland & Adlai Stevenson flask

[HiltonVillageLad]

Hi....I'm new to the site. Been collecting / digging for 50 years and recently recognized this bottle as an early screw cap label under glass. I think I have identified the image under glass as Grover Cleveland & mate Adlai Stevenson.

Grover Cleveland was president and lost reelection but won again 4 years later for a second term. This would have been promoting his final bid for office.....I think.

Flask is 6.5 inches with original cap and cork liner.

Will appreciate your comments / observations

 

[HiltonVillageLad]

Here is another photo

 

[Sitcoms]

I think you're right about it being Grover Cleveland & Adlai Stevenson, but I've got no clue on this one. If that truly is part of the original label it's very crude - looks like it may have been hand-cut, which even in the 1890s seems a bit archaic for a company producing these for profit.

Cleveland was a big drinker - there are stories of him drinking a gallon of beer a night, and the last piece of legislation he signed was the Bottled-In-Bond Act, which standardized what could bonded or blended whiskey. He certainly used whiskey as a campaigning tool; I can find examples of a whiskey bottle shaped in his bust supposedly from his first presidential election bid in 1884 (https://www.worthpoint.com/worthopedia/campaign-souvenir-1884-president-1922644634).

Since this is a screw top bottle it has to be post-1889, which is when the first screw cap was patented in the U.S. (and, funnily enough, used for whiskey), so I think your assumption is probably right; this was likely a promotional item for Cleveland & Stevenson's second election bid in 1892.

 

[102viadeluna]

Grover and Adlai!

For President, Grover Cleveland, for Vice-President, Adlai E. Stevenson

1 print (poster) : lithograph ; 74 x 103 cm. | Political poster shows bust portraits of candidates in laurel wreaths with campaign slogans, including "Tariff reform."

www.loc.gov

 

[HiltonVillageLad]

Hi and thanks for your time to reply.

Yes, it appears to have been clipped with scissors.

I have seen another label under glass that had the liquor merchant's name and address tagged in bottom corner.

Does anyone know if merchant's bought in bulk and packed into bottles from drums? If so, they should have been able to procure the label under glass package and insert whatever they chose, in this case Grover and Adlai image.

I know during the same period, the state of South Carolina (Dispensary) bottled all liquor for sale in the state.

Now that I think about it, it seems more economical that a merchant would buy bulk drums and repack into his bottles.

In fact, it seems highly feasible....I can't imagine a nineteenth century distillery would be procuring dozens of different embossed bottles, packing and shipping across country.

Thanks again