Square half post bottle redux

[div2roty]

me too, i'll pass on any german half post stuff though.

 

[Plumbata]

That irradiated "Four Aces" flask (#197) is a pile of recently-altered crap with a font style that is likewise not old. I have a handfull of those same flasks and they shouldn't be worth more than a buck or 2. If someone buys it I will seriously question reality. WTF. Anyone with a sandblaster or a bottle of hydrofluoric acid could make a million of those things. Bogus. Kinda makes the whole firm loose some credibility in my opinion, why would they accept junk like that?

 

[saratogadriver]

ORIGINAL: div2roty

He had one in his last sale too. I was the high bidder, thinking it was old based on his description. After I got it in the mail I found the discussion on here about it and the others like it. I called him and he took it back, and refunded my shipping both ways as well. I think for stuff like sodas and bitters, his auction is as good as the rest.

See, I find that kind of scary. He has had one before that has been questioned, yet here is another??! His description is totally silent on it's age, but he makes mention that he's looked through the books and can't find anything like it. I would think he would want to at least say there is some question of provenance on these pieces...

Now that I re-read the description, I can see that he's left it open, which, with the history of these pieces that we've talked about on here, tells me it isn't old. But if you didn't know the fact that these pieces have just started turning up in quantity seemingly out of nowhere, there is nothing in his description to suggest at all that it may not be old.

Add that to Plumbata's suggestion that the four aces flask is another product floating around in some quantity (namely altered in both color and in what is inscribed on the flask), and I'm beginning to question whether I'd want to buy anything from American Bottle Auctions. I would think, as a reputable dealer, that you'd want to police stuff like this.

Jim G

 

[RED Matthews]

Hello again. I just wanted to relate to the fact that the Half-Post method of making large body bottles with a small neck structure dates back to the Roman Empire glass houses. When Rome fell, German glass makers were sent to Rome to examine and learn bits of information about the Roman glass making techniques. This method thus went back to Germany where they developed the application. Some of these Grerman glass makers came to the South Jersey glass houses and made use of the process. Sewell Bottleman gave us a lot of lessons on this forming method and the understanding of the principles.
There has been a lot of these phoney replicas on the market - so every collector has to use careful common sense. RED Matthews