toddrandolph
Well-Known Member
I found a couple decent bottles last year. My job as a wetlands biologist gets me out in the woods on nearly a daily basis. Not many bottles as it seems nearly all the dumps have been dug. This particular day found me at a circa 1840s, 1.5 story Greek Revival farm house, typical in style of the Western Reserve part of Ohio. The 125 acre size and the fact that it mostly followed the OL (original lot as surveyed by the Connecticutt Land Co) lines told me that this was likely the entire original farm land. Of course, bottles were in the back of my mind as I made my way into the woods to begin mapping out the wetlands, which were quite extensive. I had made my way about half way through the property without a trace of glass or bottles, but some spectacular wetlands and old growth woods when I spotted the remains of an early sugaring site.
Now I know this forum has a nearly world wide audience so for those outside the northeast US a sugarhouse is the shed where maple syrup is made, sugaring was an important industry in the early days in Ohio and provided a source of farm income when there wasn't much else going on in February and March. It was also just about the only source of sugar for the early settlers. The sap from the sugar maple tree is boiled down to either syrup or sugar. The sugarhouse could be anywhere but was usually on a slight hillside next to a small stream to allow for the sap, which was collected from buckets hung on the trees and collected by horse and sled, to be gravity fed into holding tanks and the stream allowing sticky equipment to be cleaned up at the end of the season. The season is short, lasting from early spring till the trees begin to bud out. Some places had a well built sugarhouse that would last for a 100 years or more while others used tempoary sites.
So what does all this have to do with bottles? Well, there are often a few bottles to be found around sugarhouse sites, and sometimes the main dump would be located there. The buildings are usually long gone and the only trace is blackened dirt, a few bricks, and sometimes some metal sap buckets or evaporator parts from later sites...the early ones used iron kettles and wood sap collecting buckets so there's often not much left at those. I poked around this site for a few minutes, finding nothing but a few crock pieces and then noticed an amber bottle base sticking out of the leaf litter down the hillside. Looks like a Hostetters, probably broken. Nope, it's whole and a nice Saint Jacob's Bitters, the only bitters other than Hostetters and Atwoods I have ever found. Not super rare, but a great bottle for me. Also nothing is more interesting than to find a bottle in its original context, I can imagine the "bitters" feeling real good on a cold 1880s March night boiling sap.
Now I know this forum has a nearly world wide audience so for those outside the northeast US a sugarhouse is the shed where maple syrup is made, sugaring was an important industry in the early days in Ohio and provided a source of farm income when there wasn't much else going on in February and March. It was also just about the only source of sugar for the early settlers. The sap from the sugar maple tree is boiled down to either syrup or sugar. The sugarhouse could be anywhere but was usually on a slight hillside next to a small stream to allow for the sap, which was collected from buckets hung on the trees and collected by horse and sled, to be gravity fed into holding tanks and the stream allowing sticky equipment to be cleaned up at the end of the season. The season is short, lasting from early spring till the trees begin to bud out. Some places had a well built sugarhouse that would last for a 100 years or more while others used tempoary sites.
So what does all this have to do with bottles? Well, there are often a few bottles to be found around sugarhouse sites, and sometimes the main dump would be located there. The buildings are usually long gone and the only trace is blackened dirt, a few bricks, and sometimes some metal sap buckets or evaporator parts from later sites...the early ones used iron kettles and wood sap collecting buckets so there's often not much left at those. I poked around this site for a few minutes, finding nothing but a few crock pieces and then noticed an amber bottle base sticking out of the leaf litter down the hillside. Looks like a Hostetters, probably broken. Nope, it's whole and a nice Saint Jacob's Bitters, the only bitters other than Hostetters and Atwoods I have ever found. Not super rare, but a great bottle for me. Also nothing is more interesting than to find a bottle in its original context, I can imagine the "bitters" feeling real good on a cold 1880s March night boiling sap.
]. ~Jim
