Who'd make a "0" mold number?

[morbious_fod]

I was farting around a small "flea market" today and found this jar with a bunch of jars on a table. I was intrigued so I picked it up for three bucks, including a glass and metal lid that I hadn't seen before that was in decent shape. The reason that this jar caught my eye was that the mold number on the bottom is a "0" which I had yet to run across. I'm not even a collector of jars really; however, who would start a mold numbering system with a 0? Anyone else ever run into these, or have an explanation for the 0 mold number. Just seems a bit odd to me.

Looks like a regular old Ball jar.

 

[morbious_fod]

This is of course the bottom.

I would have thought it was a ten that the one got filled in but that 0 is dead center of the thing.

 

[cyberdigger]

So, that's not an open pontil? []

 

[RED Matthews]

Hi morbious_fod; I am quite sure you will find that this jar is the result of being made by the early Owens glass machine operations, actually before it became Owens Illinois. There is a ring around the 0 that indicates the vacuum lift of the parison glass gather from the forehearth. .RED Matthews

 

[sandman]

I have the same jar in HG that has a zero on the bottom as well except mine is an underlined zero.

 

[sandman]

Here's a pic of mine.

 

[sandman]

Or its a a weird looking 10.

 

[morbious_fod]

ORIGINAL: cyberdigger

So, that's not an open pontil?

Yeah it's that uber rare pontiled ball jar. LOL!

ORIGINAL: RED Matthews

Hi morbious_fod; I am quite sure you will find that this jar is the result of being made by the early Owens glass machine operations, actually before it became Owens Illinois. There is a ring around the 0 that indicates the vacuum lift of the parison glass gather from the forehearth. .RED Matthews

You know I never even thought I would have been even that old. Thanks for the info.

 

[RED Matthews]

Hello again, I was out in the garage looking for a bottle with a plain "/ O " on the bottom. I knew I had one and I did. It also had a patent date embossed on the bottom.
It has a bordered embossed label that could be slug plate - but I don't think so. Anyway it is embossed around the outside with:
"/ THE DUFFY MALT WHISKEY COMPANY " around the top.
an elaborate D M W Co embossed emblem in the center
and "/ ROCHESTER N.Y. U.S.A. " around the bottom of the oval.
It has a tooled to band finish and the bottom has: "/ PAT D AUG 24 1886 ". with the D high. The O is in the center of the bottom. In the background of the O is the markings of the swinging shear that cut off the lifted gob of glass to created the bottle. This mark and the O tell me that this is an early Owens Manufacturied bottle.
Someone who was a VP of O-I wrote a book that I have that told about the early Owens machine set-ups. There was someone on the Forum that lived near the Canadian plant where Owens made and operated these early machines; I couldn't find his name, either. I did find my bottle in Carlo&Dorothy Sellari's Price Guide. It was listed on page 115 and the pattern elongated circle was referred to as a watermelon circle,. with the W M W Co. monogram and the pd'd AUG. 24-1986. They also said that a plain letter or a number could be found in the bottom center.
This old price guide compiled in 1989 showed a value of $ 3 - 6.00. Not for sale, because it repesents a stage of manfacturing history. RED Matthews

 

[madman]

http://www.todayinsci.com/O/Owens_MichaelJ/OwensMichaelJ.htm heres a link about early machine made bottle production, hey morb since yer jar dates from 1922 to 1933 i doubt that its an owens mark ive dug toc bottles in toledo oh. where the early bottles were produced with just an o and always wondered if it was an early owens mark, since your jar is later, it would have a o in a square embossed on the base, but that said, ive never seen a ball jar of that era with an owens mark on the base, just numbers, my guess is its a zero......