Saturday, December 3, 2016

A Few Bottles!

I have several boxes of bottles that I've put into storage, and since I'm home alone all weekend I thought I'd take them out and do some identification.



Absorbine Junior Bottle, an antiseptic.
Dug up in a town dumpsite, 1920's most likely.




Some advertisements


An original Absorbine bottle with contents


Cherry Bottle
This bottle, although unembossed, is still beautiful. I identified it in a 1930's Owens Illinois catalogue


Catalogue Pictures


Here's a picture of how it would have looked with the cherries inside!


Drene Shampoo Bottle
Dug up at a family farm dumpsite, most likely 1930's. Drene Shampoo was introduced by Proctor and Gamble in the early 30's.

Drene Shampoo ad


Lysol Bottle
Although it's a very common bottle, I always appreciate the beauty of common bottles no matter how often I dig them up. Lysol, if you didn't know, was a disinfectant, and according to some ads was actually marketed as a feminine hygiene product! 1920's-1930's.

Lysol Ads



Odorono Deodorant Swab!
I dug up this very interesting relic that belonged to a deodorant bottle. Since I don't have the bottle, it's difficult to date. It's so fascinating thinking about how someone used this many years ago!

Odorono Ads




Thursday, December 1, 2016

Glass Shard Identification-McKee Innovation Bowl

I recently dug up these shards in one of my favorite dumpsites.





I don't know much about glass besides depression glass, so I assumed that it was EAPG, but I still wanted to figure out what it belonged to. I noticed the etched flowers and the peg foot, and concluded it was a bowl, so I searched "EAPG etched flower footed bowl" or something along those lines. After a little research, I ended up finding an almost perfect match. The feet on the bowl I found are a little longer, the bowl looks deeper, and the middle of the flower is etched as well, but it still looks like the same type/design.
Below is a picture of the bowl.

It turns out this pattern is called "Innovation", and was produced by McKee from 1916-1920. The bowl has a sawtooth rim and the glass is very thick. The flowers and buttons and petals make the bowl look so beautiful!
Thanks for reading!

Wednesday, November 30, 2016

The History of Oreo's!

Oreo's are one of America's favorite cookies. Who doesn't like them? Oreo's actually have a very fascinating history, and today I will be discussing just that!

Oreo's are actually supposedly a knock off the Hydrox cookie, which looks almost like an exact copy of the Oreo. Usually, people think that the Hydrox cookie is a knockoff of the Oreo, but the Hydrox cookie actually came first. Hydrox cookies were introduced in 1908 by Sunshine Biscuit company, a company owned by Joseph Loose, Jacob Loose, and John H Wiles.
Below is a picture of the Hydrox cookie, and an advertisement.

In 1890, Adolphus Green acquired a large number of bakeries joined together to form the American Biscuit company. in 1898, the American Biscuit company merged with even more bakeries to form the National Biscuit Company, now known as Nabisco.
The Oreo was created in 1912 by the National Biscuit Company, now known as Nabisco. The factory was located on 9th Avenue between 15 and 16th streets. This road is now known as "Oreo Way". 
The first Oreo was sold on March 6, 1912 to a grocer from Hoboken, New Jersey. On March 14, 1912 a patent was applied for and was not registered until August 2, 1913. In case you were wondering, the patent number was #0093009. In 1913, the Oreo was officially named the Oreo Biscuit.
 Although they were sold indivudually for about a month, on April 2, 1912 Nabisco announced that they would be releasing a trio of biscuits. The trio included the Mother Goose Biscuit, the Veronese Biscuit, and the Oreo Biscuit. The Mother Goose and the Veronese Biscuit did not sell well, but the Oreo sold well and eventually the other two biscuits were discontinued and the Oreo Biscuit was sold indivudually. Also, in 1920, a lemon filled Oreo was briefly introduced, but did not fare well and was discontinued not long after. In 1921 the name was changed to the Oreo Sandwich. The name was also changed to Oreo Creme Sandwich at one point, but I could not find the exact year this name change took place, but it was most likely in the 1940's.

Oreo's were originally sold in yellow tins, like these, for approximately 20-30 cents a pound.

The first design of the Oreo looked like this.
In 1924, the design was changed to this.
Then, in 1952, William A Turner designed the last change to the Oreo cookie. It has been the same since.


Below are some advertisements and old Oreo packaging.

An ad for the "Mother Goose Biscuit" introduced by Nabisco in 1912 as part of the "Trio", which was discussed above. I could not find an ad for the Veronese biscuit, also part of the Trio.

More Oreo advertisements



Thanks for reading!













Monday, November 28, 2016

Depression Glass Shard Identification #2- Cobalt Blue Aurora Bowl Shard

I dug this shard up a few weeks ago. 

It belonged to either one of these cobalt depression glass bowls


I have only dug up several cobalt blue depression glass shards, so this one was special. I did some research, and figured out that this belonged to a depression glass bowl. The pattern is Aurora. Aurora was produced by Hazel Atlas. The exact date of production is unknown, and is estimated to be produced from the late 1930's through the very early 1940s. Blue is the most common color, although pieces in green, pink, and crystal also turn up occasionally, but not as often. According to Gene Florence's Depression Glass book and the Hazel Atlas website, not many pieces of Aurora were produced. Gene Florence's book lists the below to be the only available pieces.

6 1/2 inch plate
4 1/2 inch milk pitcher (often confused as a creamer)
Cup and saucer
4 3/4 inch tumbler, 10 ounces
4 1/2 deep bowl
5 1/2 deep bowl (cereal)

Here are some pictures of the above Aurora pieces





As always, thanks for reading!