Summer Finds #9 2016

I finally made the deal with a club member and bought his Rocky Point Oysters Finest Quality milk bottle-shaped oyster jar. They were direct competitors to the American Oyster Company, but their bottles are very hard to find, to the point they have never been documented until recently!

I was finally able to visit the home of a Massachusetts bottle digger/collector and pick up two of the elusive RI fruit jars. The lids are embossed Pat. August 8^th, 1882. This is the Perry jar patent. One was a quart and the other roughly a pint. I thought I already had the smaller size, but it was an inch shorter than my other example!

A classic RI soda is the Standard Bottling Co. Pawtucket, RI with an embossed flag on the front. I have never seen one that is ABM until now!

Along with the Standard was a The Edw. Smith Co. Bottlers Pawtucket, RI crown top unlisted variant.

I have gotten somewhat tired of seeing Dr. Seth Arnold's Cough Killer bottles all over the place, but one in citron certainly changed my mind! This is the second colored Arnolds I have come across.

Summer Finds #8 2016

Seeing a completely unlisted RI bottle on ebay never fails to get me excited. This time it was a LeValley & Vanasse Pharmacists Arctic Centre, RI. I have never heard of this company, and apparently they were only in business for about 2 years.

I finally found a nice undug dump in northwestern RI! A “big” heartbreaker was a quart whiskey embossed American Grocery & Tea Co. Pawtucket, RI. This company has a listed crown top soda/liquor bottle, but not a whiskey! Sadly this fella has a hole in it, but I might never see another one.

I got my third base embossed G.L.C. & Co. (Geo. L. Claflin) from the same dump. This one is a “true oval” shape.

The shop I visited in my last post also had a beautiful Miller's Pharmacy Pascoag, RI. I had just acquired one of these last month, and surprise! This is an unlisted smaller 4-1/4” size. Awesome.

A collector from Cape Cod came across a very scarce blob embossed T.M. Morris Bristol, RI. I actually consider these to be fairly common with crown tops, but this is only the second blob I have seen from Mr. Morris, and they were both different.

 

Summer Finds #7 2016

I spotted a quart Bare Rock Spring Graniteville, RI soda in green in a shop a while back, but at $20 there was no way I was going near it. A few months and a few bottles bought from said shop later, I offered him $10, and he accepted. While not an old bottle, they are apparently hard to find, I have only seen one other and it was clear.

(picture coming)

That same shop had a nice L.E. Edwards Pharmacist & Chemist Pascoag, RI. While I thought I had that bottle, this one was 5”, while my listed one was 5-1/2”.

Another nice small town medicine was an Edwards Drugs Pascoag, RI. It was my second size, and at 4-1/2” was unlisted.

I recently moved, and had the chance to look through most of my collection. I found a box of what I deemed “boring” base embossed sodas that I had apparently neglected to catalog. Among them were two Red Fox Ginger Ale Co. Prov. RI quart sodas. They were clear and green.

The other variant was heel and base embossed Red Fox Ginger Ale Co. Providence, RI. Like the last duo, these also came in clear and green. 

Summer Finds #6 2016

Continuing with the lot of free bottles, next up is a nice Bare Rock Spring Soda Co. Centredale, RI crown top. This aqua one has a C on the base, and is 8oz. as opposed to the listed one that is 7-1/2oz.

Two is better than one! This clear example Bare Rock Spring Soda Co. Centredale, RI crown top is identical to the example above, only differing in color and having a slugplate.

I was going through some of my old sodas looking for extras to sell, when I made a surprise discovery! One of my Havens Bottling Works Westerly, RI was unlisted! I have seen so many of them that I almost write them off now. This example has no slugplate.

A small antique shop was toting an unlisted slug plates McManus & Meade Western Hotel Nasonville, RI soda, but it was not cheap. I was able to get a small discount, but if I only knew! A mere two weeks later, a friend of mine dug one and I traded him for it.

It is becoming a rather rare occasion for me to make the journey to northeastern Connecticuit's antique shops, but this time it paid off! I got a rare B.E. Dewey Apothecary Pascoag, RI in a smaller size than my other example! Two sizes of a completely unlisted small town med? Not an easy feat!

Summer Finds #5 2016

A rare blob showed up on ebay recently. It was a Chr. Kiess & Co. Dorrance St. Providence, RI. It wasn't cheap, but when I saw it was unlisted I had to bite the bullet!

Another rather funny but also exciting find showed up on ebay as well. A half pint The Cal Wine Co. T.S. Mitchell Providence, RI whiskey. It's a great looking whiskey with a nice slugplate packed with embossing. Of course it is only listed in a pint size, and now I have the unlisted quart and half pint!

A fellow collector recently got to explore the bottle-packed basement of a former RI digger. Among the hundreds of bottles, he was able to find a few scarce RI pieces. That included two Slocum's Drug Store Auburn, RI medicines. These are great looking bottles, and quite rare. At 5-1/4” and 4-1/4”, they are both unlisted sizes!

I saw a Craiglist ad for two boxes of bottles that appeared to contain some RI stuff. When I got there, there were a bunch of your typical RI blobs, but the crown tops really stole the show! I was quick to agree on his original $60 asking price, only to have him tell me “just take them!” After a few attempts to give him some money, it was clear that he was set on giving me the bottles. I thanked him profusely and went home to clean the prizes. The first unlisted one was a crown top J.P. Bottling Co. Providence, RI. It is listed as a quart, but this was a small size.

My favorite from the lot was a stunning Yacht Club Bott. Wks. Centredale, RI crown top. What makes me like it so much is the icey blue aqua color, and the fact that it is the oldest embossed Yacht Club bottle I have come across.

Summer Finds #4 2016

I apparently missed two seltzer bottles I added a while back. One was a rather handsome Colombia Bottling Works Providence, RI with an eagle on front, and the other a Caswell Massey & Co. New York & Newport.

A large Otis Clapp & Son with Millville embossed on the base surfaced on ebay recently. At 8”, it is one of the larger Clapp bottles, which are harder to come by.

A club member dug a nice Edward Mee & Son Woonsocket, RI crown top this summer. While there are close to a dozen Mee variants, I don't see them that often, and go figure this one was unlisted!

Another surprise find was a large (10”) Phosa bottle. Normally there are 8-1/2”, so that makes 4 variants!

A local antique dealer had a scarce Walter Price & Co. Pure Drugs Westerly, RI medicine. I bought it thinking it would be an upgrade to my cracked one, but surprise! It was a different and unlisted smaller size.

Summer Finds #3 2016

A few months ago, I had a few friends of mine go diving for bottles in RI. While they found a ton of bottles, most of them were newer (1940s-60s). They did find a nice Blanding Pharmacist medicine, which was unlisted without Providence embossed.

A trip to an antique store up in Uxbridge, Mass. produced a nice The Ewd. Smith Co. Pawtucket pint whiskey. It is the second size I have with Edw. misspelled.

A fellow collector recently asked me if I had a rectangular Dr. J. Miller's Balsam Prov. RI. Well, I did not, but now I do! It's the earliest Millers bottle from RI, and a great find.

My summer visit to Brimfield produced a bunch of bottles, but not many from RI. A H.H. Burrington North Main St. Providence, RI medicine stole the show. Dr. Burrington was known for his Cough & Croup Syrup, but I have never seen a pharmacy bottle from him! It's a great early example, and for $3 who could pass it up?

A Massachusetts digger had a couple RI bottles he found over the years, among them was a Jones & Davis Central Falls medicine. It was an unlisted square version.

Summer Finds #2 2016

A member of the Bottle Collectors group on Facebook contacted me saying he had a Wm. Russell Jr. Providence, RI medicine. I must say I was really impressed with this bottle! It is extremely ornate for a pharmacy bottle, which is always a plus.

A friend of mine was gifted a few bottles dug back in the 1970s, among them was a Puritan Bottling Co. Providence, RI crown top. It had 8oz. embossed in the slugplate, making it unlisted!

He also had a very fascinting bottle that I found to be very exciting. It was a plain jar with a glass lid embossed: Hawes, Bro. & Seabury Dentists Providence, RI. It doesn't look too old, but it dates from 1854-1862! Now that's a special piece.

A dig last spring produced a nice W.H. Boardman Pharmacist Lonsdale, RI medicine in an unlisted 7” size. The more sizes the merrier!

On that same dig I made a very exciting discovery. The Female Health Regulators bottles from Manville are uncommon but out there. When I dug one embossed: Female Regulator Dr. J. Lariviere Prop. Manville, RI I knew I had something special! It is the earliest documented version, and definitely unlisted!

Summer Finds #1 2016

I've been eyeing two nice Sunlight Bleach Phillipsdale, RI a friend of mine has had for some time. He finally cut me a deal, so I now have olive green, and lime green examples, which are the two rarest colors.

Like a garden you've weeded a hundred times, more will just keep popping up. Such is the case with my 16^th George A. Peckham Grocers Supplies Providence, RI.

A somewhat harder to find blob is a J.O. Gignac Central Falls, RI. I have a couple, but this is the first unlisted version, and sports an oval slugplate.

My friend who found the Eagle bottle at a yard sale also found a very nice Ernst Voigt Bottler Newport, RI blob. It's the only Voigt blob embossed Bottler.

From the distant land of Canada I found a very intriging blob, Blue Rose Bottling Co. A. Cambio Atwells Ave. Providence, RI. Curiously enough, the Blue Rose Bottling Co. was never listed on Atwells Ave!