# Sarsaparillas and bitters



## abcreview

I know sarsaparillas and bitters are a popular field in collecting in the US, they are popular in Australia too, although limited in number here.  Many of ours are quite rare too.
 I will share some of ours with you over time as they may be of interest to you guys?
 Firstly, here is a Dr Livingstones Sarsaparilla, a very rare bottle from Melbourne.


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## abcreview

Another sarsaparilla here, a blue Dr Gordons homoepathic sarsaparilla, which may be from NSW in Australia, although little is known about this one.


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## abcreview

Here is one I know little about, an amber, rectangular shape Dr Johnson's Sarsaparilla.  Does anyone know this one?  It may be American?


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## abcreview

A dark green Dr Buchans Sarsaparilla from Felton Grimwade and Co of Melbourne.






 An aqua version of the same company.










 A Dr Grahams Sarsaparilla from F & J Hemmons of Melbourne.


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## abcreview

A super rare Dr Fosters Blood Tonic from Adelaide, this is a half size cabin shaped bottle.






 A nice blue coloured Sir Astley Coopers United States Sarsaparilla from London.  Not Australian or American, but still a nice piece.









 An amber Dr Townsend's Aromatic Hollands Tonic.


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## abcreview

A rare Melbourne bottle, probably sarsaparilla, Griefendorff's.


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## abcreview

Now for some bitters:

 Lupulin Bitters from Wilson Crosbie and Co of Melbourne (yes, a very plain bottle, but rare)









 Nearly as plain is this Bavarian Hop Bitters, which I know little about.













 Up the scale a bit is this Steane's American Hop Bitters from Greene & Co of Northg Fitzroy in Melbourne, this is an extremely rare bottle, especially in this pristine condition.










 And up the scale even more here is this bitters, an amber / olive Milwaukee Hop Bitters, which is an Australian bottle, not that we know who produced this product, or who made the bottle for that matter.


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## abcreview

Here is a blue glass Dr Ralays Royal Digestive Bitters, which is a rare bottle from Sydney.









 Sorry about the doubles here, but this was the only photo I had of the Dr Fosters Jamaica Sarsaparilla, second from the left, which is an Adelaide bottle










 A group shot from left to right: Dr Bayleys Sarsaparilla, Dr Baily's Sarsaparilla (both Brisbane we believe), Dr Livingstone's as per prior post, three variations of Old Dr Jacob Townsend's sarsaparilla.






 Now for some US bottles, good old Dr Townsend's in a range of colours, the black olive example on the left is pontilled as well (and Australian found).










 Another shot of the green Dr Buchans with an amber Rowlands Sarsaparilla alongside.


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## abcreview

Here are a few of my mate's, again with some doubles of examples already shown:

 Mentiplay's are a remedy of some sort, the green is scarce, the aqua is very rare.  The Dr Weily's is a very rare bottle too. Then another example of a Dr Foster's.






 Here we have a very rare Liebig's Sarsaparilla from Sydney, A new Zealand Dr Moorehouse's Sarsaparilla with bird trade mark, another Dr Grahams and another green Dr Buchans






 Some different variations of Dr Bayley's/Bailey's/Baily's, the right hand blue one is a ripper.






 Another mates rare bottles are the green Hemmons (ex rare), Hemmons and Laws also very rare and the more standard F & J Hemmons - all Dr Grahams Sarsaparillas of course.










 Another of mine now, a Townsends with no DR and no Albany - I think this is quite rare.


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## abcreview

Another rare example, an amethyst Liebigs Sarsaparilla from Sydney









 Now for some of my mates bitters

 Amber Gippsland hop bitters






 Bairnsdale Hop Bitters of DJ Tuony and Co of Melbourne






 Kent Hop Bitters from PG Dixon and Co of Melbourne






 A couple of Philadelphia Hop Bitters with negro trade mark, one with reverse writing, a Brisbane company






 Hoile and Mackey Russian Bitters, a Melbourne Company






 Rowlands Celerine, a product that was registered as a bitters






 McDonalds Australian Hop Bitters with crown trade mark from melbourne






 A variation of above






 A yellow green New york Hop Bitters






 A Royal Kent Hop Bitters






 A green Milwaukee bitters - different to the amber green one earlier.






 An aqua Boston Hop Bitters, much rarer than the amber version






 The amber version, which is still very hard to get


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## abcreview

OK, that will do for now, except for one last shot of two of my bitters:


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## BRIAN S.

WOW ! Very nice ! Thanks for sharing !!!!!!!
 I have always liked those Australian semi cabins .


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## bottle_head9

That is some beautiful glass!!![]


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## JOETHECROW

WOW. My eyeballs are protruding and touching the inside of my eyeglasses![]  
	

	
	
		
		

		
		
	


	




  You guys have some pretty cool glass.


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## texasdigger

Very very nice! When it comes to sheer looks though I like the "Dunn's" coffee bottle the best though.   Next would be the philly hops bitters.  Just awesome!  Thanks for showing them to us.

 Brad


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## Wangan

Excellent glass! Being a Cooper myself the Sir Astley Cooper bottle is my favorite and the embossing on the Rowlands Celerine would be next.Beautiful line up.Dont hesitate to show us more!


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## RED Matthews

Well this is a beautiful exhibit of bottle pictures.  Now some one will have to tell me how to get back to this in the search system.  If I can't, I could choke the computer cow- this last computer my grandson set up form me is about the same size as a common book.  It is an Eee Box - cpu. with an external CD drive.  But it works better than the old one.
 RED Matthews


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## saratogadriver

Do you know why there are so many bottles for your country that have the names of other countries/cities/etc?   Many of those, if you hadn't shown otherwise, I would have assumed were American...   

 Some really beautiful glass.   I would have thought all the Aussie stuff would look similar to English glass...

 Jim G


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## annie44

Very impressive collection.  Thanks for taking the time to post the pictures!


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## abcreview

I cannot say deifnitively why there are so many bottles from here that are named after other places, however there are a couple of theories. 
 Many of the American named bitters were found in country areas at old Cobb and Co stations, it is thought that possibly they were named as such to cater for the large American population at the time?
 Others such as Kent Hop bitters seem to be named after a region reknowned for hops growing?
 Really there is little information on many of the bottles, for instance the Milwaukee bitters - nobody knows who made it?  The glass is made by the same glass company that blew the St Louis, Boston and New York bitters (of which small amounts of information are known, but in general these bottles are very enigmatic, and rare pieces), all with the same distinctive base corners and crude shape.  Maybe they were made for the same company?  Much like Coke these days owns just about everything, maybe many "competing" bitters brands in the day were not competing at all?


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## cobaltbot

Wow, very nice bottles, I would love to dig any of them.  Interesting on the city names, if dug in the US I would be thinking american.


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## CALDIGR2

All I can say is WOWZERS! Those are some VERY NICE bottles, Travis.


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## abcreview

I have just taken some more photographs of one of the main bitters, thought I would put them here even though already pictured here:


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## Nickevlau

Wow....Holy Bitters Batman!!!


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## loobosh

abcreview said:


> Here is a blue glass Dr Ralays Royal Digestive Bitters, which is a rare bottle from Sydney.
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> Sorry about the doubles here, but this was the only photo I had of the Dr Fosters Jamaica Sarsaparilla, second from the left, which is an Adelaide bottle
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> A group shot from left to right: Dr Bayleys Sarsaparilla, Dr Baily's Sarsaparilla (both Brisbane we believe), Dr Livingstone's as per prior post, three variations of Old Dr Jacob Townsend's sarsaparilla.
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> Now for some US bottles, good old Dr Townsend's in a range of colours, the black olive example on the left is pontilled as well (and Australian found).
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> Another shot of the green Dr Buchans with an amber Rowlands Sarsaparilla alongside.




   I have an aqua one with applied ring top.


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