# What is your reason for collecting bottles?



## arthur (Jul 7, 2008)

I find that collecting old things (antiques) interesting beacuse it gives you a look at what people had and used years ago and how different things are today.  I have collected antiques now for years.  Living in the area that I live in old farmstead and antigue dealers are in abundnace.  Family yard sales and estate sale are quite frequent.  I love to find old bottles and put them on a shelf and look at the labels and names and shapes of these old gems.  Remembering some of them when you were a kid (memories)  I have not sold one yet and don't believe I'll start anytime soon.Since I have been here on the forum my interest has increased with all the knowledge that is shared, freely. My thanks to everyone who has answered all my questions and has increased my knowledge to the world of bottles.  I collect because it is fun and keeps me sane and allows me to Dive almost everyday hoping to find one more rare beauty.
 Why do you collect-- money, flea bay, business, hobby, fun?????????????? Arthur


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## Jim (Jul 7, 2008)

I have always been fascinated with history, and bottle digging/collecting fits in very well with that. My knowledge of the history of my local area has increased greatly through researching places to dig and through the discovery and researching of newly-discovered local bottles. 

 Also, a shelf of druggists, sodas, flasks or a mix of all kinds of historic glass is just nice to look at, not to mention fun to share with others. I work 40-50 hours weekly, plus taking care of my house, finances, vehicles and lots of other less-than-fun activities. My bottles are a great stress reliever, a pleasant distraction from all of those things. Admiring nice glass sure beats the hell out of going to the bar or sitting in front of the TV  []. ~Jim


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## arthur (Jul 7, 2008)

good job.  Thanks arthur


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## epgorge (Jul 7, 2008)

Jim hit it on the head for me Arthur. I had a hard time learning history, not so much learning it but I couldn't find a time line, where I could understand the different era'.

 Bottles changed all of that for me. Since then it went from an obsession of learning to a narcotic like effect on my otherwise stressed out mind and body. Another thing is you can do it alone or with a buddy.  Also, the mrs. (my best friend) likes them too.

  It is a good hobby. I almost said a good clean hobby but then thought again.

 Good question Arthur.

 Joel


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## madman (Jul 7, 2008)

> ORIGINAL: Jim
> 
> I have always been fascinated with history, and bottle digging/collecting fits in very well with that. My knowledge of the history of my local area has increased greatly through researching places to dig and through the discovery and researching of newly-discovered local bottles.
> 
> Also, a shelf of druggists, sodas, flasks or a mix of all kinds of historic glass is just nice to look at, not to mention fun to share with others. I work 40-50 hours weekly, plus taking care of my house, finances, vehicles and lots of other less-than-fun activities. My bottles are a great stress reliever, a pleasant distraction from all of those things. Admiring nice glass sure beats the hell out of going to the bar or sitting in front of the TV  []. ~Jim


  i think jim said it right here, i always wanted to be an archeologist i hunted fosills at a young age, collected beer cans  bottle caps, match books so on , i discovered my first dump in the 4th grade im 40 now, never forget it, still have bottles from that first dump mike


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## arthur (Jul 7, 2008)

thanks guys  great bunch of people more people should answer. Don't be shy


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## lego110 (Jul 7, 2008)

i started looking for old bottles at the flea market and antique stores for christmas gifts for my cousin and now i collect them. When i started looking for my bottles i started collecting milk bottles.


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## madman (Jul 7, 2008)

> ORIGINAL: epgorge
> 
> Jim hit it on the head for me Arthur. I had a hard time learning history, not so much learning it but I couldn't find a time line, where I could understand the different era'.
> 
> ...


 i totaly agree, me personaly its about the dig, and getting down to the layer, and start finding bottles its like crack lol ,very addictive, as im sure it is for you arthur while diving, sure youve got all these bottles on the shelve, and sit back and look at them,  is nice but like i said its all about the dig and discovery,and research that keeps me diggin  mike


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## arthur (Jul 7, 2008)

Amen brother I learned alot from you and quite a few more keep up the great work  its work but it also takes talent from the talented


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## epgorge (Jul 7, 2008)

Yep! Mike it is just like that. After the thrill is gone you have to find another one. Hopefully, even better. The ones on the shelf are conquests. The need to find more, the obsession.
 Joel


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## T D (Jul 7, 2008)

Around 1976 or 77, I had a great aunt to die, and we went to her house to get the things she had left us.  I'll never forget going on the back porch and seeing three different versions of an ACL bottle from Macon, Ga.  They were a green and white B and N (Bryan and Nims) a red and white, and a red and white Brim's (Bryan and Nims combined?) I thought these simple looking drink bottles were the coolest things.  Not long after that, I began searching flea markets, junk shops, whatever, looking for any ACL bottles.  I never had any remote interest in any plain glass bottles.  I have since add a hundred or six ACLs to my collection largely thru ebay and bottle shows, and yes, occasionally in a junk/antique shop somewhere.  I guess you could say I originally started collecting for the visual impact and how many different colors and themes there were.  Once I discovered that it was darn-near impossible[] to collect every version of every painted bottle, I have begun narrowing my interests somewhat to the more intricate (bottle shape, embossing, and paint) ACLs, and interesting picture themes on the labels, and partly through this forum, I have become much more interested in early crown top sodas, especially from Georgia.  One of my newfound interests, is, as has been stated by others, the gathering of local history through bottles.  I've recently added a couple of local meds, and am always interested in local stuff.  Who knows where I'll go next, but I'm sure it will include bottles.  The three Macon bottles are here on the top shelf


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## capsoda (Jul 8, 2008)

I have always collected one thing or another as far back as I can remember. Always loved history and adventure too. Bottles are one way to have all three. I remember the multi colored fruit jars my favorite aunt had and as luck would have it a hurricane (Camille) broke the dam on a local lake and the bottom was full of bottles. I was 14 and I have been collecting them in one capasity or another ever since. Was making about 10 grand a year at one time to suppliment my VA pension which at the time was at 50% and not enough to support a family of four.

 I can't imagine being without the wife or my bottles.


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## RICKJJ59W (Jul 8, 2008)

Its 5:15 am so I will sum it up short & sweet ... its all about history man, all about history.To dig and sell all would be to much like a job not a hobby. On that note off to work.[8D]


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## RICKJJ59W (Jul 8, 2008)

> ORIGINAL: arthur
> 
> 
> 
> ...


 

 I said that in the numbers post to lol


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## morbious_fod (Jul 8, 2008)

Part of it is hereditary, my mother is a pack rat always has been, I have the same need of acquisition which luckily I steered into collecting. If Iâ€™m going to accumulate large amounts of stuff then at least most of it will be worth collecting. Bottle collecting wasnâ€™t my first collection and most likely wonâ€™t be my last, but at the moment and for at least a year and six months it has been my most prominent collection. These things go in cycles, Iâ€™ll collect an item rabidly for a period of time, until the supply begins to thin out or I get bored with it, and then another type of item will gain my attention, and I will collect those rabidly for a period of time. I donâ€™t sell off the other collections, and still keep looking for new items, that way I almost never come out of a â€œhuntâ€ without something to show for it. Even though I started as a brand collector, I quickly evolved into a local bottle collector and have evolved further into becoming a chronicler of the local bottling history in my area.

 Bottle collecting is a better fit for me overall, because I have a deep connection with sodas and the returnable bottles from an early age, the history behind them interests me, the research keeps my brain sharp, and heck some of them are just pretty. I can safely say that the bottle collecting has reached the status of one of the collections that I will never sell off, the other being my vintage Star Wars action figure collection.


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## ktbi (Jul 8, 2008)

Good question Arthur.  I started with bottles in the 60's as a teen, but stopped when I join the Navy and spend 16 years overseas.  I collected clocks for a few years buying small broken ones and trading several of them for a better one.  Kept trading up like that up for a long time and now have a half dozen really nice ones.   Went to the South Pacific for 5 years and got into diving, so collected sea shells for awhile.  Still have the clocks and shells.  Got back here and picked up bottles again when I inherited quite a few from my Grandfather (who I used to go out with in the 60's).  Bottles are my main collectable now, but I've always like the Old West and pick odds and ends from time to time.   I agree with several of the posters here - it's the history and a bit heredity.....Ron


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## GuntherHess (Jul 8, 2008)

I'm in it for the money. When the price of cobalt glass gets to $90 an ounce I am cashing in all my Bromoseltzers.


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## NCdigger5 (Jul 8, 2008)

I like it because of the history and just because i feel like collecting bottles.


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## glass man (Jul 8, 2008)

Like most here I love history and love to think what was happinig in history when my bottle was in use. Like my pontiled cathdreal pontiled pickle that was dug in CHARSTON ,S C. THE BOTTLED MAY HAVE WITNESSED THE FIRING ON FORT SUMMNER AND THE START OF THE CIVIL WAR,AT LEAST WOULD HAVE WITNESSED SLAVERY. THE THINK I LOVE MOST IS KNOWING WHAT CRAFTMAN WERE THAT MADE THE BOTTLES AND HOW HARD THE WORK WAS AND HOW UNDER PAID THESE CRAFTMEN WERE! I ALSO WISH THEY COULD TELL THE HISTORY,THE PEOPLE THEY MET AND HOW THEY WERE SO FORTUNATE THEY WERE TO STILL BE HERE!


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## deepbluedigger (Jul 9, 2008)

The short answer for me is: I can't kick the habit. The long answer I'll have to think about.


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## digdug (Jul 9, 2008)

My Grandfather got me started digging for bottles when I was 8 years old. My father was away in Vietnam, my mother, sister and I stayed with my Grandparents. My Grandfather worked for a small City in Ohio, so he was always digging for the City.  If he found a great spot, he and I would go after he got off work.  He instilled in me an appreciation of history and bottles.  I've been hooked ever since.  I can look at any of my bottles and remember who I was with when I dug it, where I found it, etc.  A lot of good memories in those bottles.


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## Hoosier49er (Jul 9, 2008)

I gotta agree with glass man on this one. It excites me to own a bottle that hasn't seen the light of day for 145 years or more. I always wonder about the people that used them. A love of  history has a great deal to do with it.


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## NYCFlasks (Jul 20, 2008)

Like so many others, I collect them for the history.  Imagine the stories they could tell us if they could only talk.
 With hundreds of flasks adding new ones is a bit tricky, but the research is amazing.  I will tell you, finding out something about a flask which has stumped me for some time is as good, or better, than adding another flask to the shelf.
 I have had the very good fortune to meet several people over the years who are decendants of these shop owners, and they are over joyed to learn about their ancestors bottles, and of course they want one for the family.
 Do I sell it to them?  Of course.


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## PrivyCheese (Jul 20, 2008)

The history part of collecting is nice, but for me its a part of who I am. Some of us call it "the Bug"  For me it's more then that. I couldnt think of not collecting bottles. My family and friends know that on many weekends I am unavailable, because I am digging. My girlfreind understands that its who I am, Thank God I never will have to choose between the two.....LOL I started collecting when I was 12, odds are against her.....lol


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## JOETHECROW (Jul 20, 2008)

Quite alot is historical for me,...but I love the way a misshapen, crude, whittled 'quack' med looks, as well as some of the insane things that were embossed on the bottles....also the incredible range of colors and having a 'portable' stained glass window, so to speak....The rush of digging a good one is (as epgorge said) narcotic....It's kind of ironic that alot of what I'm digging for were actual narcotics....<laughing>,....I've been at it since 12 years of age and I'll be 50 next weekend....Still try to get out every weekend and explore and dig......and I couldn't imagine not doing it.           Joe


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## RedGinger (Jul 20, 2008)

I have always loved history and have been interested in finding "treasure".  I used to pray at church to find a chest full of treasure.  I was always in the woods looking for arrowheads, or reading books about history.  I love beachcombing and looking for interesting things.  Anyway, it started out as a solitary activity when I started finding bottles and decided to look it up.  I kind of stumbled onto this hobby.  Now, it's the anticipation and thrill of finding something so old.  You feel like you won the lottery.  You got lucky and found something you were meant to find.  It is definitely a high.


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## Baydog51 (Jul 21, 2008)

It was grandmother. No she didn't collect old jars, she used them. When I hold that plain old fruit jar, it is like a time capsule for me. Getting up on a cold morning for a hunt with the old single shot 22, getting the milk cow up, feeding chickens, roaming the woods. I didn't know about taxes, insurance, politics, mortgages, or even girls. I just knew that when I got back from the serious business of living the day, that one or two of those beautiful Mason jars would be missing from the kitchen shelf and the contents perfectly prepared on the table.
  I guess I'm just cheap. For $3-$20 I can go back in time 50 years. I can't travel any further any cheaper.-
 Gary


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## bunchesofbottles (Jul 21, 2008)

Local history for me. I love my hometown! Don't get me wrong, if it's a neat bottle I'm keeping it regardless of where it's from. I'm a Realtor  (don't cringe, it's not as bad as lawyer) and I love being able to go into old houses & businesses and see "what used to be". My first interest was when I learned that my Great g-ma bootlegged liqour for Al Capone. It's a really long story but my grandparents have some glass from her tavern, and I've always loved it, love to think of where it was and who else saw it. If glass could talk.......


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