# Today’s haul



## Catcat16 (Mar 27, 2020)

Just thought my haul today was fitting for the beginning of spring with these Easter colored bottles I found. ( rarely do I find amethyst)


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## yacorie (Mar 27, 2020)

The purple ones are changing color from being exposed to the sun.  
Too bad about the Pegasus bottle


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## sandchip (Mar 27, 2020)

You go, girl.  Nice finds!


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## CanadianBottles (Mar 27, 2020)

Oh yeah that pegasus bottle would have been really nice if it was whole!  Those are an unusually deep shade of amethyst for dump-dug bottles, they must have sat on the surface for quite a while.

Also I've never heard of Courtenay & Co Worcestershire Sauce, and I've never seen a clear Worcestershire sauce bottle before either.  I wonder if that was an American brand imitating the British ones.


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## Catcat16 (Mar 27, 2020)

yacorie said:


> The purple ones are changing color from being exposed to the sun.
> Too bad about the Pegasus bottle


 Yea I’ve been hunting for that same bottle for a year now and every time I find one, that’s exactly how I find it. Top gone.


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## Catcat16 (Mar 27, 2020)

CanadianBottles said:


> Oh yeah that pegasus bottle would have been really nice if it was whole!  Those are an unusually deep shade of amethyst for dump-dug bottles, they must have sat on the surface for quite a while.
> 
> Also I've never heard of Courtenay & Co Worcestershire Sauce, and I've never seen a clear Worcestershire sauce bottle before either.  I wonder if that was an American brand imitating the British ones.



actually most of these I pulled out of the ground. But not terribly deep maybe 12 inches or so. I guess that would still be considered a dump spot?


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## Catcat16 (Mar 27, 2020)

Catcat16 said:


> Yea I’ve been hunting for that same bottle for a year now and every time I find one, that’s exactly how I find it. Top gone.



so wait, they weren’t originally purple? I pulled them out of the ground but only like 12 inches or so.


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## sandchip (Mar 27, 2020)

Catcat16 said:


> so wait, they weren’t originally purple? I pulled them out of the ground but only like 12 inches or so.



No, ma'am.  Manganese oxide was used to decolorize soda glass which normally has a greenish tint.  Some customers wanted their bottles clear (or colorless).  Longterm exposure to sunlight (UV) causes it to turn purple, hence the term sun colored amethyst or SCA.  Your bottle probably lay in the sun for a few years before eventually getting covered by leaves, dirt, etc., giving the sun time to do its thing.  Use of MnO discontinued when we entered WWI, and was later replaced by selenium as a decolorizing agent.


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## martyfoley (Mar 28, 2020)

Great explanation sandchip.  Nice bottles cat.


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## hemihampton (Mar 28, 2020)

A Search in here on SCA or Sun Colored Amethyst might reveal a lot of info but Sandchip pretty much summed it up. LEON.


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## willong (Apr 1, 2020)

Had sandchip not beat me to the punch explaining the amethyst colorization, I was going to lead off with a mysterious question for Catcat16:  Where are you living, young lady, that gets such intense sun?

I grew up on the fringe of the Mojave. Before everything got picked up and carted away, sun colored glass was fairly common lying about the desert. Even given that combination of intense sun exposure and a dearth of accumulated organic debris to cover over discarded glass, one rarely encountered bottles so evenly and deeply colored.

To sandchip's excellent summary, I'd like to add that the World War One era glass de-colorized via addition of selenium will also colorize with exposure to ultraviolet light.  However, in that case, the change results in a light yellow or straw color--so I have read.  Which begs the question: with light amber being a fairly common glass color for a number of products in the early twentieth century, how does one determine if a bottle they have found in such a color from the correct timeframe was thus originally produced, or turned a straw color due to UV exposure?

*Could any member here post pictures of selenium glass confirmed to be sun colored?*  If so, unless the color is so unique to make it obvious, please explain how you know.

One other tidbit:  I've read that reheating sun colored glass in an oven, even without remelting, will revert it to clear colorless condition.


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## Roaddie (Apr 1, 2020)

Sandchip, what time frame would you date the amethyst bottles. I always thought they dated from late 1890's to the early 1900's.. Would some of them have been later than that. I agree, they are a much darker color than you would normally get out of a domp. Catcat16, you keep up the good work-seems like you are having fun.


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## sandchip (Apr 1, 2020)

That's about right.  I always say from 1890 to 1917 or thereabouts.  I have a couple of tooled top crown sodas that have a straw tint, but it's really tough to accurately capture the color in a photograph.  Here's one next to an SCA of about the same darkness.  As far as confirming that it's sun colored straw?  I can't give you a sworn deposition to that effect, but hey, we're just collecting bottles here.


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