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Bottled in Illinois: Embossed Bottles and Bottled Products of Early Illinois Merchants from Chicago to Cairo (Studies in Illinois Archaeology, Volume 6)
Bottled in Illinois Embossed Bottles and Bottled Products of Early Illinois Merchants from Chicago to Cairo - Studies in Illinois Archaeology, Volume 6 Author:Kenneth B. Farnsworth and John A. Walthall This book describes and illustrates nearly 1,100 different Illinois embossed-bottle varieties produced before, during, and after the Civil War for close to 500 Illinois merchants operating in over 100 small towns and cities across the state, with populations ranging from just a few hundred souls to more than 100,000 people. The authors have work... more »ed with historical archivists Eva Mounce and Curtis Mann to research the bottlers and bottled products included in our book-and 14 additional historical-research contributors have added their local and regional expertise and knowledge to help make the volume a reality.
Because of the daunting scale of the effort needed to document embossed and stamped bottle styles, user/maker marks, bottle contents, and product histories, the few existing pioneering published studies of such bottles used by early Illinois merchants provide only partial, often regional, thumbnail-outline lists with little associated historical information on the merchants and their products. For example, the most extensive of these studies-which focuses only on embossed Illinois soda bottles dating from 1840 to the 1940s-lists just six embossed sodas dating to the 1840-1860 period (only three of which were recognized by the authors as dating to pre-Civil War times). Our current study documents, illustrates, and provides historical-context studies of 87 embossed soda/mineral water bottles of this age, used by bottlers in 46 Illinois towns ranging from Chicago to Cairo. For the 1860-1880 period, previous publications document only 43 blob-top soda styles statewide. Our current study provides comprehensive historical and stylistic information on 247 such bottles. Previous volumes list just 17 stamped stoneware bottles from Illinois, several of which were not identified as the product of Illinois bottlers at the time his publications appeared. Our current study provides historical and stylistic information on 37 such bottles.« less