Monday, June 29, 2009

A PAIR OF SQUARES


Two incredible examples of the E. G. LYONS & CO / MANUFACTURERS / SANF co bottle. At left is an olive green example with whittleness to the glass and crude gloppy embossing. At right is an olive yellow example with an incredible amount of glass drip around the neck, with some stippling to the glass and crudity in the lettering. Both of these examples are variant 1 mold design.

Lyons placed two different advertisements in the San Francisco Alta California on January 7, 1865 stating that he was a Wholesale Dealer in Wines and Liquors and Manufacturers of Syrups, Cordials, Bitters at 510 Jackson St, between Montgomery and Kearny S. F.

4 comments:

  1. Warren,
    What has always interested me in the Lyons (besides it being an early San Francisco blown square) is the difference between one bottle & another. Some Lyons are neatly made and have hardly any crudity to them at all. Other Lyons (as the examples pictured in the post) are so crude they look like a child made them. Highly whittled glass, necks leaning, globby letering and over size out of round tops make the crude examples look like they were manufactured at another glass house. It is hard to imagine that the Lyons bottle was made at the same place that the extremely elegant Cassin's & Lacour's were produced. Or were they?
    g.o.

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  2. G.O.Blake,
    I believe the Lyons bottles were manufactured at the Pacific Glass Works. A stereoscopic view card by photographer Carlton Watkins taken of PGW's glassware display at the 1869 S.F. Mechanics Institute Fair shows what appears to be an exact shaped square with the same characteristics of a Lyons bottle in their display. The Lyons bottle is distinct in its size capacity, sharp beveled shoulders, large diameter neck and rather longish, with a straight stove-pipe collared mouth. Nothing quite looks like it.

    I am quite sure that the Lacour's and Cassin's bottles are a product of SFGW. Several strong pieces of evidence point to this conclusion, however recently an example of a Lacour's Bitters in flint glass (clear/white)is known, this seems to be conclusive evidence as PGW did not blow any flint glass during their operations prior to the sale of the works to SFGW in the summer of 1875.

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  3. Since you have two..... can you "spare a square" ?

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  4. looks like the one with the large drip i dug in a pontiled age hole in the 1970s,the drip hung down and barely touched the neck.open pontiled and smooth bases ,and a dickey that had the long neck ,and a dr adolfas anti rhumaitic cordial s.f.very early.a whole green old sacham was half way down,but the first 10 ft was solid brick.

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