Wednesday, November 26, 2014

Huh? Star Base Black...

Dale's post about his 8-Ray Star Base Patent Fifth reminded me of this black glass ale I've had in my garage for a few years. It has a few embossed letters (almost resembling that of directional abreviations N,E,S,W). I'll get some additional pictures posted in the next few days showing the bottle itself, as well as a better close-up of the letters, which I remember being a "C, M, W" or "G, M, W"
Any thoughts or information would be of help in identifying the manufacturer of this star-base bottle.

7 comments:

  1. The star base is not even close to an exclusively western glass house base marking. Several glass houses across the world used various stars in various ways, but there are unique base and star combinations that absolutely are Pacific Glass Works.

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  2. Well said Starman ! Certainly not all bottles with "stars" are Western, Just as with the curved "R", a trained eye can recognize a Western curved R opposed to others from the East and Midwest that have some sort of curve to them.
    AP

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  3. That being said, the western glass houses did make black glass ales, and there are a few known star bases (different than the above example) that are believed to possibly we western. Time will tell. Since there are inks, 6ths, pickles, fruit jars, and apothecary bottles base embossed "Pacific Glass Works S.F." perhaps someday a black glass ale with the same marking will appear !

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  4. Nowhere in my post did I claim or assume this bottle to be a western black, moreso I believe the very opposite. This bottle may be what little proof we have that not all star bases are western. I'm looking to see if anyone recognizes this star base with letters and where it may have been made.

    Sent from my iPhone

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  5. I have one of those blacks and my guess is English . I got the bottle with a large group of bottles that were dug in Hamilton Nevada . Lots of them had some label left and the ones you could read were from England or Scotland .

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  6. I have dug several of these star base blacks at the site of the Sierra Buttes Mine north of Sierra City. Some of them still had labels marked India Pale Ale from England. Although the Buttes Mine was discovered by gold rush pioneers. around 1850, it was bought and incorporated by a group of English investors. Lots of early English bottles come out of this site along with later 1870's - 80's western bottles.

    The company rules prohibited alcoholic beverages at this mine but everything from McKenna's and J. Moore fifths to Peruvian Bitters and early Hostetter's came from this company town. Today this site is so covered with buck brush and manzanita you can't even walk through it.
    I hate wild fires but maybe a controlled burn........
    - rs -

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