kenb
Bronze Member
Another good article.
Construction worker uncovers passion for collecting bottles
KIMBALL TOWNSHIP, Mich. -- Fred Feldhouse wasn't looking for a hobby. He was just trying to make a living.
Then he dug up a curious-looking bottle. And then another. And another.
He carried them home, and eventually he had old bottles everywhere, a thousand or so displayed on shelves, stacked in the pantry, stored in the garage.
"I got into it by accident," he said of his hobby. "I was working construction for Sheldon's, and we'd find bottles everywhere we dug."
There's a reason why this is true. Port Huron, as with any community founded before the era of indoor plumbing, once was a city of outhouses. Today, every old privy is a potential treasure trove for bottle collectors.
"People would throw (used bottles and other trash) in the hole until it filled up, and then they'd dig a new hole," Feldhouse said. "You find one of those privies, it's like a snapshot into the past. They're all over the city. Every yard had one."
Construction crews have little trouble identifying old outhouse pits. "Once you get the topsoil off, you can see the outline," Feldhouse said.
Early on, Feldhouse kept bottles of all sizes, shapes and hues. As he learned more about bottle collecting, and as his wife grew concerned about an alarming shortage of shelf space in their home, he became more discerning.
"Anything with a screw top went into the trash," he recalled. "Machine-made (bottles) went into one box, blown-into-a-mold into another."
Many of Feldhouse's bottles were duplicates. He logged onto eBay and sold more than 200 of these, including several to theatrical groups looking for period-piece props.
The Internet, he noted, is laden with information about old bottles and the collector's art.
Earlier this year, nine of his bottles from C Kern Brewing Co., makers of Cream of Michigan among other brands of beer and pop, went on display at the Port Huron Museum. "I'll help the museum any way I can," he said.
Feldhouse, 52, has a particular affection for local bottles, but then he's a local guy _ a 1973 graduate of Port Huron Northern. He and his wife Karen make their home on Maple Road, a quiet lane in Kimball Township.
A cabinet in the living room holds several bottles that echo the city's past, including the druggists H.C. Knill and Chester E. Bricker, Gruel and Ott pop and Port Huron Brewery Co. There are several milk bottles from local creameries such as Lake Huron Dairy and Cloverleaf Dairy.
"If they hadn't been Port Huron bottles, I wouldn't bother bringing them home," he said.
Feldhouse holds up a bottle from the Detroit Creamery Co. and explains it once owned a large dairy farm in Kimball Township.
While many bottles have little more than sentimental or historic value, a few can be quite valuable. "Thousands of dollars are paid for special commemorative flasks and the like," he said.
Feldhouse pulls bottles from a shelf, bottles that held ingredients of every description: patent medicines, vegetable bitters, perfume, 3-in-1 oil, shoe polish and snuff.
"Have you ever heard of buying snuff in a bottle?" Karen Feldhouse asks.
Her husband reaches for a small bottle with raised dots. "In the old days, any bottle containing poison had raised ribs or raised diamonds or raised dots," he said. "It was done to protect the blind."
He agrees it seems a good idea that got lost along the way.
The names embossed on the bottles often seem exotic and dated: Pepto-Mangan Gude, Hood's Sasparilla, Lydia E. Pinkham's Vegetable Compound, Florida Water (made in New York), Andrew's Nerve Builder and Mrs. Winslow's Soothing Syrup.
This last tonic, Feldhouse explains, was known as "the baby killer." That's because it contained enough morphine to kill toddlers and to turn their mothers into addicts.
Bottle after bottle gets a look, each with something to distinguish it, something distinctive or novel or simply pleasing to the eye.
"Every one of them," Feldhouse said, "has a story."
___
Information from: Times Herald, http://www.thetimesherald.com
Construction worker uncovers passion for collecting bottles
KIMBALL TOWNSHIP, Mich. -- Fred Feldhouse wasn't looking for a hobby. He was just trying to make a living.
Then he dug up a curious-looking bottle. And then another. And another.
He carried them home, and eventually he had old bottles everywhere, a thousand or so displayed on shelves, stacked in the pantry, stored in the garage.
"I got into it by accident," he said of his hobby. "I was working construction for Sheldon's, and we'd find bottles everywhere we dug."
There's a reason why this is true. Port Huron, as with any community founded before the era of indoor plumbing, once was a city of outhouses. Today, every old privy is a potential treasure trove for bottle collectors.
"People would throw (used bottles and other trash) in the hole until it filled up, and then they'd dig a new hole," Feldhouse said. "You find one of those privies, it's like a snapshot into the past. They're all over the city. Every yard had one."
Construction crews have little trouble identifying old outhouse pits. "Once you get the topsoil off, you can see the outline," Feldhouse said.
Early on, Feldhouse kept bottles of all sizes, shapes and hues. As he learned more about bottle collecting, and as his wife grew concerned about an alarming shortage of shelf space in their home, he became more discerning.
"Anything with a screw top went into the trash," he recalled. "Machine-made (bottles) went into one box, blown-into-a-mold into another."
Many of Feldhouse's bottles were duplicates. He logged onto eBay and sold more than 200 of these, including several to theatrical groups looking for period-piece props.
The Internet, he noted, is laden with information about old bottles and the collector's art.
Earlier this year, nine of his bottles from C Kern Brewing Co., makers of Cream of Michigan among other brands of beer and pop, went on display at the Port Huron Museum. "I'll help the museum any way I can," he said.
Feldhouse, 52, has a particular affection for local bottles, but then he's a local guy _ a 1973 graduate of Port Huron Northern. He and his wife Karen make their home on Maple Road, a quiet lane in Kimball Township.
A cabinet in the living room holds several bottles that echo the city's past, including the druggists H.C. Knill and Chester E. Bricker, Gruel and Ott pop and Port Huron Brewery Co. There are several milk bottles from local creameries such as Lake Huron Dairy and Cloverleaf Dairy.
"If they hadn't been Port Huron bottles, I wouldn't bother bringing them home," he said.
Feldhouse holds up a bottle from the Detroit Creamery Co. and explains it once owned a large dairy farm in Kimball Township.
While many bottles have little more than sentimental or historic value, a few can be quite valuable. "Thousands of dollars are paid for special commemorative flasks and the like," he said.
Feldhouse pulls bottles from a shelf, bottles that held ingredients of every description: patent medicines, vegetable bitters, perfume, 3-in-1 oil, shoe polish and snuff.
"Have you ever heard of buying snuff in a bottle?" Karen Feldhouse asks.
Her husband reaches for a small bottle with raised dots. "In the old days, any bottle containing poison had raised ribs or raised diamonds or raised dots," he said. "It was done to protect the blind."
He agrees it seems a good idea that got lost along the way.
The names embossed on the bottles often seem exotic and dated: Pepto-Mangan Gude, Hood's Sasparilla, Lydia E. Pinkham's Vegetable Compound, Florida Water (made in New York), Andrew's Nerve Builder and Mrs. Winslow's Soothing Syrup.
This last tonic, Feldhouse explains, was known as "the baby killer." That's because it contained enough morphine to kill toddlers and to turn their mothers into addicts.
Bottle after bottle gets a look, each with something to distinguish it, something distinctive or novel or simply pleasing to the eye.
"Every one of them," Feldhouse said, "has a story."
___
Information from: Times Herald, http://www.thetimesherald.com
