Hoppe & Strub Toledo O

[robertk]

Bottle Vitals​

Embossing	Date	Color	Shape	Size (Width x Diameter)	Value*
Hoppe & Strub Toledo O.	1880s	Amber	Round (cylindrical wine)	12" x 3.5"	$100.00

Bottle Views (click to enlarge):

Front	Back	Side	Side	Bottom
Hoppe & Strub Toledo O.

Hoppe & Strub was a bottler of mineral water, ginger ale, beer, and other beverages, beginning in the 1880s in Toledo, Ohio. They started off bottling beer for the Toledo Brewing & Malting Company, but after the beer wars of the mid 1880s, they started bottling for Pabst Brewing Company in 1889. There was quite a rivalry between the two brewing companies, with each regarding the other as an inferior "foreign" beer. Pabst unionized, while Toledo Brewing and Malting did not, which caused price pressure on both companies. Here's Toledo's viewpoint:

And here is Milwaukee's take on the situation:

When Hoppe & Strub's contract with Toledo Brewing & Malting ran out, they jumped ship and started bottling for Pabst. They had a large building on South Superior Street, with four loading bays suited for heavy wagons and draft horses. Here is the building in the 1890's -- you can see the Pabst sign on top of the building.

The building still stands, but the bottling business is long gone. The building is currently the home of a Spaghetti Warehouse restaurant. Here's how it looks today (from the other side, not the loading bay side):


While Hoppe & Strub were in business, they advertised primarily in local and regional papers, many of them in other languages. Here are a couple.

This bottle appears to be one of their early ones, as later ones had base embossing as well as "B. Co." in the center of the logo, which this one does not. It would have originally been sealed with a cork and then a wire bail, but the bail is long gone on this one.

I didn't get a "before" photo of this one, but it only needed light cleaning with soap and water.

* Value on this one is hard to nail down, since there are so few examples online. I saw a sold example in the same color for $80 (price plus shipping), and one like it currently offered at $180, but neither is a perfect match so I'm guessing somewhere in the middle. As always, that would vary a lot with condition, and this one would probably need a bit more polish to make that value.

 

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[achanceforgold]

Excellent History and Research!
"Toledo Beer Wars", what a great find, a Hoppe and Strub bottle.
I would have never thought a bottle could have that much history behind it.
Dang cheap non-union beer.

 

[pepperj]

Great looking embossed amber.
I have only a few ambers, but the large whiskey and other one have no embossing.

 

[newnan man]

I used to drink Pabst once in awhile in Ohio. It wasn't my favorite. Nice bottle.

 

[Limitool]

Great post Robert.... Was there just one of those in collection? You did an excellent job in the research with a lot of info behind bottle. Glad ya found one possibly worth more than the $10-$20 range thus far. Keep up the great work sir....!

 

[robertk]

Was there just one of those in collection?

Yep, that one is a loner. Pretty color. I might see if I can get it a bit cleaner, but I am hesitant to do too much for fear of messing it up. I don't mind the little bit of haze.