MAKING the BEST OUT of THE BEST

By Bruce Schad

I'm sure that many collectors have had a bottle they would like to get cleaned, but were hesitant to put it through the tumbling process. Here's a story of just such a bottle.

Some collectors like the look of the patina or iridescent stain covering an old dug bottle, especially if it displays a rainbow of colors, but I believe most would rather have them look as close to mint as possible.

I've been collecting for over 35 years, and back then a large portion of bottles were dug. Cleaning involved water, different cleaners, various brushes and a variety of twisted wires to get into those hard-to-reach corners. The worst that happened was using water too warm or too cool, and the temperature change causing breakage. Most cleaned up quite well, but some were left with stains. The type of ground the bottles came out of played the major factor; those found in sand or rich dark dirt came out near mint, but most dug in ash or mixed in with rusting metal had degrees of stain. A few of the badly stained ones might have been kept had I realized that some day most all could be made to look near perfect — or at least a lot better. I really should have known better, since even then some guys were dipping bottles in acid and experimenting with ways to clean inside and out.

Today, there are various machines to accomplish this, and the future may hold even better techniques, so I hesitate to clean every bottle in my collection that now has stain, in the hope that more improvements will come. I also have one of the tumblers and have attempted to clean a number of bottles with varying success.

There's a lot to be learned before considering yourself a professional cleaner, and I do not think of myself as such. The more I do, the better they are turning out. Each bottle presents a little different challenge. There are things to consider, such as scratches and stains, which vary from slight to deeply etched. The quality of glass also plays a part in how well a bottle will tumble.

Years ago, I went to a show in Mobile, Alabama, and purchased a square amber bottle for a few bucks. The outside was covered in a heavy, dull layer and not very attractive looking, hence the low price. My plan was to remove the coating, then have it tumbled. With just a single-edge razor blade in hand, this layer just scraped away, and in no time the bottle looked like it had never been in the ground. I could hardly believe the transformation. The inside had been spared from this coating and no further cleaning was necessary. The chance of repeating this is probably remote, yet the experience stayed in my mind as I tried to find more like it.

In cleaning bottles, there are other things to consider: shape, size and flaws such as potstones that might crack due to heat, or bubbles on or near the surface which could open. These factors influence the choice of canister size and how much copper to use to polish. Every time you put a bottle through the process, there is a risk that it will not polish out, or that serious damage could occur. In the majority of times, you will have no problem.

Recently, I opted to have a rare bottle professionally cleaned by a person who has had much success. I could have done it myself, but I thought it might come out a little nicer if someone with more experience did it. Unfortunately, it shifted in the machine's holding fingers and deep gouges were cut into each side. As mentioned, I have cleaned a number of bottles and have had only a few break. I remember seeing the pieces of a Best Bitters in America selling on eBay after it had been broken in a tumbling machine. Of course, damaging any bottle while trying to clean it is not a pleasant experience and it would surely hurt if the bottle was a rare or expensive one like a Best. I don't know how I would handle breaking one, but you probably would see a grown man cry. It's just such a bottle I recently acquired that prompted me to write this article.

A collector from Michigan found several nice bottles in an antique stop; among them was a Best Bitters. This sort of find rarely happens, but it is why we all continue to search out every possible place to locate our treasures.

Back in the mid-'80s I stopped at the Great Northern Mall near Cleveland, Ohio, where an antique show was set up in the aisles. There on a table, sitting for most of three days, was an aqua Simon's Centennial Bitters. It was represented as a reproduction, but I knew that it was actually made for the nation's Centennial in 1876. The glass did have an old look to it , and it also had an applied double-collar lip, unlike the tapered lips on some of the repros, and this example had a smooth base. So with the price being right, a purchase was made. The Ohio bottle club had its show shortly after, and I took it along. A pioneer bitters collector from Ohio confirmed that I had the real deal.

Even at a very early stage in my collecting, bitters were one of my favorites and I was overwhelmed to have gotten a good one. It still sits on my shelf and is one of the most prized.

If you want to collect bitters, better not count on finding them by digging. Although many thousands of bottles were dug in those early years, the number of great bitters found could be counted on your fingers. I do remember one exceptional dig, finding four different ones in the same day and also getting into several "nests" of them, including one particular dump that had an unusually high amount of bitters mixed in along with a GREEN Warner's Safe. But as luck would have it, the only bottles not broken were catsups.

Most bitters bottles in my collection at that time were purchased. I remember the Ohio collector mentioned above coming to a Flint, Michigan show in the early 1970s and having many nice bitters on his table, including a rare and beautiful Favorite Bitters barrel. The price was $750, and I sure wish now that I had bought it, along with a Kelly's at $450. As a young man beginning a family, that kind of money was hard to come up with. Still, I was hooked on bitters and those from Michigan really sparked my interest.

Cris Batdorff, another bitters collector from Michigan, had just purchased a great looking cabin figural embossed "THE BEST BITTERS IN AMERICA" from Kalamazoo. What a bottle, and from then on it has been high on my want list. I searched shows and watched auctions, but these bottles just did not turn up very often. When they did, the price escalated along with the number of collectors who wanted one and in the end I would be outbid. If I ever was to win one at auction, my bid limit needed to be higher.

Years ago, I had made a want list that included most all known bitters from Michigan, and as time passed, the majority of embossed ones were added to the collection with the exception of a few, the Best Bitters being one of them. These bottles may not be quite as rare as some people think, but they do not come up for sale often. Each time one would, I made a note on what condition it was in. To the best of my knowledge, there may be a total of 15 to 20 examples known, ranging in condition from mint to repaired, cracked or just pieces. Perhaps a dozen whole ones are in existence. When acquired, these bottles tend to remain until the collection is broken up.

Of course, as collectors move, and with the many auctions, bottles find their way around the country; I have heard stories of Bests turning up from Florida to California, but most originally showed up within a few hundred miles of Kalamazoo. I just learned that an example has turned up in this area, having been bought at a garage sale.

No firm date is connected to the Best's time of production or how many years they were sold, but the company was formed in 1864 after Myer Desenberg joined his brother, Bernard, in his grocery business becoming B. Desenberg & Co. It prospered and grew into a number of successful business ventures lasting past the turn of the previous century. All known bottles appear to have come from their earlier years, and were blown in the same mold. They are somewhat crude and have applied tops, indicating they were produced in the mid-1860s to 1870s. I find it interesting that they all look to have a slight downward tilt to the roof line. As of now, little else is known about these bottles.

Hearing of this great bottle find, (no one was aware of this particular example until now), naturally got my attention. These bottles were mostly dug and the Best looked to have heavy stain with a lot of color showing, (see figure 1). Still it was said to be free of damage and the inside looked clean as if it had set there buried upside down with the opening plugged. Perhaps it was discarded still corked, who knows?

With all the stuff covering the outside, I was skeptical that surely there must be some damage. In past dealings in buying old bottles, my eyesight seams to be remarkably better than the sellers' at finding chips, cracks, scratches and dings in so-called mint bottles. With the option of returning it, the bottle was shipped to me. Anticipation was high to finally having one, and after looking very carefully through different types of lighting for quite some time, it appeared to be pretty much as described.

There were some swirl lines present; I believe these are caused when a bottle is being blown and glass swirls into the mold. Besides tiny surface nicks, the worst I could find was a very small surface flash with some high-point wear along the bottom roof line and what looked to be some reflection covering two of the ropes in top corner. My heart sank when I thought these were cracks in the edges of a bubble and I would have to return the bottle.

After scratching off a little more of the coating, I felt more comfortable that they might just be reflections from thin glass around the bubble. Being quite concerned about cleaning such a bottle and possibly breaking it, I decided that this one might have to wait for one of those future cleaning methods.

But, realizing that the coating did scratch off fairly easy and remembering that bottle from years before, I surmised that with the coating removed, the rest could be hand polished. Even if it took years, surely with enough work sooner or later it could be done.

Since I like the beauty of the glass, I began to remove the coating. Using several types of blades, and with great care not to scratch the surface, the coating came off. The hardest part was getting into the rope design on the edges. This left the bottle with an overall dull looking appearance (see figure 2). By searching the Internet, I discovered and ordered products that claimed to remove scratches and renew old glass. This seemed to be just what I was going to need on this bottle, so once again, I sat down using these products along with a glass cleaning cloth and a couple of soft rags. A little cleaner and a lot of rubbing were repeated over and over. At first it seemed pretty slow going, but the shine started to appear after several sessions over a week's time; the only stain left was some wear along the roof line and the sore end of my index finger.

After cleaning the glass, you can now better see its details. The bubble spread across two of the ropes looks to be just that. Amazingly, the inside did not appear to require cleaning. Next came the part I feared most. After filling the bottle with water and lightly corking it, an electric motor buffer and red jeweler's rouge was used on the roof line and a few areas where the stain was exceptionally stubborn. A small area was buffed at a time and cooled with a damp rag after each lick. This did remove most of the noticeable wear, and then another overall polishing was made. Perhaps some further cleaning might be done at some point, but for now it looks very nice and quite a big change from before I started (see figure 3). You would have to look close to tell it was a dug bottle.

This method would not be recommended for a bottle heavily stained or etched, due to the enormous amount of work it would require. Also, I'm not trying to say that this would be better than having one tumbled — far from it. But if you happen to have a bottle that you just can't risk having tumbled and if other conditions are favorable, you may want to consider it. I know you cannot hand polish the inside of a bottle, but remember the condition can be improved by using certain acids, other cleaners or tumbling just the inside. I also believe these products used on the outside will help many bottles that are not quite bad enough to have tumbled or that have light surface stain such as label stain. Besides, there's little chance of ending up with a bottle that looks over-polished.

As the name boldly states, the Best Bitters is considered to be one of the best in the bitters category, or at least in the figural cabin types, and one of the best bottles from Michigan as well as one of my best. This particular bottle may not be the best of the Bests, but at last I have a very nice example in my collection. The only thing better would be to find a truly mint or labeled example.

I can only wish and keep on looking.....

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