BOTTLES MADE AFTER 1900
This final group of bottles and jars have nothing in common except their date. The two clear glass bottles at left are standard desktop ink bottles made after the 1904 introduction of the Owens bottle machine and before screw top inks replaced the corked variety around 1930 ([Fig. 25]). The conical ink in the center was one of the earliest shapes for desk-top ink bottles, introduced when ink was first bottled in small individual containers in the 1840s. The contents of the ointment jar at right, made after 1916, are unknown. Patent records indicate that the May 15, 1916, date was neither a trademark registration nor a patent issue. It may be a false patent date, put on the bottle to lend the contents an air of legitimacy.
Although other artifacts, such as the Austrian porcelain in [Figure 11] and the beef extract jar in [Figure 24], may have been manufactured in the twentieth century, these three containers were the only items in the privy pit that were definitely made after Susan Middleton’s 1900 abandonment of the plantation. As such, they were the only evidence archeologists had that these nineteenth century objects were probably deposited in the twentieth century. All three are items likely to have been in use at the time of the Smith family’s 1925 move to Middleton Place, and they were probably discarded at that time.
Figure 25. Twentieth century bottles. A. Cylinder ink bottle, machine-made, c. 1904-1930. B. Cone ink, machine-made, c. 1904-1930. Embossed on base, CARTER’s MADE IN USA. Carter’s Ink Company began bottling ink in Massachusetts in 1858. C. Screw top ointment pot, white pressed glass. Embossed on base, AUBREY SISTERS MAY 15, 1916.
LAMP GLASS
In 1859, drillers in Pennsylvania brought in the nation’s first producing oil well, an event that was to alter radically the lives of generations of Americans. The first revolution achieved by this versatile new fuel was not in mechanical power, but in lighting. A working oil field made possible the manufacture of kerosene, a promising coal and petroleum-based illuminant that had been patented in New York in 1854 but had not been put into production because of the scarcity of one of its principal ingredients. Kerosene burned more brightly, steadily, and efficiently than almost any known fuel except gas, which suffered from the twin disadvantages of requiring immovable fixtures in the wall or ceiling, and of being generally unavailable outside large urban areas. The abundance of petroleum from the Pennsylvania fields made kerosene one of the cheapest fuels available, and by the mid-1860s, its use had far outstripped that of gas lighting. In many rural areas, it remained the only practical form of household lighting until electrification of these areas in the 1930s.
Figure 26. Student lamp chimney. This glass was used in reading lamps like those illustrated in [Figure 27]. The kerosene-fueled student lamp was an 1863 Prussian design that became popular in the United States in the 1870s.