Sunday, February 10, 2013

Best Find of 2012

One of my favorite aspects of antique bottle digging is that you:
  1.  Will find something really good occasionally.
  2.  It will happen when you least expect it.
On this particular day my father and I had just arrived at the local 1930's age town dump.  First course of business is to find a likely spot to dig.  This particular dump is about six feet deep on the average and one usually doesn't find much in the first foot or two.  The surface is generally tangled with roots and I find a pickax is the best tool to get through this quickly.  To get to the point I slammed the pickax into the ground, pulled back as hard as I could, and to my astonishment a beautiful half gallon jug with blue script writing popped out of the ground.  It must have been my lucky day because a few inches closer to me with the pickax would have left this jug in many small pieces.


Half gallon jug marked Jos. Hirschfeld & Son Long Branch N.J.

These blue script jugs were made by the Fulper Pottery of Flemington, NJ around 1900, give or take a few years, for grocers and liquor dealers throughout New Jersey and other close by states.  In 43 years of digging this is only the sixth one I have ever found and I don't know anyone else who has found that many.