America the Beautiful ACL CORNER #5

Geyser (Figs. 2 & 3) in Yellowstone, surrounded by a crowd of observers, and asserts that something (the geyser and/or the soda) is “Acclaimed by Thousands.” Old Faithful was discovered by an American expedition in 1870, two years before Congress created what became the first National Park in the world. The geyser is one of 10,000 hydrothermal features within Yellowstone and the most famous, erupting every one to two hours by shooting thousands of gallons of boiling water into the air for one to five minutes. Reportedly, soldiers stationed in the area in the 1870s used the post-eruption pools of hot water to do their laundry. No doubt, due to its picture, the bottle was often saved by consumers as a souvenir rather than returned to the store for the nickel deposit, and it is relatively available today. A nice example typically will set you back $100 or less.

Okay, I realize that I’m biased, but I believe the United States of America is the most beautiful country on earth. Stretching from the Atlantic Ocean to the Pacific Ocean and down to the Gulf of Mexico, America has towering mountains, vast deserts, rain forests, prairies, and everything in between.

Justifiably proud of the physical beauty of our country (and looking to catch the attention of consumers), soda bottlers often created labels depicting an iconic natural feature within their locality. Let’s look at a few of these ACL soda bottles.

“Old Faithful Beverages” (Fig. 1) was put up by the Old Faithful Beverage Company of Idaho Falls, Idaho, which is located near the western entrance to Yellowstone National Park. The bottle depicts an eruption of the Old Faithful

“Yosemite Beverages,” from the Yosemite Beverage Company of San Francisco, California (Fig. 5), comes with several different ACL’s in different sizes and colors, bottled in the late 1930s through the 1950s. All the bottles are hard to find and highly sought after by collectors. The ACL depicts the Bridalveil Falls (Fig. 6), located near El Capitan in Yosemite National Park in the Sierra Nevadas. Protected from development since 1864 by President Lincoln, the huge preserve of pristine land became a National Park in 1890 and has been popular with tourists since its inception. (Fig. 7) Direct railroad service from San Francisco to Yosemite National Park began in 1907, and the number of annual visitors reached five million in 2016, at which time the government had to start limiting entries. A rare seven-ounce example of the bottle made with a striking red and white ACL on green glass sold for $325 in 2022.

Only two volcanos in the contiguous United States have erupted during the twentieth century, and both are depicted on ACL soda bottles. “Mt. Lassen Beverages” is a ten-ounce bottle put up in 1950 by the Mount Lassen

Company of Susanville, California (Fig. 8). The back of the bottle touts that it is “A Delightful Beverage

Made from Mountain Spring Water.” Technically named Lassen Peak, the volcano in northern California awoke from 27,000 years of dormancy and violently erupted between 1914 and 1917, after which it returned to an uneasy sleep. (Fig. 10)

“St. Helens Beverages” was bottled by the St. Helens Ice & Beverage Company in St. Helens, Oregon. (Fig. 11) The front depicts Mount St. Helens, located in Washington State about 40 miles from the Oregon town that bears its name, from where the peak is clearly visible. The bottle comes with several similar but different applied color labels in various sizes, ranging from 7 to 32 ounces, and was put up between 1945 and 1960.

In 1980, long after the soda brand had disappeared from commerce, Mount St. Helens suddenly erupted with far greater violence and destruction than that of Mt. Lassen, killing fifty people and reducing hundreds of square miles of surrounding territory to wasteland. (Fig. 12) “Mt. Lassen Beverages” and “St. Helens Beverages” are scarce but do appear from time to time and are not terribly expensive when found for sale, typically under $50 for a nice clean example, although the rare quart size costs more.

No state has more physical beauty than our fiftieth, the State of Hawaii, (Fig. 14) and it was home to several beautiful ACL soda bottles. “Maui Soda” is a seven-ounce ACL bottle from 1966, put up by the Maui Soda & Ice Works of Wailuku, Maui. The red ACL has an outline map of the island of Maui with a volcanic crater and a tiny leaping swordfish and states “no ka oi,” which means “the best” in Hawaiian. The bottle is colorful, cute, and readily available and typically costs less than $50 for a nice, clean example. Like “Old Faithful Beverages,” this bottle is another type that apparently was saved by locals and visitors. My bottle was given to me by a friend, who purchased it at a flea market in Maui. (Fig. 13)

The magnificent Cascade Range (which includes the two volcanos discussed previously) extends from British Columbia in the north through Washington, Oregon and northern California in the south. The range is reportedly the home of Bigfoot, also known by its Native American name of Sasquatch. Some of the snow-capped peaks are depicted on the blue-and-white front ACL of “Cascade Beverages,” which was bottled in Wenatchee, Washington, in 1953. (Fig. 15) The bottle comes in several variants and is not too hard to find, typically costing only $15 to $50.

“Shasta Beverages” was bottled by the Shasta Water Company of Seattle and San Francisco in 1952 and shows the reflection of mountains in Shasta Lake, California. (Fig. 16) Like many soda bottles of the 1950s, it contained a mere seven ounces of liquid. Its slogan was kind of silly: “It has-ta be Shasta.” Lake Shasta is the largest artificial reservoir in California, created in the 1940s as part of the Central Valley Project. Sadly, the lake is under stress today due to the longstanding Western drought. When found, a nice example of the clear-glass bottle sells for about $200, although a very rare and dramatic version exists sporting a red-and-white ACL on green glass that costs more.

Finally, “Red River Valley Beverages” depicts one of America’s most important natural resources, its vast, fertile plains. Bottled in 1950 by the Crookston Coca-Cola Bottling Co. of Crookston, Minnesota, the bottle proudly proclaims on the back that it was “Bottled in the heart of the Red River Valley, the breadbasket of the Nation.” (Fig. 17) The Red River Valley spans northwest Minnesota and northeast North Dakota into Canada. It is one of the most productive agricultural regions in the world, growing enormous quantities of wheat, corn, potatoes, sugar beets and many other crops. In 2022, a mint example of the pastoral little seven-ounce bottle sold on eBay for $85.

These are just a few of the many ACL soda bottles depicting various natural features located throughout America the Beautiful. God bless America!

BIBLIOGRAPHY:

Sweeney, Rick, Collecting Applied Color Label Soda Bottles (3d ed. 2002, PSBCA). Tim A.C.L. Miller, a FaceBook page showing hundreds of rare ACL sodas from Tim’s collection.

VintageSodaCollector.com by FOHBC member Tom Pettit, a great resource. Weide’s Soda Page (ca-yd.com), by Chris and Catherine Weide, another great resource. Wikipedia entries for Mount Lassen, Mount St. Helens, Old Faithful, Red River Valley, Shasta, Yellowstone National Park, Yosemite.

Editor Note: See AB&GC September–October 2022 issue for the premier article in this series, The Joy of Collecting ACL Bottles, followed by ACL Corner #1–Portraits on Bottles, ACL#2–Topic of Space, ACL#3–Indians, ACL#4–Famous Women. Look for ACL#6 next issue–Cowboys!

Auction #35 will include a diverse selection of more than 280 Lots including Historical Flasks, Rare Bitters, Choice Pontiled Medicines, Inks, Blown and Pattern Molded Wares, Sodas, Mineral Water Bottles, Black Glass, and much more!

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