Heard it through the Grapevine

Bottle Collectors Support John Ryan Grave Marker

By Bill Baab

Savannah, Georgia – One-hundred and thirty-five years ago, this port city lost one of its most prominent sons when soda water manufacturer John Ryan passed away after a short illness.

From 1852, when he joined Savannah’s Irish community and established his Excelsior Bottling Works, Ryan became well-known for his soda water, ginger ale and mineral water — put up in a scintillating colorful array of bottles.

When the Civil War started, he faced difficulty in acquiring shipments of the bottles manufactured at Philadelphia’s Union Glass Works and other glass manufactories in the North.

But after the war ended in 1865, John Ryan resumed operations and even established branches in the Georgia cities of Augusta (1866), Atlanta (1867) and Columbus (1883).

In the early 1960s the hobby of digging privies and 100-year-old landfills in Savannah for antique bottles brought to life many of Ryan’s bottles that had been buried just after his death on March 25, 1885.

Collectors were astounded by the containers’ colors in cobalt blue, emerald green, various shades of amber, yellow, red, pink and even gray. Bottles in the odd colors are rare.

After his death, Ryan was interred in the old Catholic Cathedral Cemetery on Savannah’s Wheaton Street. One would think a man of his prominence would have his grave marked with a first-class monument, but such was not the case, for unknown reasons.

Many collectors of Ryan’s bottles have become offended by the lack of a monument or memorial on the grave of one of America’s best-known pioneer soda water manufacturers.

So a memorial fund has been established with a $5,000 goal, a suitable marker will be selected and a graveside memorial service to commemorate his life and achievements will be held. Once the goal is reached, the bottle collecting world will be notified of the date and time and collectors who would like to attend the service will be welcomed.

The writer financially supports such an endeavor and hopes many of his collector friends will feel likewise. Checks payable to the John Ryan Memorial Fund and mailed to P.O. Box 9491, Savannah, GA 31412-0491 will help reach the goal. If contributors wish to pay by credit card, ask for an invoice and it can be paid securely by their email.

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Heard it through the Grapevine

Van Gogh: Great Painter, Second-Rate Bottle Collector

By Ralph Finch

A brush with old bottles? Well-known now as an artist, but Vincent Van Gogh didn’t have an eye for old bottles. Clearly, his perspective on things was off.

While the original painting might cost you millions, and the print shown here sold for $80 at a recent auction in Las Vegas, and the subjects of his oils were, well, less oil and more oy vey. If these items were to show up today at an antiques show, the pottery pieces might attract $25-50, while the bottle might bring a bit more. If only he had put in a great flask, or perhaps an early cure, then we would all be interested.

If Van Gogh could be here today, and looking back, he’d probably ask, “Why didn’t I pick up a really good bottle? Even a fruit jar.” No wonder he committed suicide. He had a brush with art, but not an ear for the public’s taste. Vincent Willem van Gogh, 1853-90, was a Dutch post-impressionist painter who is among the most famous and influential figures in the history of Western art. Still, he isn’t my favorite painter. He even painted a series of old shoes. (I painted my garage once, but did that make me special?) Not so oddly enough, only one of Van Gogh’s paintings was sold while he was alive.

How close Vincent would have come to create a real masterpiece if only he had also been a bottle collector. (Note: We have at least one painting on the wall that shows a bottle of ketchup. Now THAT’S art, and as American as apple pie with a taste of Heinz.)

FYI: The original painting, called “Still Life with Four Stone Bottles, Flask and White Cup,” was done in 1884, and is in the Kröller-Müller Museum in Otterlo, Netherlands. If you want to see a painting of a ketchup bottle, it is in the Finch Museum, in Farmington Hills, Michigan, and open to the public, free of charge.

Classy Item for your Toilet

Actually, it IS a toilet. An old one. Another dubious report by Ralph Finch

Selling about the 1st of October was this circa 1900 “Sanitary Works Lambeth” item offered by Whitley’s Auctioneers of Dania Beach, Florida.

Why was I interested? I don’t even have a good answer, but I’m a collector, so … I don’t need a good answer. And I really am not overly flush with money.

It was described as 4 inches high, made by England’s Royal Doulton, and “ROYAL DOULTON SALESMAN SAMPLE TOILET, SANITARY LAMBETH.”

Estimated at $600-$800, it sold for $200 plus a buyer’s premium of 25 percent. This is the kind of item that goes to a collector who wants to send his cash down the drain.

Upset? Complain to rfinch@twmi. rr.com