48
January - February 2022
Bottles and Extras
If you can’t do business
Drink Rex Bitters By Ferdinand Meyer V
Most of the ephemera used in this article is from the Joe Gourd and Ferdinand Meyer V collections.
Pre-Prohibition Chicago Rex Bitters is what I call a “telephone bitters.” A bitters produced so late that you could call your favorite saloon, liquor, or drug store and order a case of Rex Bitters using your Chicago Telephone Company-issued telephone if you were fortunate enough to have one. Illinois Bell would not form until 1923 when they began automatic telephone service in Chicago. The first Rex bottles were amber squares followed by amber and clear round or cylinder bottles. There are several variants but we will look at the main examples for now. The primary listings within the Carlyn Ring and W. C. Ham Bitters Bottles, Bitters Bottles Supplement, and Bitters Bottles Supplement 2 books are as follows: R 41 REX / BITTERS / CO. / CHICAGO // c // Rex Bitters Co. 1712 – 1714 Michigan Avenue, Chicago, Illinois 11 ½ x 3 (7 ½) Round, Clear & Amber, ABM Label: Drink Rex Bitters for your stomach’s sake. Good in all cases of biliousness, constipation, liver, kidney and blood troubles. Fine as a bracer in any case of over-indulgence in eating or drinking. Get Yours. You’ll Need It. R 43 REX / KIDNEY & LIVER / BITTERS // f // REX BITTERS / NOTHING ELSE // f // Overbrook & Co., Wholesale Liquors, Boston, Massachusetts 10 x 2 ¾ (8) Square, Amber, LTCR, Common R 44 REX ( l > s ) KIDNEY ( au ) / AND / LIVER ( ad ) / BITTERS ( s > l ) // THE BEST LAXATIVE / AND BLOOD PURIFIER // f // 9 5/8 x 2 ¾ (7 ½) Square, Amber & Green, LTCR, Common (Editor Note: Never seen a green square? Round, green screw cap bottles used in 1941) Very similar to Lash’s Kidney and Liver Bitters.
Rex Bitters studio model photography
Collectors tend to shy away from these later bitters though every serious bitters collector should have a Rex Bitters bottle as it tells a story. A story of the tail end of bitters production before Prohibition in the United States, which in 1920 essentially shut the alcohol-laced bitters business down. Well, Prohibition tried to, as some bitters were quickly re-purposed or disguised as medicines and sold illegally as we will see. In 1933, with the end of Prohibition, some of the more resilient bitters came back to life.
