Tag: BIM

Wm. R. Warner & Co., Philadelphia

 

William R. Warner is one of several individuals recognized as pioneers in the manufacture and distribution of sugar coated pills in the United States. According to a feature on Warner found in a publication entitled: “First Century of the Philadelphia College of Pharmacy,” published in 1922:

Like the process of percolation the sugar coating of pills was discovered in France but was developed in America by the labors of Warner, Bullock, Wiegand and others.

Born in Caroline County, Maryland in 1836, Warner first entered the drug business with the Easton, Maryland firm of Chamberlain and Anderson. His experience there apparently inspired him to attend the Philadelphia College of Pharmacy where he graduated in 1856. Shortly afterwards he opened his own retail pharmacy at Second Street and Girard Avenue in Philadelphia.

According to his son, William R. Warner, Jr., who was quoted in the Philadelphia College of Pharmacy story, it was at the Second Street pharmacy that Warner began the manufacture of sugar coated pills. That being said, initially they were not distributed under the Warner name.

My father conceived the idea of sugar coating pills when a lad in the drug store at Easton, Md., and accomplished the feat though somewhat crudely. I am inclined to believe that he perfected his process of covering pills with sugar shortly after 1856, or probably the next year. He made and sold them to Bullock and Crenshaw in bulk and they put them up and marketed them as their own, such is now done by druggists under “buyers name.” My father was not known by the profession as the real maker of sugar coated pills at that time.

It appears that Bullock and Crenshaw began selling Warner’s sugar coated pills under their name sometime in 1858 as evidenced by this notice dated May, 1858. Sounding introductory in nature, the notice starts out with:

The attention of Druggists and Physicians is particularly invited to the Pills of our Pharmacopeia, coated with sugar, which we are now able to supply…

This situation changed in the mid-1860’s when Warner purchased the wholesale drug business of John C. Baker at about the same time that his contract with Bullock and Crenshaw expired. Located at 154 North Third Street in Philadelphia, it was here that according to William R. Warner, Jr., his father began to manufacture and market his pills under the name and label of  William R. Warner and Co.

The change had certainly occurred  by 1867 as evidenced by this Warner advertisement that appeared that year in the “Handbook of the Great Manufacturers and Representative Mercantile Houses of Philadelphia.”

That same year, now in direct competition, both William R. Warner & Co. and  Bullock and Crenshaw, exhibited their sugar coated pills at a September, 1867 exhibition sponsored by the American Pharmaceutical Association. In fact,  both firms were listed directly adjacent to each other in the exhibition summary .

Warner remained on North Third Street for the next 10 years during which time he frequently marketed his sugar coated pills to the medical profession. An example of his marketing pitch appeared in the 1870 edition of the “Humboldt Medical Archives” under the heading “Notice to Physicians.”

The solubility of Officinal and other Sugar Coated Pills as made by us, is an indispensable quality, and a matter of so much importance as to command your special attention. An experience of thirteen years, with careful attention and study, has enabled us to achieve a perfection otherwise unattainable.

We claim this art of Sugar Coating, avoiding the necessity of drying so hard as to render them insoluble and inert make them permanent.

Being extensively engaged in the Wholesale Drug business, and in the manufacture of Standard Officinal Preparations, and New Remedies, in our own Laboratory, affords us facilities for supplying Physician’s orders with all articles of the purest quality at the lowest prices.

A discount of 25 percent will be made to Physicians on all orders for Pills amounting to $10.00 net. Less quantities will be sent by mail or express pre-paid on receipt of catalog prices.

Please specify our make (W. & Co.) when it suits your convenience to order elsewhere. Half freight paid on shipments of Drugs to distant points

A good customer could even get a “Pill Globe and Sample Bottle” along with his 25% discount..

It was also during this time that the company began to expand its product line well beyond sugar coated pills to include elixirs, fluid extracts and medicated lozenges among other things.

The company’s success on North Third Street ultimately lead to a period of expansion that began in the 1870’s. This expansion was documented in a January 9, 1908 feature on the business published in “The Pharmaceutical Era.”

In 1876 the business having outgrown the quarters on Third Street, the fine large building at 1228 Market Street was purchased, elegantly fitted up and occupied. About this time, on account of the extensive growth of the business, branches in London, England and New York City were opened, and these were soon followed by branches in Chicago, New Orleans, Atlanta, St. Louis, Denver, Portland, Ore., and Minneapolis, Minn.

In 1886 a large laboratory building at Broad and Wallace was erected and put into use, the business having outgrown its quarters on Market Street.

Renderings of both Philadelphia locations were included in the ninth edition (1897) of “Wm. R. Warner’s Therapeutic Reference Book for Physicians.” The top view depicts the Broad Street laboratory while the lower view is of Market Street.

The business operated out of both locations until 1899 when the Market Street building was completely destroyed by fire. The fire was described like this in the February 17, 1899 edition of the Philadelphia Inquirer.

Snow on many roof tops proved to be a blessing in disguise last night, when a great fire raged at Thirteenth and Market Streets, calling forth every energy of those who were battling with it to save a vast amount of property on all sides that for a time seemed doomed to destruction. It was a fire that brought out the entire department, that swept away an immense six-story building, or rather three in one, entailing a loss estimated at from $400,000 to $500,000….

The story included this sketch of the Warner building in flames.

As early as the next day the company had formulated a plan to move on as evidenced by this February 18, 1899 story in the “Philadelphia Inquirer.”

In regard to the future plans of the firm of William R. Warner & Co., Mr. William R. Warner, Jr., said last evening: “All the employees of our Market Street store, numbering some fifty, have been notified to report at our laboratory, at Broad and Wallace Streets. Those that are available for work in that line will be given employment immediately and the others will be kept on full pay. The laboratory will be made headquarters for the firm and all the offices will be removed there. We intend to rebuild at 1228 Market Street as soon as possible, but as to the size of the new building or its equipment I am not able to speak as yet. All the old men will thus be retained and none of them will suffer by our misfortune.

Less than a month later, on March 13, 1899, an item in the “Philadelphia Inquirer” announced that the company was fully back in business, now filling orders at their Broad Street laboratory.

Around the same time, a March 18, 1899 “Philadelphia Inquirer” story announced that Warner was planning a new 10 story building at 1228 Market Street, however, it appears the company never followed through on those plans and a year later, in June, 1900, the Montana Diamond Co. ran a ‘Philadelphia Inquirer” advertisement announcing their plans to move into a newly constructed eight story building at the 1228 Market Street location.

As far as I can tell William R. Warner & Co. never reopened  another location in Philadelphia but instead continued to operate solely on Broad Street.

When Warner passed away in April, 1901, he left the company to his son, William R. Warner, Jr., who, as early as 1880 had been associated with the business, first as a cashier and later as a partner/principal.

In 1908, Warner Jr. sold the company to Henry & Gustavus Pfeiffer, who, at the time, owned a drug business in St. Louis. The Pfeiffer’s retained the William R. Warner & Co. name and continued to operate the business out of Philadelphia where, in 1910, it was listed with William R. Warner, Jr. as president, Henry Pfeiffer as vice president and Gustavus Pfeiffer as secretary/treasurer.

As late as 1916 the company was in the process of constructing a new headquarters in Philadelphia when the Pfeiffer’s acquired the Richard Hudnut Company of New York City. The acquisition was reported in the August, 1916 edition of the “Pharmaceutical Record.”

An announcement of interest to the trade was recently made by Richard A. Hudnut, who has sold substantial interest in Richard Hudnut to Messrs. H. Pfeiffer, G. A. Pfeiffer and G.D. Merner, of the firm of Wm. R. Warner & Co., of Philadelphia and St. Louis. Mr. Hudnut continues as president, and the business policies that have made the name “Richard Hudnut” famous in the perfume and toilet goods world will be continued…

The acquisition of Hudnut apparently motivated the Pfeiffer’s to change course and headquarter both the Warner and Hudnut companies in New York City. This led to the purchase of a large property on West 18th Street in Manhattan. The announcement appeared in the October 26, 1916 edition of the “Philadelphia Inquirer.”

W. R. Warner & Co. Leave City

Having purchased the whole of the old Altman store, 113 to 123 and 131 to 143 West Eighteenth Street, and 110 to 124 West Nineteenth Street, New York, William R. Warner & Co., manufacturing chemists, employing about 500 persons, will abandon their property at 639 North Broad Street, this city. The price paid for the new location is said to have been approximately its assessed valuation, $1,100,000, all of which was paid in cash…

Three days later, another announcement in the “Philadelphia Inquirer” put their new Philadelphia building, still under construction, up for sale.

This building is now being constructed on Willow, Seventh and Marshall Streets, Philadelphia, by Wm. Steele & Sons Co., for Wm R. Warner & Co., Manufacturing Pharmacists.

Their move to New York, as announced, will bring into the market for sale this new modern six-story, heavy concrete, sprinkled, loft building. The fact that the building is now under construction enables you to adapt it to your needs…

We are also offering for sale an unexpired lease on the present Wm. R. Warner & Co. plant at 639-41-43 N. Broad St. which continues for a term of years.

The building that was under construction 100+ years years ago, remains to this day. Here’s today’s view courtesy of Google Maps. It appears that a seventh story was added, taking  the place of the roof top “Wm. R. Warner Co.” sign.

As early as 1917, the New York City directories listed both Wm. R. Warner & Co. and Richard Hudnut, Inc. at the West 18th Street address in Manhattan.

Both continued to be listed under their respective names at that location until 1950, when they were combined under a new corporation called Warner-Hudnut, Inc. At that point both Warner and Hudnut were listed as separate divisions under the Warner-Hudnut umbrella.

Five years later Warner-Hudnut merged with the Lambert Co., makers of Listerine, forming the Warner-Lambert Pharmaceutical Co.  The merger was announced in the February 9, 1955 edition of the “Philadelphia Inquirer.”

Directors of Warner-Hudnut Inc., and Lambert Co. approved plans for a merger of the two companies, with the new concern to be known as Warner-Lambert Pharmaceutical Co.

The new company would have estimated annual sales of $100,000,ooo and assets of $45,000,000.

On the same day the merger was announced, plans to build a new factory in Pennsylvania were unveiled. According to the February 9, 1955 edition of Lancaster Pennsylvania’s “Intelligencer Journal” the plant was slated to replace the company’s West 18th Street facility.

The new plant, according to a Warner-Hudnut spokesman, will replace one operated in New York by the company. It will manufacture the firm’s nationally-known line of “Richard Hudnut” hair preparations and toiletries..

Last November the company announced it had contracted to sell its New York buildings to Webb & Knapp, Inc.

The new factory opened in Lancaster County, Pennsylvania in November, 1956. By then, the corporation was completely out of New York, having also moved their offices to Morris Plains, New Jersey earlier that year. The company had announced the move to New Jersey in the February, 1956 editions of several local newspapers.

When completed in mid-summer, this modern air-conditioned building will be the new headquarters of Warner-Lambert Pharmaceutical Company, now located in New York City. It is being built on a knoll across Mt. Tabor Road from Warner-Chilcott  Laboratories, our ethical drug division.

The site will be the administrative center of our world-wide organization. From here we shall direct our five divisions in the United States, as well as our manufacturing plants in twenty-two foreign countries, and our sales agencies in one hundred more.

Over the next several years Warner-Lambert continued to grow through acquisition. According to a December 15, 1967 story in Philadelphia’s “Intelligencer Journal,” between 1955 and 1962 they acquired a number of well known brands that included Bromo Seltzer, Chiclets, Dentyne, Rolaid’s and Clorets.

Warner-Lambert merged with Park-Davis in 1970, ultimately becoming part of Pfizer in 2000.

Over the years I’ve found two Wm. R. Warner bottles. Both include “Philadelphia” in their embossing, dating them no later than 1916 when the company moved their headquarters to New York City.

The first is a small mouth blown vial. A little over three inches tall, it likely contained a small quantity of pills? The other, also mouth blown, is cobalt blue and six inches tall. It appears to have contained an effervescing salt called “Bromo Soda.”

The product was frequently advertised in the late 1880’s and 1890’s:

For The Speedy Relief Of Nervous Headache and Brain Fatigue.

 

C. B. Ellin’s Horseradish, New York

 

Clifford B. Ellin was a native New Yorker born in 1880. He was active in New York City’s wholesale grocery trade during the first two decades of the twentieth century before relocating to Morrisville, in Bucks County,  Pennsylvania.

His business career began at the age of twenty when he  partnered with Charles S. Heron forming  C.B. Ellin & Company. Located in the Bronx, N.Y., the company was first listed in the 1901 N.Y.C. Copartnership and Corporation Directory at 769 East 167th Street.

A year later, the 1902 edition of the same directory listed their address as 1238 Brook Avenue. During this time N.Y.C general directories identified Ellin’s occupation as “teas.”

C.B. Ellin & Company was no longer listed in the 1906 N.Y.C Copartnership and Corporation Directory (the next one I have access to) and after 1903 Ellin’s general directory listing drops the Brook Avenue address; all suggesting that sometime between 1903 and 1905 the formal partnership between Ellin and Heron was dissolved.

Later, sometime in 1906, Ellin apparently went into business for himself as a wholesale dealer in both “pickles” and “horseradish.” Now located in lower Manhattan, the business was originally listed at 425 Greenwich Street until sometime around 1909 when it moved to 503 Greenwich Street

An item in the September, 1915 edition of a publication called “Simmon’s Spice Mill” referred to C.B. Ellin as “the headquarters for horseradish root in wholesale quantities.” The item appeared under the heading: “Queries and Answers of Special Interest.”

Fresh Horse Radish Root

“M. S.,” of Marion, N. C. asks: “Will you do us the favor of telling us from whom we may obtain fresh horse radish root?”

Ans.- C. B. Ellin, 503 Greenwich St., New York, is headquarters for horseradish root in wholesale quantities. We understand that at the present time, however, there is no actually fresh horseradish root on the market and that there will not be any root on the market until after September; but correspondent can obtain cold storage horseradish root from the above named firm.

The company remained at 503 Greenwich Street until 1918 or 1919 when Ellin apparently closed up shop.

By 1920, Ellin had moved to Morrisville, Pennsylvania where, according to a March 12, 1920 story in the Bristol (Pa.) Daily Courier, he established a business operating a bus route between Morrisville and Trenton, N.J. By then he was also serving on the Morrisville Borough Council.

The jar I found is eight-sided and measures 2-1/4-inches wide at the base. Towards the top it transitions to an approximate 1-3/4-inch round opening. It dates to the 1906 to 1918 time period when Ellin marketed horseradish. Blown in a mold, it likely trends to the early end of that range.

 

Leslie Dunham & Co., Brooklyn, N.Y., 1-lb. Pure Honey

 

Leslie, Dunham & Company were wholesale dealers in honey, maple syrup and sugar that operated in Brooklyn, N. Y. from 1888 to 1908. Ultimately the company opened another location in New Jersey where they continued in business until the mid 1920’s and possibly longer.

Their honey was sold with brand names like “Orange Blossom,” and “Choice Extra Clover,” while their maple syrup brands were, among others, “Green Mountain” and “Maple Twig.” “Green Mountain” was apparently one of  their most popular.

The company’s founder and long time senior member was a native Canadian of Scottish descent named Charles G. Leslie who settled in Pittsfield, Massachusetts sometime after arriving in the United States in 1848. According to his September 27, 1907 obituary published in the “Berkshire Eagle:”

Mr. Leslie was born in St. Bridget, Canada, moving to the United States when a young man. He spent most of his life in Brooklyn, N.Y., where he was actively engaged in business, being the head of the firm of Leslie, Dunham & Co., which he established some 50 years ago.

The above obituary suggests that the business was established sometime around 1860, a fact that’s referenced in several of the company’s business cards published years later in the Brooklyn city directories.

That year census records listed both Charles G. Leslie and Darius W. Dunham as farmers living in the Berkshires of western Massachusetts.  The census records, along with the obituary of Darius Dunham, published in the 1896 edition of the “Pittsfield Sun,” indicate that in 1859 Leslie married Dunham’s daughter Malissa. So the Leslie’s and Dunhams certainly had a personal relationship by then.

That being said, through the early 1870’s there’s no reference to either Leslie, Dunham or the company in the city directories for Brooklyn, New York City or even Boston for that matter, so any business apparently remained local to Pittsfield during that time.

That changed in the mid-1870’s when both Charles G. Leslie, along with Darius Dunham’s son, Jasper T., both began to appear in the Brooklyn directories with the occupation of “syrup manufacturer” and/or “honey” albeit at separate locations; Charles G. at 150 Nassau Street, and Jasper T. at 478 4th Avenue. During the early 1880’s Jasper also spent some time across the Hudson River in Jersey City where he was listed with the occupation of “honey” at 133 Coles Street.

Whether a partnership existed at this point is not clear, however by 1888 they were certainly in business together when this item appeared in the March 24th edition of the “Brooklyn Daily Eagle.”

On Greene Avenue near Grand, Messrs. Leslie & Dunham are about to build a two story brick factory 25 x 95, to cost $8,000.

Subsequently in Brooklyn’s 1890 “Lains Business Directory” the Leslie, Dunham & Company name appears for the first time with an address of 275 Greene Avenue.  That year , their business card was included with the directory listing.

Also listed individually at the Greene Avenue address were both Charles G. Leslie and Jasper T. Dunham along  with Leslie’s son, Merwin. The business remained on Greene Avenue for the next 20 years, listing 281 Greene as their address in later years.

Apparently a relatively small operation, the New York State Factory Inspector’s Report for the Year Ending November 30, 1900 listed seven full time employees, all working a 60 hour week.

In 1904 the company opened a second location, this one at 252 Livingston Street in Newark, New Jersey, where the 1904 Newark Directory named Merwin Leslie as “plant superintendent.”

In 1908, with Charles Leslie having passed away the year before and Dunham either retired or having taken a step back (he passed away in 1944 at the age of 96), the Brooklyn plant disappeared from the Brooklyn directories. The Newark operation, with Merwin now listed as principal, remained at the Livingston Avenue location until sometime in the mid-teens at which time it relocated to 644 Montgomery Street in Jersey City. The company was still located there in 1925 (the latest directory I have access to).

It’s not clear when the business came to an end, however, Merwin Leslie was still living in New Jersey and continued to list his occupation as “merchant, maple products” in the 1930 census records, so its possible the life of the business extended into the 1930’s.

The bottle I found is 6-1/2-inches tall with a 2-1/4-inch square cross section that transitions to an approximate 1-3/4-inch round opening. Its embossing includes the “Brooklyn, N. Y.” location, dating it between 1888 and 1908.

 

 

A. Hupfel’s Son’s, 161st St. & 3rd Ave., New York

 

Three generations of the Hupfel family owned and operated two breweries located in and around New York from the mid-1800’s up through the start of Prohibition. One was situated in New York City’s Borough of  Manhattan and the other in the Westchester County town of Morrisania, that later became part of the Bronx.

The Manhattan location got its start in 1854 when a German immigrant named Anton Hupfel along with several partners established a brewery on East 38th Street. The founding of the brewery along with its early history was described in a publication entitled “One Hundred Years of Brewing,” published in 1903.

In 1854 John Roemmelt, Anton Hupfel and Dr. Assenheimer, under the firm name of John Roemmelt & Company, founded a brewery in New York City, in Thirty Eighth Street, between Second and Third Avenues. In 1856 Andrew Leicht, Charles K. Leicht and John M. Leicht purchased Dr. Assenheimer’s interest, and two years later (1858) Anton Hupfel bought out Messrs. Roemmelt and Leicht.

Much of this history is supported in the N.Y.C. directories where Roemmelt & Company was first listed in 1855/1856 as brewers with an address of 151 and 153 East 38th Street. By 1858/1859 Anton Hupfel was listed individually as a brewer on East 38th Street.

Later, in 1863, Hupfel acquired his Morrisania brewery. Its history prior to Hupfel’s acquisition is somewhat muddled. According to “One hundred Years of Brewing:”

About 1857 Xavier Gnant built a small brewery in New York City, which he operated until his death. His widow (Eliza) married a Mr. Schoemig, who in 1863, disposed of the business to Anton Hupfel.

Records associated with an 1868 Westchester County Supreme Court Case, “Xavier Gnant against Anton Hupfel,” tell a different story. They indicate that Xavier’s brother, George Gnant actually established the brewery and was the Gnant actually married to Eliza. In 1857 George deeded the brewery to Xavier in an effort to protect the property from the claims of an ex-wife. Though the property was deeded to Xavier, it was George who continued to run the business and it was his death in January, 1862, not Xavier’s, that resulted in Eliza’s marriage to Schoeming and the sale of the brewery to Hupfel; a sale that Xavier would go on to unsuccessfully contest.

A reference to the brewery found in the 1858/1859 N.Y.C Directory refers to the business as G. Gnant & Co. which serves to support this version of the brewery’s early history. Either way, it’s quite certain that by the end of 1863 Hupfel was running the brewery.

The Supreme Court records generally located the brewery in an area bounded by streets formerly named Carr Avenue, Cliff Street and Avenue A in the Town of Morrisania, with the 1858/1859 directory listing its address as 93 Avenue A. In 1874, Morrisania, along with much of the surrounding area west of the Bronx River,  was annexed to New York City and ultimately became part of the Bronx. At that point N.Y.C directories were listing the brewery’s address on St. Ann’s Avenue (3rd Ave.).

Both breweries operated under Anton Hupfel’s name until 1873 when, according to “One Hundred Years of Brewing,” he disposed of his entire interest to his two sons, J. Christian. G. Hupfel and Adolph G. Hupfel. Over the next 10 years the sons continued to operate both breweries as a single business entity that was listed in the directories as A. Hupfel’s Sons. This  advertisement that exhibits the address of both breweries under the A. Hupfel Sons’ name appeared in the December 31, 1878 edition of the “New York Times.”

In 1883 the Hupfel sons dissolved their partnership at which time Adolph Hupfel continued  to operate the 161st Street brewery under the the A. Hupfel Sons’ name while J. Chr. G Hupfel retained possession of the Manhattan plant. Individual advertisements for each brewery published in late 1883 and early 1884 serve to confirm the new arrangement.This December 25, 1888 “New York Sun” advertisement located A. Hupfel’s Sons solely on 161st Street in Morrisania…

….and an April 27, 1884 advertisement, also in the “New York Sun”, put J. Chr. G. Hupfel on 38th Street in Manhattan.

A history of each entity moving forward continues below.

J. Christian G. Hupfel Brewery, 229 East 38th Street

In October, 1887 the business incorporated as the J. Chr. G. Brewing Company with capital of $500,000 and  J. Christian G. Hupfel as president. The first listing for the new corporation that I can find appeared in the March, 1889 N.Y.C. Copartnership and Corporation Directory.

At some point during the 1890’s Hupfel’s three sons, Anton C. G., Adolph G. and Chr. G. Hupfel were appointed officers and/or trustees of the company, as evidenced by the March, 1900 N.Y.C. Copartnership and Corporation  listing below.

A  turn of the century depiction of their 38th Street facility appeared on this serving tray recently offered for sale on the internet.

In 1914 the company added a Brooklyn plant, acquiring the former brewery of Joseph Eppig.  Joseph Eppig Brewery, Brooklyn, N.Y.  The acquisition was announced in the August 8 edition of the Brooklyn “Times Union.”

The plant of the Joseph Eppig Brewing Company, which covers an extensive area at Central Avenue, Grove and Leonard Streets, has been sold by the estate of Joseph Eppig to the J. Chr. G. Hupfel Brewing Company, of 229 East 38th Street, Manhattan. The purchase price is not known, but the property is known to have brought a high figure.

The Eppig Brewing Company’s plant consists of two large brick and one frame structure covering an area of 200 x 500 feet.

Another story covering the sale, this one published in the “New York Times,” went on to say:

Both breweries will be operated in the future under the Hupfel Company’s name.

Five years later, with Prohibition becoming a reality, the Hupfel’s transitioned into the real estate business and in 1919 established the Hup Realty Company. The incorporation notice was published in the October 3, 1919 edition of the “New York Times.”

The address of the realty company, 229 East 38th Street, makes it clear that they were running the business out of their former brewery building. Another advertisement, this one found in the September 3, 1922 edition of the “New York Herald,” indicates that other portions of the 38th Street brewery (items 2 and 3 on the list) were being rented out to other businesses.

That being said, as Prohibition ended the Hupfels were back in the beer business serving as brewers for Canada Dry who at the time was attempting to expand into the domestic beer arena. The Boston Globe was one of many nationwide newspapers providing the details. They appeared in their August 31, 1933 issue.

CANADA DRY GINGER ALE, INC TO HANDLE HUPFEL’S BEER

P.D. Saylor, president of Canada Dry Ginger Ale, Inc., and Anton C.G. Hupfel, president of J. Chr. G Hupfel Company, Inc. announced yesterday that an agreement has been entered into between the two concerns, under the terms of which a company will be organized called the J. Chr. G. Hupfel Brewing Corporation, in which Canada Dry Ginger Ale, Inc., will have a financial interest. There will be no sale of stock to the public.

The new company will immediately install modern equipment in the Hupfel brewery on 38th and 39th Sts., between 2nd and 3rd Aves., Manhattan, New York City, established in 1854.

Brewing will begin about the first of next year, and distribution will start about April, 1934, when it has been properly aged.

Distribution of Hupfel’s beer will be undertaken by Canada Dry Ginger Ale, Inc. The initial capacity of the brewery will be about 350,000 barrels and may be increased as demand warrants it. A new bottling plant will be erected on the 39th St. side of the property.

The agreement marks the launching of Canada Dry’s domestic beer business.

Canada Dry newspaper advertisements for  “Hupfel’s Beer”  began appearing in June, 1934

Canada Dry’s venture into the beer business was short-lived with the end of the venture, as well as the end of the Hupfel brewery, coming less than four years after Hupfel Beer was introduced. An October 21, 1939 story in Toronto Canada’s “Financial Post” ultimately served as the final chapter in the brewery’s history.

In 1935, a former contract was revised and a new one signed, whereby Canada Dry was relieved of all financial responsibility with respect to the brewery and from any obligation to market draft beer.

Canada Dry gave back its 50% interest in the common stock of the brewing company in consideration for the cancellation of the original agreement. Canada Dry still had the $1 million first mortgage on the property and when in 1938 the Hupfel Corp. discontinued operation, foreclosure proceedings were started.

The story went on to say:

Canada Dry Ginger Ale acquired the property of the J. Chr. G. Hupfel Brewing Corp. at a mortgage sale recently. Canada Dry was the foreclosure plaintiff and bid in $500,000 for the brewery property. Amount of the mortgage debt involved was about $1.2 million.

A. Hupfel’s Sons Brewery, St. Ann’s Avenue (3rd Ave) and 161st Street

Meanwhile back in the Bronx, Adolph Hupfel continued to operate the 161st Street brewery under the A Hupfel Sons name and in 1889 joined a newly formed corporation called the United States Brewing Company. The terms of the deal were explained in the May 13th edition of “The Journal,” published in Meridian Connecticut.

New York, May 13. – Three big lager beer breweries in Newark, one in this city and one in Albany were combined last week in a great brewing corporation, with a capital stock of $4,750,000. The owners of the plants are Gottfried Krueger, the brewer king of Newark; Mrs. Christiana Trefz of Newark: Peter Hauck of East Newark, Adolph Hupfel of this city and the Albany Brewing Company…Krueger’s brewery is the largest in the scheme, and it is understood that it has been taken at a valuation of $2,000,000, and that he is to receive half in cash and the other half in stock. The valuation upon Hauck’s brewery is said to be $1,000,000, and he gets the same terms. Mrs. Trefz’s is valued at $600,000, Hupfel’s at $600,000 and the Albany Brewing Company’s at $500,000. The management of the breweries is to remain entirely in the hands of the former owners…

The brewery continued to operate under the A. Hupfel Sons’ name up through Prohibition.

This 1896 view of the brewery appeared on a post card recently offered for sale on the internet…

…and a May 23, 1908 feature published under the general heading “Industry and Commerce,” in the Staunton Va. “Leader,”  provided this snapshot of the business in the first decade of the 20th Century. By this time, Adolph’s son, Adolph G. Hupfel, Jr. was serving as president.

Four different kinds of beer are brewed by A. Hupfel’s Sons – a light beer, in which rice is an ingredient; a dark German brew which, with the beer used for ordinary consumption, is a malt product and a special brew for bottling purposes.

Twice each day there is a brewing. Each adds 300 barrels to the output of the A. Hupfel’s Sons’ brewery, whose capacity is 600 barrels a day….

Started in 1854 by Anton Hupfel with an output of only a few thousand barrels a year, it now produces 120,000 barrels annually, and has branches at Yonkers, Mount Vernon, Peekskill, Ossining, Fishkill, Mamoroneck and Bridgeport Connecticut. A total of 100 hands is employed.

Between 1913 and 1915 the brewery transitioned from horse drawn delivery to motor trucks. A story found in the March 5, 1917 edition of the “Anaconda (Montana) Standard,” described the associated benefits of this transition in Adolph Hupfel’s own words. It also provides some insight into the issues associated with the operation of an early 20th century brewery.

Mr. Hupfel explained that the great gain affected by the trucks had been in the abolition of two service stations. These were located at Mount Vernon and Mamaroneck. Beer was shipped to the two points in car load lots under the old arrangement and then distributed by horse-drawn vehicles.

At both points it was necessary to maintain full-fledged stations with 10 horses each, 6 wagons, 3 drivers, watchmen, stablemen, superintendent, clerks, etc.

There was also the problem of the extra handlings. Beer had to be carted to the railroad station, taken off, loaded on the platform, thence into freight cars, taken off these at the end of the journey and then put on the horse-drawn vehicles that completed the journey.

Now all the delivery is made from the main garage. The stations have been rented for other purposes and now, in place of being a source of outlay to the company, have become a source of revenue.

The brewery survived prohibition in unique fashion, transitioning into, of all things, a mushroom plantation. A November 4, 1923 story in the “Tampa Tribune” tells the story.

Speaking of prohibition and the changes it has wrought, one of the most remarkable is to be seen from the windows of elevated trains that pass the old Hupfel brewery at Third Avenue and 161st Street. Above the lofty cornice of the big red brick building a sign rears itself: “Hupfel Mushroom Plantations.”

Inside those red walls, covering only a portion of a city block, ten acres of ground, a fair sized farm, is under cultivation, and is yielding daily something like half a ton of fresh picked mushrooms…

Mr Hupfel himself hardly knows why he selected mushrooms as an industry when he had to admit to himself back in 1918 that prohibition was practically sure to come. A brewery represents a very large investment, mostly in the shape of insulated store rooms which are but slightly adaptable to any other line of manufacture. Also as a brewer, one of his principal interests had been the growing of yeast, a very low form of fungus. So it didn’t seem wholly strange to contemplate growing a higher fungus, the mushroom…

Building specially designed racks in the cellars and store rooms he created a skyscraper garden precisely on the principle of the skyscraper office building or dwelling. Now in many rooms six tiers of beds are erected one above the other, which accounts for the existence of a ten acre “plantation” on a comparatively small ground space..

The end product was a paste marketed under the name “Champee,” a name he trademarked in 1922.

The following spring advertisements for “Champee” made their appearance in more than a few magazines and newspapers. The following appeared in the May, 1923 edition of the Chilton Hotel Supply Index.

“Champee” advertisements popped up in other forms as well. Look closely and you’ll see a “Champee’ billboard in this photograph of Yankee Stadium taken on opening day in 1923. The photo is courtesy of the Detroit Public Library.

After Prohibition the Hupfel Brewery resurfaced as a division of the Allied Brewing and Distilling Company called the Pilsner Brewing Company (Listed first below).

A  stock offering for the Allied Brewing and Distilling Company, published in the June 28, 1933 edition of Louisville, Kentucky’s “Courier-Journal, clarified Allied’s relationship with the Pilser Brewing Company.

Allied Brewing and Distilling Company, Inc. represents a consolidation of a number of long established and profitable enterprises which have been developed and operated for many years under the present management. The company has acquired all of the assets, including plants, equipment, patents, trade-marks, inventories of merchandise and supplies as well as the organizations of the constituent companies…

This advertisement for Pilser’s “Special Draught” appeared in several Westchester County newspapers in the late summer of 1936.

Other Pilser brands included “Lion Beer,” “Koenig’s Special,” “Champ Ale” and “New Yorker Beer.” This advertisement for “New Yorker Beer” is the last one I’ve been able to find.

The ad appeared in the June 17, 1948 edition of Hackensack, New Jersey’s “The Record.” That year, The Pilser Brewing Company was still listed at 3rd Avenue and 161st Street, now 561 East 161st Street, in the New York City Telephone Directory. After that I lose track so it’s likely the company didn’t last into the 1950’s.

Today 561 East 161st Street certainly looks like it could have served as a brewery office back in the day.

The subject bottle is blown in a mold and roughly 12 oz. in size.. It’s embossed with the company name of A Hupfel’s Sons and an address of  161st St. and 3rd Ave. That associates it with the Bronx location and its tooled crown finish dates it well after the Hupfel brothers dissolved their partnership in 1883. Likely early 1900’s.

Chas Mau, 561 E. 156th St., N.Y.

 

Born in 1860, Charles Mau was the proprietor of a New York City bottling business that was active in The Bronx during the late 1800’s and early 1900’s.

N.Y.C. directories first listed Mau in 1895 as a bottler of lager beer with an address of 561 East 156th Street. That address puts the business near the corner of St Ann’s Avenue and 156th Street, which was within or adjacent to  the confines of the Ebling Brewery. This suggests, though I can’t confirm, that Mau may have started in business serving as a local bottler of the Ebling product.

In 1898 Mau moved to 687 East 159th Street but his relationship with Ebling may well have continued. Now located near the intersection of Eagle Avenue and 159th Street, it appears that the business was still within the same overall block as the brewery.

In 1907, things may have changed when the business moved again, this time several blocks away, to 429 East 159th Street. Around the same time directory references to beer were being replaced with “mineral waters.”

Thirteen years later, the 1920 “White-Orr Reference Register” continued to list Mau as a mineral water manufacturer with an address of 429 East 159th Street, however, census records that same year describe Mau as retired. This points to 1920 as the likely end date of the business.

The bottle I found is mouth blown,  with a blob finish. It’s embossed with Mau’s initial address of 561 East 156th Street, dating the bottle sometime between 1895 and 1898 when he listed that address in the directories. It likely contained an Ebling brew.

 

Camphorine (R.H. Williams, Amityville, L.I.)

In the late 1800’s/early 1900’s, the name “Camphorine,” was associated with a wide range of companies and products. So, recognizing that there’s no company name or address embossed on our bottle, more than just a few potential uses for it exist. The following turn of the century advertisements illustrate several of them. The obvious one is an insecticide for moths.

Others include a “Disinfecting Powder” and “Disinfecting Solution” manufactured by a British firm called the “Sanitary Dry Lime Company…”

…a toilet preparation called “Bishop’s Camphorine…

and even a “Camphorine Shampoo.”

With all these possibilities I had to narrow down the field, ultimately opting to research a purported ‘cure-all” simply called “Camphorine” that was concocted by a man named Reuben Hoyt. The patent medicine had its roots in Brooklyn, N.Y. and was later manufactured in Amityville, Long Island, within shouting distance of the Great South Bay where the bottle was found.

The name “Camphorine,” registered by Hoyt, appeared  in the March 2, 1875 edition of the U.S. Patent Office’s “Official Gazette,” under the heading “List of Trademarks, Descriptions of Which Have Not Previously Appeared In Any Printed Publications.” This suggests that it was one of, if not the first product to actually exhibit the Camphorine name.

Hoyt was a New York City druggist dating back to the early 1850’s. Originally listed in the N.Y.C directories with an address of 537 Greenwich Street, sometime around 1855 he partnered with James Quinn and formed Reuben Hoyt & Company. The business remained listed at 537 Greenwich Street but was short-lived and ultimately dissolved three years later. The dissolution notice, dated February 9, 1858 was published in the February 11th edition of the “New York Times.”

Within two years Hoyt, still in the drug business, partnered with Sidney H. Blanchard under the name Hoyt and Blanchard. Throughout the 1860’s the partnership was located on Manhattan’s Fulton Street, initially at 215 Fulton Street (1860 to 1866) and later at 208 Fulton Street (1867 to 1868). Their business card appeared in the August, 1866 edition of the “Druggist Circular and Chemical Gazette.”

By 1870 the company moved again, this time to 203 Greenwich Street and it was around this time, five years before its name appeared in the U.S. Patent Office Gazette, that the partnership began advertising “Camphorine” as a “cure-all.” The earliest advertisement I can find was published in the July 5, 1870 edition of the Brooklyn Daily Eagle.

Shortly after these initial ads were published the Hoyt & Blanchard partnership apparently dissolved. As early as 1871 Blanchard was no longer listed at the 203 Greenwich Street address and “Camphorine” advertisements simply named Hoyt as the proprietor. An early example of the change is depicted in this December 12, 1872 advertisement published in the “Portchester (N.Y.) Journal.”

Between 1872 and 1874 “Reuben Hoyt” advertisements for “Camphorine” routinely appeared in newspapers throughout the northeastern United States from Maine on south to Maryland with many touting it as “The Greatest Discovery of the Age.”

After 1874, Hoyt’s advertisements for “Camphorine” drop off significantly but up through 1879 the N.Y.C. directories continued to list him at the 203 Greenwich Street address with the occupation “patent medicines.”

The following year, in 1880, the directory only listed Hoyt with a home address, and there was no longer any mention of “patent medicines,” or “drugs” as his occupation. Based on this its likely that the business did not survive into the 1880’s; a supposition that’s further supported by 1880 census records where Hoyt named his occupation as Custom House Officer. He ultimately passed away in February, 1896.

While this signaled the end of Reuben Hoyt’s association with “Camphorine,” it didin’t result in the end of the product as a “cure-all, when sometime in the late 1800’s its manufacture  was apparently picked up by a man named Richard H. Williams. Also a New York City druggist, directories indicate that between 1875 and 1884 he was living in Brooklyn and working at 180 South Street in Manhattan. Then, according to his wife’s obituary, published in the February 3, 1911 edition of Babylon, Long Island’s “South Side Signal,” in 1886 the couple moved to the Long Island village of Amityville.

By 1900 Williams was certainly manufacturing “Camphorine” in Amityville and marketing it locally on Long Island, as evidenced by this story that appeared in the “South Side Signal,” on March 17, 1900.

Tomorrow (Saturday), weather permitting, our neighbor, R.H. Williams of Amityville, will be in town and will distribute at the residences in the village sample bottles of Camphorine and Silvershine, of which he is the manufacturer. Camphorine is a remedy with an established reputation as a pain reliever, and the Silvershine, as its name implies, is a preparation for cleaning silver. Both are good articles and well worthy of trial. When Mr. Williams or his representatives call on our readers we bespeak for him courteous treatment and counsel a fair trial for the articles he will leave. The goods are advertised in other parts of this issue, and will be placed on sale in Babylon and throughout the country.

The advertisement promised in the story also appeared in the March 17th edition of the “South Side Signal.” and bears a close resemblance to Reuben Hoyt’s previous advertisements, right down to the phrase “The Greatest Discovery of the Age,” strongly suggesting a connection between Reuben Hoyt and R.H. Williams.

While the above story appears introductory in nature, similar  advertisements for “Camphorine” appeared sporadically in local Long Island newspapers dating back as far as the mid 1880’s. The earliest one I can find appeared in the December 11, 1886 edition of “The South Side Signal.”

Though none of these ads mention Williams by name, they’re almost identical to the one he published in advance of his sales trip to Babylon in 1900. This suggests that Williams may have begun manufacturing “Camphorine” as early as 1886 when he arrived on Long Island.

By the early 1900’s local newspaper advertisements for Camphorine as a ‘cure-all” disappear completely, a fact that’s not surprising considering that increased public awareness and stricter food and drug laws were clamping down on the outlandish claims of the  patent medicine industry around that time.

This advertisement for “Camphorine” that appeared in Charles N. Crittenton’s 1902/1903 catalog of druggist sundries and proprietary medicines is one of the last ones I can find.

That being said, Williams was listed as a drug nanufacturer in the ERA druggist directories as late as 1911 and was still manufacturing ‘Camphorine” as late as 1920, as evidenced by its inclusion on this list of  Price Changes published in the April 3, 1920 edition of the  “Drug Trade Weekly” (at the bottom.)

The bottle I found is five inches tall with a 1-1/2 inch square cross-section. Mouth blown, its characteristics fit nicely into the late 1800’s/early 1900’s time period that “Camphorine” was manufactured and marketed on Long Island. Recognizing that Long Island is where the bottle was found, makes R.H. Williams a likely source.

That being said, he’s certainly not the only possible source. In addition to the varied uses mentioned at the start of this post, by the early 1900’s other companies were also manufacturing a patent medicine named “Camphorine.” Two even exhibited the Hoyt name. One was E. W. Hoyt & Co., of  German Cologne fame and the other was the Hoyt Chemical Co., of Indianapolis, Indiana. As far as I can tell, other than their name, neither one bears any connection with Brooklyn’s Reuben Hoyt.

 

 

 

Healy & Bigelow, Kickapoo Indian Sagwa, Kickapoo Indian Oil and Kickapoo Indian Cough Cure

 

John E. Healy and Charles Bigelow were proprietors of a patent medicine business called the Kickapoo Indian Medicine Company that sold several different concoctions under the “Kickapoo Indian” name in the late 1800’s. Later, the company continued to operate as a subsidiary of the William R. Warner Co. well into the 1900’s.

What they’d like you to believe about their line of patent medicines was spelled out in Healy & Bigelow’s “Family Cook Book,” published in 1890.

The Kickapoo Indian Remedies have acquired a wide spread fame, and have done more to help suffering humanity than any other medicines…

They have been born in nature’s bosom and reared in nature’s lap; hence the mysteries of all nature is an open book to them. They live up to nature’s laws and partake in nature’s remedies, and this gives them the healthy lungs, superb muscle power, strong constitution, luxuriant hair and sound white teeth for which they are noted. No-one has ever seen a deformed or bald headed Indian.

…None are more intellectual than the Kickapoo’s, and they have discovered superior medicinal qualities in certain barks, roots, herbs, gums and leaves, never ascertained or applied before…and the peculiar compounding of their medicines is known only to themselves. These Kickapoo doctors now manufacture five special remedies:

Their “Family Cook Book” went on to illustrate each medicine’s late 1800’s packaging.

The affectations supposedly cured by each of these remedies were spelled out in another 1890 advertisement, this one found in a publication called “Keeling’s Book of Recipes.”

The Kickapoo remedies were promoted by traveling medicine shows that featured both Native Americans and vaudeville performers. According to a book entitled “Snake Oil, Hustlers and Hambones,” by Ann Anderson:

Each traveling unit featured a “village” populated by varying numbers of Native Americans, several performers to entertain the audience with jokes and songs, and an agent who harangued the audience about the benefits of Kickapoo Indian Remedies during the performance.

This undated photograph of one such show was recently offered for sale on the internet.

According to a story in a Wisconsin newspaper called the “Steven’s Point Gazette,” in 1895 Healy & Bigelow had 100 of these shows operating throughout the country. The story was published on February 6th after one such show had just closed up and left Steven’s Point.

Dr. Percy Hudson and his Kickapoo medicine company closed a two weeks’ engagement, at Chilla’s Hall, last Saturday evening, giving good performances nightly and selling fair quantities of their Kickapoo remedies. Healy & Bigelow are the proprietors, and they have 100 companies on the road at present, covering the entire country, and they have been traveling continually for years. The size of these companies average a half dozen people, and it will be seen that the income from their sales and performances must be considerable.

In addition to saturating the United States the company put on their medicine shows in places as far away as South America, as evidenced by this item that appeared in the September 23, 1891 edition of New Haven’s “Morning Journal-Courier.”

Five colored men from the “sandy hollow” district of New Haven went to New York last night to sail for South America, where they are to do their musical acts in the employ of Healy & Bigelow.

The concept for the  “Kickapoo Indian Medicine”  operation was born in the late 1870’s when John E. Healy got together with a patent medicine manufacturer named E. H. Flagg who, early in the 1870’s, was hawking two patent medicines; a pain reliever called “Flagg’s Instant Relief,” and “Flagg’s Cough Killer.” This advertisement touting both appeared in the July 12, 1871 edition of Portland Maine’s “Daily Press.”

At around the same time, Healy was managing a traveling comedy company that performed an Irish themed variety show called “Healy’s Hibernian Gems.” Between 1874 and 1876 the troupe was criss crossing the country performing in various cities along the way. The following advertisement touting their San Francisco stay appeared in the September 3, 1874 edition of the San Francisco Examiner.

It follows quite naturally that Healy’s experience with traveling shows coupled with Flagg’s patent medicine business resulted in the traveling medicine show concept. In fact, its likely that Flagg’s “Instant Relief” became “Kickapoo Indian Oil” (both cured both internal and external pain), and Flagg’s Cough Killer became “Kickapoo Cough Cure.”

Now all they needed was a front man and Charles Bigelow fit the bill. According to the New England Historical Society, in the late 1870’s Bigelow was associated with a man named “Dr. Yellowstone” who had also concocted a line of Native American themed medicines called “Indian Herbs of Wonder,” so he was certainly familiar with the requisite “sales pitch.”

Early on the company headquarters was no more than a series of tents pitched in a major city where they put on extravagant medicine shows and coordinated the operations of their local traveling shows.

According to “Snake Oil Hambones and Hustlers”

Healy & Bigelow started the Kickapoo business in a Providence hotel storeroom and then moved to Boston where they pitched a tent in front of the train station and put on a show.

Not just a tent, as early as May 20, 1882 they were advertising it as an Indian Village in the “Boston Globe” .

The only mention of Healy & Bigelow in the Boston directories during this time appears in 1884 when they’re listed in the commercial directory under the heading “medicines,” with an address of 130 Commercial. There’s no mention of Flagg suggesting that he was out of the picture by then. The next year, in 1885, the Boston Directory simply stated: “Healy & Bigelow, patent medicines, removed to New York City.”

There, the city directories listed the business as John E. Healy, “pat meds,” (1885 to 1887) and later, “Healy & Bigelow” (1887 to 1888). Always listed with an address of 26 West Street, this is likely where they manufactured their medicines during this time.

Though not listed until 1885, as early as 1882 they were operating what they called “wigwams” in New York,  as evidenced by this item that appeared in the November 12th edition of the “Boston Globe.”

John E. Healy of the Indian Village claims to be clearing $1,000 a week at his New York branch wigwam.

Apparently a seasonal operation, in the Spring of 1883 the New York “wigwam” was located on Flatbush Avenue in Brooklyn and described like this in the May 13, 1883 edition of the “Brooklyn Daily Eagle:”

Three large tents have been erected here, in which are to be displayed, in the first a “real” Indian village populated by “real” Indians; in the second a museum which is claimed to be unequalled for the extent and variety of its curiosities and rare exhibits; while the third is fitted up as Summer theater, with a well appointed stage, comfortable sittings, etc., and which is to be devoted to acrobatic, gymnastic and specialty performances of the best class.

This advertisement for opening night appeared in the May 14, 1883 edition of the “Brooklyn Union.”

The next day, opening night, which included more than one appearance by Charles Bigelow (alias Texas Charlie), was described like this in the “Brooklyn Union.” Having bought in to Texas Charlie’s spiel, the reporter certainly appeared  awed by the experience.

The Big Indian Wigwam

Mr. W. C. Coup opened his Indian wigwam at the corner of Flatbush and Fifth Avenues last evening, and the prevailing rainstorm, though making unpleasant for an opening night, did not very materially interfere with the attendance, as all the seats were occupied. The tent in which the performances are given is about 150 feet in diameter, having a circle of “circus seats” and the center is supplied with chairs. The interior is tastefully decorated with bunting and large squares of movable pictures of Indian warfare scenes are exhibited. Mr. Charles Bigelow (“Texas Charlie”) introduced fifty Indians to the audience and made a speech which was in reality an eloquent plea for the red man’s rights, and, coming from one who has had long experience on the border, carried a conviction with it. The audience heartily applauded the lecturer for his sentiments, which were given with an unmistakeable Western feeling. These Indians during the evening gave their war and medicine dances and peculiar chants, and the more intelligent among them welcomed visitors at the close of the performance to their tents. The variety show comprised a dog circus by Mr. Shedman’s trained canines, tight-rope gyrations by a trained monkey, banjo playing by Al Harris, horizontal bar acts by Currey and Avery, songs and dances by Saunders and Dean, musical selections by Pettingall and Frazer, acrobatic performances by the Sherman Brothers, and trapeze acts by Ella Zuila. The fancy shooting by Texas Charlie was excellent, shooting potatoes off a stick from almost every conceivable position, and ending up with two shots which made the audience feel somewhat awed, knocking off at the first shot the ashes from the cigar of a gentleman held between his lips and at the next shot cutting off the lighted portion.

The museum tent is about one hundred and thirty feet in diameter and is filled with one of the most remarkable collection of curios and antiques outside of the old-established museums of universities and scientific bodies. Mr. Coup intends to remain all summer and will add fresh novelties every week. Stage performances are given afternoons and evenings.

The following summer Healy & Bigelow were operating another “wigwam,” this one in Manhattan. According to a story published in the June 25, 1884 edition of the “New York Tribune,” it was not well received in the neighborhood.

A “Big Indian Wigwam” at One-hundred-and-sixteenth Street, between Second and Third Aves., has so far disturbed the usual quiet of that neighborhood that a petition signed by nearly a hundred residents was recently sent to District-Attourney Onley, asking if some action could not be taken against the proprietors. John Healy and Charles Bigelow – the latter known as “Texas Charlie,”-  proprietors, and the manager, Thomas E. Hallock were indicted for keeping a disorderly public resort. Hallock was tried yesterday before Recorder Smyth. More than a score of businessmen living in One-hundred-and-fifteenth and One-hundred-and-sixteenth Sts. were called as witnesses. Some of them described the place as a nuisance and testified that the tent was nightly filled with a crowd, mostly boys, that yelled and hooted in applause at the performers, who were called by the Assistant District-Attorney “Sullivan St. Indians.” The jury convicted Hallock, and he was remanded for sentence.

At the same location, earlier that month, a June 6th “Brooklyn Union Story” announced that Bigelow had been fined $100…

for violating the Penal Code by giving an exhibition, in which a man stood against a wooden target while another threw daggers in close proximity to the man’s body.

The following summer, there were no Manhattan or Brooklyn newspaper advertisements for the “wigwam,” suggesting that by then Bigelow may have worn out his welcome there. At which point he apparently moved on to Chicago where a “Chicago Tribune” reporter found “Texas Charlie” in 1886. It’s clear from his July 5th story that the Tribune reporter was more skeptical than his Brooklyn counterpart.

PATENT MEDICINE MEN

Indians Employed to Advertise a Certain Sort of Alleged Medicines

An “Indian village” of about a dozen tents has been located for the last few weeks in the baseball park at Thirty-third street and Portland Avenue. The occupants are some ten to twelve Pawnee Indians and an equal number of more or less civilized whites. The whole is under the command of “Texas Charley,” formerly an Indian agent and now a patent medicine drummer. The Indian village is an advertising scheme for the medicine referred to – the medicine being advertised as of  Indian origin – and the proprietors of the village and the manufacturers are a firm of New York druggists, whose concoctions have probably about as much connection with Indian herbs and simples as they have with the oyster-beds of Lake Michigan or the sugar-mines of Siberia.

“Texas Charley” was found at the village yesterday enjoying a sleep in the sunshine. He was pleased to talk to reporters about Kickapoos, and Pawnees, and Sioux, and Chipewas, and wigwams, and medicine men, and braves, and squaws, and chiefs, and happy hunting grounds, and all the romantic hocus-pocus appertaining to the poor Indian. He said the firm has about twenty bands of Indians out over the States advertising their medicine. Chicago was the headquarters; he kept the reserve forces here and directed the movements of each band. They gave free shows of a Buffalo-Bill sort of character, distributed advertising pamphlets to the crowds, and then induced the local druggists to keep a permanent stock of the medicine. Their expenses here at Chicago averaged $700 to $800 a week. They gave two exhibitions a day here, except Sundays, when the baseball clubs needed the park.

“Texas Charlie” went on to answer a few questions about the Native Americans that were part of the show.

“Where do you get the Indians?

“Off the reservations. We hire them and give bonds to the government to treat them well and send them home when we are through with them.”

“You pay them a salary?”

“Yes; $30 a month. The chiefs get a commission on the business to make them take an interest in the work, and we give them about $50 a month. Of course we feed them besides. They send home about half what they earn; we don’t let them spend it. The rest of their pay they spend on tobacco and trinkets.”

“What reservations do you get them from?”

“From everywhere and anywhere we please. These here now are Pawnees from the Kansas reservation.”

In 1887 and 1888, the Chicago city directories listed “The Kickapoo Indian Medicine Company,” with an address of 174 W. Van Buren. which was likely used for storage.

In 1888 Healy and Bigelow moved their headquarters to New Haven, Connecticut where they were listed with an address on Grand Avenue.

They remained at that location until 1893 when they moved to larger quarters at 441 Chapel Street, also in New Haven. The March 1, 1893 edition of New Haven’s “Morning Journal-Courier” announced the move.

Yesterday the Healy & Bigelow company bought for about $25,000 the large brick factory at the corner of Chapel and Hamilton Streets, formerly occupied for years by the well remembered firm of Durham & Wooster, carriage makers. The property has a frontage on Chapel Street of 157 feet and 140 feet on Hamilton Street and is a valuable investment. 

Healy and Bigelow remained the proprietors of the business up until 1895 when Healy retired. According to the February 26, 1895 edition of the “Morning Journal-Courier:”

The well known patent medicine firm of Healy & Bigelow, with headquarters on Chapel Street, has been dissolved, John E. Healy withdrawing… Mr. Bigelow retains the controlling interest.

A week later the business incorporated with Bigelow serving as its first president.  The March 2, 1895 edition of the Morning Journal-Courier published the incorporation notice.

The Kickapoo Indian Medicine Company of New Haven has filed a certificate of organization with the secretary of state, its capital stock being $72,000 and the shareholders, Charles Bigelow of this city, Lucius S. Davis of Northampton, Mass., and James K. Averill of New York City.

Four years later, the September 5, 1899 edition of the “M0rning Journal Courier” announced that Bigelow had sold the Chapel Street factory and was planning a move.

Charles Bigelow, president of the Kickapoo Medicine Company, who sold their factory at 441 Chapel Street last week, says a new factory will be built for the headquarters of the medicine company, as soon as a suitable site can be procured.

Another story, this one in the September 2, 1899 edition of the (Meridian Connecticut) Journal added:

The price paid was $28,000.

The medicine company has a lease on the property for a year with the privilege of an extension.

Bigelow took advantage of the additional time afforded by the lease, ultimately moving just outside New Haven, to Clintonville, in early 1901. The move was announced in the February 27, 1901 edition of the “Morning Journal Courier.”

The Kickapoo Medicine Company will soon remove to Clintonville, where a manufacturing building is being fitted up for the company. It is on the Air Line road and has ample facilities for shipping freight…It is expected that the company will remove prior to April 1.

By the time the company settled in Clintonville their menu of Kickapoo products had grown significantly. A February 13, 1902 price list that appeared in the “Pharmaceutical Era.” shows Kickapoo Indian Pills, Liverines, and Prairie Plant, along with Kickapoo Soap had been added to the original five.medicines.

Ultimately, ten years after moving to Clintonville, the corporation dissolved. The preliminary certificate of dissolution was published in the “Hartford Courant” on October 10, 1911.

Advertisements for their traveling shows, though less and less frequent, continued right up to the end. One of the last ones I can find, published in the December 1, 1908 edition of the “Waterville (Me) Seninel.” made it clear that their approach remained the same.

The Kickapoo Indian Medicine Company which has been demonstrating the Indian remedies at Vose & Luques’ drug store for the past two weeks, has changed the window attraction for this week and has transferred here the little Indian family consisting of Chief White Horse, squaw Minnehaha and papoose Little Thunder.

Little Thunder is about eight months old and is strapped to the Indian cradle in the primitive way, and whenever he has appeared has attracted great crowds of all classes of people.

In addition to the Indian family there will be added two chiefs, Deep Sky and Deer Foot, and through efforts of Messrs. Rose & Luques the people of Waterville are to be given an opportunity to see and hear the Kickapoo Indians in some of their native songs and dances at the Silver Theatre on Tuesday and Wednesday afternoon and evening, when will be given such songs as “Lake Side” and “Mosquito Song.” Among the dances will be the White Bean and War dances.

Indian courtship and marriage will be illustrated and also the raising of a man up to be a chief. The admission to the Silver Theater will remain the same.

While dissolution of the Connecticut corporation put an end to any connection Bigelow had with the business, it didn’t put an end to the Kickapoo Indian Medicine Company or their products.

The next year, an item published in the June 6, 1912 edition of the Philadelphia Inquirer, announced that the Kickapoo Indian Medicine Company had incorporated in Pennsylvania, with capital of $5,000. Now operating as a subsidiary of Wm. R. Warner & Co., between 1913 and 1919 their listed addresses coincided with Warner locations at 639 N. Broad in Philadelphia and 500 N. Commercial in St. Louis, Missouri.

The menu of Kickapoo products continued to expand under Warner as evidenced by this listing that appeared in the 1915 N.A.R.D. Journal.

Under Warner, their medicine shows vanished but newspaper advertisements continued through the mid-teens; most focused on their Kickapoo Worm Killer. The following, published in the May 28, 1914 edition of the “Oklahoma Register” was typical.

The Kickapoo Indian Medicine Co. remained in both Philadelphia and St. Louis up through the late teens at which time the William R. Warner & Co. consolidated in New York City. According to the November, 1916 edition of the “Practical Druggist:”

The formation of a new centre of New York chemical interests is heralded in the sale of the old B. Altman department store property, once occupied by the Greenhut Company, in the west side of Sixth Avenue, between Eighteenth and Nineteenth Streets, New York City, to William R. Warner & Co., of Philadelphia, manufacturing pharmacists and wholesalers, for close to $1,100,000 in cash. The transaction means bringing 500 employees and their families to New York.

The Warner Company is one of the largest concerns of its kind in this country, controlling the local Richard Hudnut Company, the Searle & Herth Co., Sloan’s Liniment Co., Kickapoo Indian Medicine Co., the Haywood Family Remedies, the Kid-ne-oid Preparations, Meade & Baker Carbolic Mouth Wash Co., Morely Medicine Co., the Sutherland Medicine Company and others.

The Kickapoo Indian Medicine Company (Pa.) was listed at William R. Warner & Co.’s New York City address of 113- 133  West Eighteenth Street from 1917 up through the early 1930’s, after which I lose track.

Advertisements for most of the Kickapoo named products had petered out by the 1920’s, however “Kickapoo Worm Killer” was still included in drug store price listings as late as 1942.

Over the years I’ve been fortunate enough to find bottles that contained three of the five original Kickapoo products; Indian Sagwa, Indian Oil and Indian Cough Cure. In fact they’re the only three that came in bottles. They’re mouth blown and exactly match the bottles exhibited in the company’s 1890 “Cook Book.”

     

“GEM” Asbury Paine Mfg. Co., Philadelphia, Pa., U.S.A., Pat-2-3-1880

At first glance you would think this small 1-3/4 inch diameter jar contained some sort of medicinal or cosmetic cream but you’d be wrong.  In fact, it served as the lower portion of a jar that contained oil and could be converted to an oiler by adding a nozzle at the top.

An example of the jar adapted for use as an oiler was recently offered for sale on the internet

Called the “Gem” Oiler, it was on the market from the late 1880’s up through the turn of the century when you could pick one up for between 10 and 15 cents.

Its story begins with a native Pennsylvanian named Reuben Ritter who in the mid to late 1800’s was listed in the directories with a wide variety of occupations that included patent med’s, insurance agent, salesman, foreman, oiler and watchman. That being said it’s clear that he could also have been listed with still another occupation, that of  inventor. As early as 1874 he obtained a U.S. patent for what he called the “self sustaining paper box.” The July 14, 1874 edition of the “Scranton Republican” told the story.

On the 30th, Mr. Rueben Ritter of this city, was granted a patent upon a paper box, samples of which are to be seen at Peacock’s drug store. It is called the self-sustaining paper box, and its merits lie in its being composed of only one piece of paper, (ingeniously cut by a machine for the purpose of which is also the design of Mr, Ritter), and put together so that it cannot come apart, and will hold water, so perfectly is it cut, and yet no paste or any fastening substance is used. The box is called by all who examine it, an admirable invention, and when introduced, Mr. Ritter will not fail of securing an unlimited demand for it.

Six years later, on February 3, 1880 (the date embossed on the base of the subject jar), Ritter obtained a patent (No.234,041) for what he called his “Combined Oiler and Oil Bottle.” According to the specifications included with the patent application, in addition to serving as an oiler the bottle/jar could also be adapted for use as a night lamp.

The bottle may be made with very little cost, filled with oil, closed by a suitable stopper and sold as a bottle of oil.

The purchaser can, at the time of first purchase, procure the oiler nozzle and a night lamp. The device may then be used either as an oiler for machinery or a night lamp.

Both the nozzle and lamp configurations were illustrated on this drawing that was also part of the patent documents.

At around the same time that Ritter was obtaining his patent, George H. Paine was establishing  George H. Paine & Co. in Philadelphia. The company was first listed in 1881 as “commercial merchants” with an address of 105 S Front.  In 1883 William E. Diehl joined Paine and the company changed its name to Paine Diehl & Co. The company operated under that name up through 1894 utilizing several different Philadelphia addresses over that span including 105 S Front (1883), 7 Strawberry (1884 to 1885), 12 Bank (1886 to 1887) and 430 S Penn Sq. (1888 to 1894).

During this time the company marketed several unique household items. The one they advertised the most was called the “self-pouring coffee and tea pot.”

Another was their “Egg Beater and Cream Whip.”

Sometime in the mid-1880’s  Paine, Diehl & Co. apparently obtained the rights to Ritter’s design and by 1889 they were running advertisements for what they called the “Gem” Oiler. One of the first ads I can find appeared in the June, 1889 edition of a publication called “The Iron Age.”

Turning to page 67 you found the following item that touted the oiler’s benefits and described how to use it.

GEM OILER

Patented February 3, 1880

The oiler is made of heavy flint glass – strong, clean and durable; filled with the best of oil. It has a metallic top (the bottom is glass), with a flexible chamber with which to squirt the oil. The cap is screwed onto the bottle, making the oiler absolutely leakless.

Being transparent, the quantity of oil in or being poured into the oiler can be seen at a glance, thus enabling you to fill without spilling the oil. Having the bottom and sides all in on piece and of glass, they are perfectly clean, with no spring bottom to leak or come out.

They are sold so cheap that they can be sold at about the price of a bottle of good oil alone.

To the dealer it is a most convenient article and ready seller.

With the consumer it is a most desirable arrangement, as it enables him to get an oiler with his oil, and a splendid offer too.

In using – Place your thumb on the bottom of the oiler, letting the spout pass between the fingers. To squirt the oil, press down on the washer around the spout. This gives a better flow than a spring-bottom oiler, and is easily regulated.

They are sold by Grocers, Stationers, House-Furnishers, Druggists, Hardware Merchants, Novelty Dealers, Typo-writer Dealers and Sewing-Machine Dealers.

__________

PAINE, DIEHL & CO.

Paine, Diehl & Co. was last listed in the 1894 Philadelphia directory, suggesting that the relationship between Paine and Diehl ended around that time. That same year Paine apparently associated with a man named Charles W. Asbury and they established the Asbury-Paine Manufacturing Company in Trenton, New Jersey.

Within a year, the November 9, 1895 edition of the “Philadelphia Times” announced that the company was set to move their headquarters to Philadelphia. The announcement was included under the heading “New Charters.”

The following foreign corporations have been licensed to do business in this State:…the Asbury Paine Manufacturing Company of Trenton, N.J., headquarters to be in Philadelphia.

The company remained  headquartered at Wayne Junction (Wayne and Berkley) in Philadelphia up through the turn of the century with Paine named vice president and Asbury, treasurer. During this time, in addition to advertising many of the former Paine Diehl products, they added some new ones as well. One, that was advertised quite heavily was called “Witch-Kloth.”

Ashley-Paine also continued to market the “Gem” Oiler as evidenced by the following advertisement that appeared in several 1896 editions of the “Trenton Evening News.”

   

Apparently, the Asbury-Paine Manufacturing Company came to an end in 1900, at which time the company name vanished from the Philadelphia directories. That being said, the “Gem” brand of oilers survived well into the 20th century.

On November 27, 1899, the Gem Manufacturing Company was established in Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania. An announcement to that effect appeared in the November 7, 1899 edition of “The Pittsburgh Press.”

An application for a charter for the incorporation of the Gem Manufacturing Company will be filed at Harrisburg, November 27. The company will locate its plant in the building formerly occupied by the Bradley Stove Company, Second Avenue and Wood Street. The larger stockholders of the new company are men conversant with the machinery business and have already purchased the hydraulic presses and the die machinery required for the manufacture of the steel specialties. The incorporators of the company are: William H. Frick, John A. Clark, Edwin S. Fonnes, D.A. McCaffrey and W. D. Forsythe.. The two first named are the secretary and vice-president of the Frick & Lindsey Company, Water Street.

The official organization of the company will take place when the charter is received, about December 1, and the company expects to have the plant in working order not later than January 1.

What connection they had with the former Asbuury-Paine Manufacturing Company or, how they obtained rights to the “Gem” name, is not clear but almost immediately after the Gem Manufacturing Company was established they introduced a newly designed “Gem” Oiler. This advertisement touting its benefits can be found in the June 18, 1900 edition of a publication called “The Daily Railway Age.”

According to another introductory item, this one published in the April, 1900 edition of a publication called “Railway Master Mechanic,” the new design replaced the glass jar with a steel base and bottom.

A New Oiler

The Gem Manufacturing Co., of Pittsburg, Pa., presents a new device in the Gem oiler. The can itself is a departure from methods now obtaining, yet it still preserves the fundamental principle of the old.

In this oiler the bottom is constructed from high carbon spring steel. The body is made from the best grade of basic low phosphorus steel, pressed and drop forged into shape, and flared and spun firmly against the bottom proper. To further strengthen the cans and insure against any leakage whatever, the oilers are brazed upon the inside…

This August, 1900 advertisement in “Steam Engineering” called it “The Best Oiler Made.”

This example of their early steel oiler recently appeared for sale on the internet.

 

Later the company added  the “Gem” Steel Tallow Pot and the”Gem” Engineer’s Set to the “Gem” family of oilers.

These additions, coupled with the company’s choice of publications in which to run their advertisements make it clear that the market for their oiler was expanding. Originally sold in local grocery, drug and hardware stores, Ashley-Paine simply targeted the customer who wanted to fix a squeaky door or oil his wheelbarrow. Under the Gem Manufacturing Company, much of their advertising was now directed toward the professional mechanic.

Another market for their oilers opened up with the proliferation of the automobile. According to this January 11, 1906 advertisement published in a magazine called “The Automobile:”

If you have a high-class car, you need a high-class Gem Oiler.

Not just oilers, in the early 1900’s the “Gem” name began to represent an entire line of products. As early as 1902, this May 26th advertisement in the “Birmingham (Alabama) News” referenced both a “Gem” flue scraper and a “Gem” flexible shaft in addition to the “Gem” oiler.

By 1925, this advertisement in “Hendrick’s Commercial Register” made it clear you needed a catalog to see the entire line of “Gem” Products.

In the 1930’s and 1940’s the company expanded into many other areas including the manufacture of automotive items such as mufflers. That being said, through it all they apparently continued to manufacture oil cans and oilers. As late as 1953 the company was included on a  U. S. government listing under the heading: “Manufacturers of  Lubricating Systems and Devices.”

In March, 1953 the company, still located in Pittsburgh, went into receivership. According to the March 6th edition of the “Pittsburgh Press:”

Uncle Sam today slapped a big tax lien on a Pittsburgh firm now in receivership.

The lien for $185,193 was filed against the Gem Manufacturing Co. Attorney J. Howard is the receiver…The lien covers income taxes for the years 1943 through 1946 which the Government claims the firm has failed to pay.

The business apparently reorganized and was still active in Pittsburgh in 1960 and possibly longer. Whether they were still manufacturing oil cans and oilers at this point is unknown.

Our subject jar held two ounces of oil. Embossing on the base includes the Asbury-Paine Mfg. Co. name dating it between 1895 and 1899 when they manufactured the oiler.

On a final note: Unlike most items presented on this site, this jar was not found in the Long Island bays. Instead it was found by one of my wife’s best friends while tending her beautiful northern Massachusetts garden. Thanks Di and HAPPY BIRTHDAY!

Hartwig Kantorowicz, Posen, Germany

 

Established by Hartwig Kantorowicz, his liquor factory of the same name was located in Posen, Germany. Throughout much of the 1800’s and early 1900’s  it was operated by three different generations of the Kantorowicz family. Once the largest and most important liquor factory in Germany, one history of the company summarized their turn of the century operation like this:

Around 1900, the Hartwig Kantorowicz liqueur factory was known world-wide and about as famous as Mercedes Benz or Coca Cola are today. In addition to liqueurs, fruit juices and jams were now also produced and sold on a large scale. It had its own line of cognac and whiskey with at least 50 different products, and German and international wines were also sold in large quantities. The company probably had around 1,000 different products in their portfolio.

The above quote was found on the web site of a liquor company called Alrich. They produce liquors from historical original recipes and their website includes the history of former liquor factories, one of which is Hartwig Kantorowiz. As a preface to the following post, quotes not specifically cited otherwise were found on the English translation of the Alrich website.  https://www.alrich.eu

Born in 1806, Hartwig was the son of Joachim Bernard Kantorowicz who was the owner of a brewery and distillery in Posen that dated back to 1782. At a young age, Hartwig went into business for himself.

In a small house at Alter Market No. 10, the then 17 year old Hartwig Kantorowitcz modestly opened a retail distillation shop and initially offered a small selection of popular drinks at the time.

Advertisements published years later generally recognized 1823 as the year Hartwig founded the business.

Over the next quarter century the growth of the business ultimately led him to construct a new distillery in Posen at Wronkerstrasse No. 6

When a few years later, his business had experienced very good growth despite a variety of competition (there were 30 other distillery shops in Poznan around 1825) he moved it to the house at Wronkerstrasse No. 4 north of the town hall. A few years later the business expanded again and in 1843 it was relocated to Wronkerstrasse No. 6…A two-story building was erected in the yard of the property, where, among other things, a large new copper distillation plant could be put into operation…Around 1850 the total value of the company was estimated at around 75,000 thalers (the annual wage of a worker was around 200 thalers).

The following depicts the street front of the building at Wronkerstrasse No. 6 with their sign clearly visible above the entrance.

A biography of Hartwig Kantorowicz’s grandson entitled “Ernst Kantorowicz, A Life” written by Robert E. Lerner and published in 2017, described two of Hartwig’s mid 1800’s concoctions.

A document of 1862 referred to two of Hartwig Kantorowicz’s products: Kummelliqueur” and “Goldwassercreme.” The first, otherwise known as “Allasch,” was made primarily from caraway seeds, the second from an essence based on a mixture of herbs such as anise, cinnamon, nutmeg, cloves and peppermint (and always plenty of sugar).

It was also sometime in the 1860’s that Hartwig added the famous “Litthauer Bitters” to his menu.

In 1864, Hartwig hired the assistant Josef Loewenthal, who was trained as a journeyman distiller. He developed, probably on behalf of his employer , the very famous herbal bitter Litthauer Meganbitter, which he later marketed himself in Berlin and Cleveland.

After Hartwig’s death in 1871, management of the business passed on to three of his sons, Max (1843-1904), Edmund (1846-1904), and Joseph (1848-1919).

Under the management of the sons, the Hartwig Kantorowicz liqueur factory was constantly expanded. In the years 1871 and 1882 further buildings were erected, in which there was daily hustle and bustle. Building parts of different ages and sizes stood on the property, which in addition to the production areas, also housed an office wing, huge storage cellars, a carpentry shop and export rooms. 

In 1895 the company added  a retail shop and tasting room in Posen at Berliner Strasse 5, a view of which is presented below.

As early as 1874 the company had opened a Berlin branch and soon after was operating factories, warehouses and tasting rooms there as well.

By the 1880’s Hartwig Kantorowicz was exporting their liquors all over the world.

The company even delivered in the middle of the African bush. Letters from chiefs with liquor orders arrived, who also asked for other items to be sent, such as mouthwash, chocolate, clothespins, but also firearms – these were all sent at the same time. The goods were then paid for with mahogany blocks, palm kernels or palm oil. Since the Kantorowicz company had no use for it, a branch was opened at the port in Hamburg in order to “exchange” these things there for money.

Its clear that Hartwig Kantorowicz products were also making their way to America well before the turn of the century. According to the Lerner biography:

Sometime in the 1880’s he (Max) traveled to the United States to arrange for the regular exporting to Posen of fruit juices, which made for a more varied range of liqueurs. On the same trip he arranged for the regular purchase of California wines, which were extremely cheap, in order to introduce the sale of wines as a sideline to the Kantorowicz business. So far as is known, Max was the first to introduce California wines to Europe.

It would make sense that at the same time he was arranging for the importing of California’s fruit juice and wine to Posen, he was also arranging for the export of Hartwig Kantorowicz liquors to the United States. A supposition that’s bolstered by the fact that the earliest U.S. newspaper advertisements for Hartwig Kantorowicz that I can find appeared in several 1883 editions of California’s “San Francisco Chronicle.” The following was published in the May 24, 1883 edition.

Throughout the 1890’s, the company apparently increased their focus on the United States. This is supported by their advertisement that appeared in an 1897 German publication entitled the “Directory of German Export Co.’s.” that bragged:

Specialties known in nearly all transatlantic countries.

The ad went on to  include a menu of their specialty products that was printed in both German (on the left) and English (on the right).

In the United States, up through 1898 they apparently did business with local sales agents who typically marketed Hartwig Kantorowicz liquors under the generic term, “Cordials.” as evidenced by the following advertisement found in several 1896 editions of the “Buffalo (N.Y.) Commercial.”

Another advertisement, this one in the August 15, 1893 edition of the “Pharmaceutical Era” attached names to some of their cordials; Absinth, Blackberry, Creme de Minthe, Coca Liqueur Curacao, Kuemmel, Maraschino, Etc.

Advertisements for Litthauer Bitters  continued to appear as well, with one January 24, 1894 ad in Washington D.C.’s  “Evening Star” touting”

These world famous stomach bitters are unequalled for curing indigestion, flatulency, hysteria, colics, agues, colds, “La Grippe,” abdominal disorders, etc.

Around the turn of the century Hartwig Kantorowicz established a presence in New York City where the company was listed in the directories as liquor importers with an address of 32 Water Street. Likely a wholesale branch, the endeavor was short lived with the company only listed from roughly 1900 to 1903. No longer listed in the 1903/1904 directory, they apparently returned to the use of U.S. agents.

When Max and Edmund both passed away in 1904, Joseph Kantorowitcz, along with Max’s son Franz, became co-managers of the firm. Several years later continued growth demanded the construction of a new, modern factory.

Over the years, production continued to increase, so that the premises at Wronkerstrasse 6 gradually became too small.

The architect Martin Sonnabend was commissioned to build a new factory complex. The family bought a large piece of land on Sudstrasse opposite the slaughterhouse and cattle yard. After several years of construction, the company was able to move its headquarters to the more than 1,000 square meter production and administration building in 1908. The entire facility had a full basement and was built in reinforced concrete. It comprised four five-story factory buildings, several production and storage halls, all of which were connected to each other.

A pictorial representation of the complex, which also included housing for the workers is shown below.

Two years later when Joseph retired in 1910, the business was incorporated under the name “Hartwig Kantorowicz Actien-Gesellschaft.” Franz was named as director and a man named Hans Schuchard as managing director.

During World War I the business survived when providing supplies to the army compensated for the loss of foreign trade. After the war Franz, now living in Berlin, sold the business.

On the evening of November 5, 1920 he came from Berlin and sold the company for a total price of 20 million Reichsmarks, including 5 million Reichsmarks for the real estate alone, to the Unternehmerbank Posen. The contract…also included the handing over of the liqueur recipes, that had been closely guarded until then.

After the sale to the Unternehmerbank the company in Posen continued to exist under the name Hartwig Kantorowicz Folger AG from December 9, 1920.

They continued to produce liqueurs, other spirits, fruit juices and jams in Posen throughout much of the 1930’s. In fact, it appears that after Prohibition some of their product continued to make it’s way to the United States. An advertisement for their Vodka and Mountain Ash Brandy can be found in several 1936 editions of a Polish newspaper published in Omaha, Nebraska called “Gwiazda Zackodu.”

Ultimately in 1939 the Posen business was placed under German administration and during World War II their output went exclusively to the army.

After the war it operated as a stock company under the name “Obstdestillierie und Wodkafabrik Hartwig Kantorowicz SA” until September 18, 1951 at which time:

the entire alcohol production and thus also the Kantorowicz company was nationalized and placed under the central administration of the fruit and vegetable industry.

Meanwhile in Germany Franz Kantorowicz and Hans Schuchard continued to operate the former company’s German facilities.

After the sale of the parent company in Posen, the Hartwig Kantorowicz liqueur factory in Berlin remained a stock corporation and was temporarily located at Greifswalder Strasse 224 in 1919. The tasting rooms and the office continued to operate at their old locations.

Originally quite successful, in the early 1920’s they established a new German office and factory and:

In 1921 Kantorowicz  had inventories worth 5.3 million Reichsmarks and a net profit of 3.2 million Reichsmarks.

That all changed with an economic crisis that began in 1925 and ultimately ended the Kantorowicz family’s long time association with the business.

It is highly probable that the sales and profits of Hartwig Kantorowicz AG had fallen so much between 1925 and 1927 that the company ran into difficulties and could only be saved by merging with the famous Berlin liqueur factory CAF Kahlbaum, which was also ailing. As part of the merger, the Kantorowicz family sold all their shares in the company…

The bottle I found is mouth blown, olive green in color and contains somewhere between a quart and a fifth. In addition to the company information embossed on the base, a unique trademark is embossed on the bottle’s shoulder. A trademark application included in U.S. patent records (No, 17889) described it as:

The representation of two triangles arranged to form a six-pointed star and a fish produced upon said star.

The U.S. trade mark application was filed on March 3, 1890 but the record indicates it had been in use since October 9, 1880, further suggesting that Hartwig Kantorowicz products began any significant appearance in the United States sometime in the early 1880’s.

The company used a wide variety of bottle styles.

From about 1880, the company also housed its own design department for bottles and labels and a packing station in which about 20 people worked. Large quantities of bottle labels were stored in a special room – there were always new designs so that, like in the fashion industry, the customer could always be addressed in a new way.

New bottle shapes were also constantly being invented, which were manufactured by various glassworks in the province of Posen, Silesia, Bohemia and the Kingdom of Saxony. There were always new bottle designs, such as round, square, triangular, bulbous, tower-like, pyramidal,shapes, but also small spiked helmets.

In the early 1900’s, the company employed at least 60 different bottle shapes all categorized by number. Our subject bottle closely, if not exactly, matches their Facon (Shape) Nr. 12.

   

Again thanks to Google Translate, the shape was referred to as the “Dutch Liqueurs Kind,” and was used for cherry brandy, curaçao, stoughton, half and half and anisette.

The bottle was produced in 860ml., 430ml., 120ml., and 60ml sizes. Our bottle is certainly 860ml.

 

 

 

F. C. M. Lendholt, 490 E. Tremont Ave., Pharmacist

 

Frederick C. M. Lendholt was born in Germany in the early 1870’s and arrived in the United States sometime in the mid-1880’s. As early as 1900, census records indicate he was living on Prospect Avenue in the Bronx with the occupation of “clerk.”

New York City directories continued to list his occupation as simply “clerk” up through 1908. I suspect for some, if not all of this time, he worked for long time Bronx druggist, Edward F. Miller. This 1899 advertisement described Miller’s business as:

The Oldest and Most Reliable Establishment in the Bronx

During much of the early 1900’s, in addition to 712 Tremont Avenue, which was also Miller’s home address, he also listed a second business address at 2007 Boston Road.

Towards the end of the decade, Miller incorporated the business as Edward F. Miller, Inc. By this time Lendholt, more than just a clerk, was apparently managing the business, as evidenced by the fact that Miller named him president of the new corporation. The incorporation notice was published in the March 24, 1909 edition of the “Paint, Oil & Drug Review.”

The N. Y. C. Copartnership and Corporation Directories continued to list the corporation in this fashion up through 1915. That year Lendholt left the Miller company and opened his own pharmacy on East Tremont Avenue. The announcement appeared in the May, 1915 edition of “The Practical Druggist.”

F. C. M. Lendholt has succeeded Wm. Isemann in the drug business at Bathgate and Tremont Aves., New York City. Until recently Mr. Lendholt was manager for E. F. Miller.

Located at 490 East Tremont Avenue, Isemann’s business had been listed there as early as 1907.

Lendholt continued in business for at least the next 18 years. As late as 1933 N.Y.C.’s business directory still listed him as a retail druggist at 490 East Tremont Avenue. Sometime after that he passed away, with 1940 census records listing Lendholt’s wife Katherine as a widow. That being said, the 1939/1940 Bronx Telephone Book continued to list the pharmacy, now F.C.M. Lendholt Inc., at the 490 East Tremont Avenue address. So, its likely that at some point after his death the business passed into the hands of a corporation. What became of it after 1940 is not clear.

Today, 490 East Tremont Avenue, at the corner of East Tremont and Bathgate Avenue is a vacant lot.

The bottle I found is a mouth blown prescription bottle made by the Whitehall, Tatum Co. (W.T.Co. embossed on the base). It exhibits Lendholt’s “490 East Tremont Avenue” address dating it no earlier than 1915 when Lendholt succeeded William Isemann at that address. Recognizing that it’s mouth blown, I don’t expect that it dates much later than 1915 after which I would expect a machine made bottle. This could put it in the initial batch of bottles ordered by Lendholt after assuming control of the business.