Located in Klamath Falls & near Chiloquin, Oregon - a beautiful area with BIG lakes (Klamath & Agency Lakes...and very near to Crater Lake National Park and within sight of two snow covered peaks (Mt. Shasta & Mt. McLoughlin). 

The Klamath Basin is also located on the extreme western edge of the high and "cold desert" of eastern Oregon at over 4100' (valley bottom).  Not real high for the Intermountain West, but just right for cold (but not too cold) winters and warm (but not too warm) summers.

I (Bill) am a collector (41+ years!) of all kinds of older, mouth-blown (not machine-made) American bottles and flasks, i.e., made from the late 18th through the very early 20th century (pre-1910 + or -).  Collecting tastes run the gamut from early American figured (aka "historical") flasks, bitters, California gold-rush era soda & mineral waters and other Western American bottles, early American utilitarian bottles, Oregon bottles, Lindsey's Blood Searcher bottles, etc.  I really don't have huge amounts within many of the recognized types or categories of 19th century bottles, but do have something within virtually all types - even some fruit jars which are one of the more fascinating bottle collecting genres I think.  In short, I am a generalist at heart with the one exception of medicinal tonics bottles...more later.
 

Bottles, Books & Collectibles For Sale

I offer an assortment of bottles and related items for sale via several other pages within this website - see the hyperlinked list in the green box below.  I am recently retired and need to sell a large amount of my bottle collection (and many books) to pare down the amount of "stuff" we have in order to move to a smaller house in 2009.  I also need to divest myself of the scores of bottles purchased primarily to illustrate the information and concepts on the Historic Glass Bottle Identification & Information Website - my other very large website.  (This website is discussed in the box to the right below.)

Click Bottles For Sale/Trade to access the main page for these items.  On that page one will find links to the various category specific "bottles for sale" pages.  Check back frequently, because now that I am retired I plan on adding a couple dozen or so new bottles per month to my for sale lists over the next couple years.  

The links in the box below also takes one straight to each of the category specific "bottles for sale" pages: 

I also offer some Western Americana & history books via my Books For Sale webpage.

Our email is - admin@historicbottles.com - or click on the following link:

If the email above does not seem to work, use this back-up one: wlindsey@centurytel.net

Medicinal Tonic Bottles...

My one fling into antique bottle collecting specialization is MEDICINAL TONIC bottles.  Not hair tonics, but medicinal tonics where, for example, the word "tonic" is used in the place of the word "bitters" or "cure" - i.e. a Fever & Ague Tonic instead of Fever & Ague Cure.  We do not generally collect items where the word Tonic is descriptive instead of the actual product, i.e. Dr. Jayne's Tonic Vermifuge is not a tonic, but a vermifuge with "tonic effects".  But I would consider the Wilson's Tonic & Sarsaparillian Elixir to be pretty much of a true tonic bottle.  It's a fine line of course, but I'm just after what I consider to be "true" tonic bottles.

A great example of the above is in the H. H. Warner's line of bottles from the 1880-1900 era where there is a Warner's Safe Tonic, a Warner's Safe Bitters, and a Warner's Safe Tonic Bitters.  All were apparently different names for the same product since Warner's "tonic" bottles with a "bitters" label have been found; and vice versa.  The small variant of the Warner's Safe Tonic is located on the right side of the bottle grouping photo here.

There are lots of tonics out there (I have over 150 different specimens personally) and looking for more since there exist several times what I currently have.  Though the number of tonic bottles may not reach that of 19th century bitters bottles, it may be close.  Makes sense since they were very similar products - "quack" medicines made up of various herbs and medicinal plants, most often well preserved with lots of alcohol!  Often, the two terms - bitters and tonic- are frequently used together on the same bottle - for example, The Globe Tonic Bitters or Old Sachem Bitters and Wigwam Tonic - which is the green ringed "barrel" shaped bottle in the image at the top of the page.

I am in the process of compiling a list of all the known, embossed medicinal tonic bottles (though I am also interested in label only ones).  My goal is to get as complete a list as possible, including different embossing patterns of the same brand; color, lip and size variations; and all the unique American and Canadian brands.  I have a listing of over 375 to date.  Although the list doesn't grow every day like it used to, I frequently run across new brand or variations of known ones.  I am striving towards some kind of book (or website?) on the subject in the future.

Click on Medicinal Tonics to see my most updated listing of tonic bottles.  I am also looking for good pictures of unusual tonic bottles.  If you have or know of any medicinal tonics that I don't have on my linked list let me know, using the email link below.  I will give credit in the future book for your additions if new to me (and if you desire).

Our email is - admin@historicbottles.com - or click on the following link:

If the email above does not seem to work, use this back-up one: wlindsey@centurytel.net

Central Oregon's Smith Rock State Park - August 2008  (Photo by website author)
 

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Last updated: 8/30/08
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