1891-1920
Pitkin & Brooks was an importer of china and glassware, established in 1891 and incorporated in 1901; the company did not produced its own wares, but applied its own makers’ mark to all the products it sold. The business had a large…
1889-1956/1975
Emerson Drug Company was founded in 1890, two years after Isaac E. Emerson had an idea for a headache-curing medicine while working at a Baltimore drugstore. Emerson trademarked Bromo-Seltzer in 1889. An 1899 ad touting…
1863-1930s
By far the most famous product produced by this company was their Hunyadi Janos Mineral Spring Water, named for a 15th-century Hungarian hero; the base of a bottle of this water was found at the Charnley-Persky House in 2015 (see below).…
1875-1946
Aurelius Stone Hinds purchased his own drug store in 1870, developed his soon-to-be-famous Hinds’ Honey & Almond Cream. Five years later, the A. S. Hinds Company was established. The Honey & Almond Cream was heavily marketed toward women…
1874-present
Scott and Bowne was formed in 1874 with the partnership of Alfred Scott and Samuel Bowne; their most famous product was Scott’s Emulsion, an emulsion of cod liver oil meant to make the substance “palatable as milk” (as the 1884 ad…
1871-1920
Hannis Distilling Company was the 1871 restructuring of Henry S. Hannis & Co, established 1863; both tapped into the booming whiskey industry in 19th-century Philadelphia. Hannis’s Mount Vernon Pure Rye Whiskey won first award at…
An aqua base of a bottle manufactured by the Adolphus G. Busch Manufacturing Company between 1908 and 1920, and an advertisement for the company from 1899, seven years after the company was incorporated.
1892-1941
Bourne & Leigh was one of many potteries in this area in the 19th-century; established in 1892, the firm produced earthenware in a variety of patterns (see the May Blossom pattern in the 1922 ad below). Bourne & Leigh was in business until…
1877-1894
Brothers Thomas and William Wood established their pottery on the Burslem Branch of the Trent and Mersey Canal, near a recently-built wharf; fittingly, they called the venture New Wharf Pottery. The 1880 advertisement below promotes the…
1893-1928
Adelbert Merton Foster took over the the Chicago branch of Dean, Foster & Co. in 1893, naming the ten-year-old division after himself. A glass wholesaler, A. M. Foster was closely associated with Dean, Foster & Co. (referred to as “The…
1850-1953
Sharp & Dohme formed their pharmaceutical partnership in 1860, expanding to large scale manufacturing by 1865. Their Chicago branch opened in 1888, and an amber bottle made by Sharp & Dohme was found at the Charnley-Persky House in 2015…
1884-1917
Price Baking Powder Company was established in 1884, nearly twenty years after Vincent Price and Charles Steele first started manufacturing baking powder in Chicago. The company was most famous for its baking powder, but it also produced…
1881-1946
Brothers Benjamin and Samuel Foster brought young pharmacist Malcomb Fairchild into their drug manufacturing partnership in 1881. The company mostly sold digestive products, a bottle of which was found at the Charnley-Persky House in 2015…
1880-present
Founded by Charles M. Higgins in 1880, Higgins Ink is still a top producer of ink worldwide. Just eight years after opening its doors, Higgins was providing ink for periodicals like Harper’s Weekly; this success allowed the company to…
August H. Heisey, born in Germany in 1842, immigrated to the United States in 1843, setting up home in Pennsylvania. In 1861, Heisey got into the glass business working as a clerk for King Glass Company in Pittsburgh. After fighting for the Union…
1881-1943
Andrew Scherer (pictured below in a 1941 Chicago Tribune article) opened his pharmacy on State and Division in 1886, five years after his first store. The pharmacy served many in the Gold Coast, and a bottle of Scherer’s was found at the…
1893-1910
Roxbury Distilling Company produced liquor, most famously Roxbury Rye, from 1893 to 1910. The company’s founder, George T. Gambrill was convicted of fraud in 1910 and the company was shut down. Gambrill’s most famous product, Roxbury…
The colorless glass base from a bottle of AbilenA Natural Cathartic Water found in 2010 at the Charnley-Persky House. A 1910 advertisement for AbilenA, a "cathartic water" bottled in Abilene, Kansas used as a laxative.
