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 store on the corner of State and Lake Streets (see below), and went out of business around 1920. RRH
Lexie Nogulich, Chicago Fellows Research Assistant.
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 Bromo-Seltzer’s ability cure all headaches can be seen below. An excellent example of Emerson’s iconic cobalt blue bottles was found at the Charnley-Persky House in 2015 and can be seen below. Bromo-Seltzer was made with acetanilide (now known to be poisonous); after the passage of the Pure Food and Drug Act in 1906, Emerson was forced to list all of its ingredients on the labels of its products. Despite complaints, Emerson never changed Bromo-Seltzer’s formula. Emerson’s medicinal and glass plants were sold to Warner-Lambert Pharmaceutical Company in 1956. It is unclear in Warner-Lambert continued to produce Bromo-Seltzer, but all Bromides were withdrawn from the U.S. market in 1975. RRH
Rebecca S. Graff (photograph) Public Domain (advertisement)
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). First introduced in 1863, The water was advertised extensively as a laxative (as in the 1899 image below). Hunyadi Janos was very popular in the U.S. between 1870 and 1920, and the company disappears from historical record in the 1930s. RRH
Rebecca Graff (photograph) Public Domain (advertisement)
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 (as shown in the 1922 advertisement below) and continued to be produced until 1948. RRH
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 below suggests). Cod liver oil was very popular at the beginning of the 20th century, especially for mothers to give their children. Scott’s Emulsion is still available today, but is only produced in Indonesia. RRH
An advertisement for Dr. Bell's Pine-Tar-Honey, produced by E.E. Sutherland, depicting "Granny" Metcalfe and her testimonial
Hannis Distilling Company's Mount Vernon Whiskey
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 Philadelphia’s Centennial Exposition in 1876; a turn-of-the-century advertisement is below. The company shut down in 1920 for Prohibition. RRH
Hamlin's Wizard Oil, ca. 1890 advertisement; photograph of embossed glass fragment of bottle, CHAP 2010
Adolphus G. Busch Manufacturing Company: Bottle Base (CHAP 2015) and Advertisement (1899).
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.
https://www.flickr.com/photos/carlylehold/6492543417 (advertisement)
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 1941, after which the company continued Leighton Pottery Ltd. A ceramic base (below) made by this company was found at the Charnley-Persky House in 2015. RRH
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 earthenware the company manufactured, an example of which can also be seen below; these plate fragments were found at the Charnley-Persky House in 2015. The company was absorbed by Wood & Son in 1894. RRH
Sarreguemines plate fragments, CHAP 2010.
Peace
Base of a druggist bottle reading "PARIS," A.M. Foster & Co., CHAP 2015.
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 East House” in the company’s 1907 catalog page below). A glass bottle with the company’s “Paris” embossing was found at the Charnley-Persky House in 2015 (see below) and can be dated to 1900-1904. A. M. Foster closed in 1928. RRH
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 (see below). A 1914 advertisement showing their seven branches across the U.S. is below. Sharp & Dohme merged with Merck in 1953, renamed as March Sharp & Dohme. Two years later, however, Merck had dropped the Sharp & Dohme name, calling itself Merck & Co. RRH
Dr. Price's Delicious Flavoring Extracts
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 flavoring extracts, a bottle for which was found at the Charnley-Persky House in 2015 (see below). Price emphasized that his products were healthy, natural, and economical, as in the 1893 ad below. Price’s company was acquired by the Royal Baking Powder Company in 1899; Royal continued manufacture under Price’s name until 1917. RRH
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 (see below).Their office is also below in an 1888 illustration. Fairchild Brothers & Foster was acquired by the Sterling Drug Company in 1946. RRH
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 expand its range of products, as the 1914 advertisement below shows. A bottle of Higgins Ink was found at the Charnley-Persky House in 2015. RRH
Heisey Glass Company: advertisement and portions of stemware recovered from CHAP 2015.
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 side in the Civil War, Heisey joined Ripley Glas Company as a salesman; in 1870 Heisey married Susan Duncan, daughter of the George Duncan, owner of Ripley. After George Duncan’s 1877 death, the company was left to Heisey and James Duncan (George’s son). Fourteen years later, the company (renamed George Duncan & Sons) became a part of U.S. Glass. In 1895, Heisey began construction on his own glass factory in Newark, Ohio; the plant opened in 1896. This fine-cut glassware was sold worldwide, often to bars and hotels, like the stemware found at the Charnley-Persky House in 2015 (pictured below). Heisey began registering trademarks at the turn of the century, particularly the well-known “H within a diamond” in 1901, as seen on the stemware pictured below. Heisey advertised nationally as early as 1910 with large, full-page spreads like the one below. August Heisey died in 1922, leaving the company to his son, E. Wilson Heisey. In the 1920s and 1930s, the company expanded in colored glass, and then into figurines in the next two decades. The company closed for the 1957 holiday season and never reopened. RRH
Heisey Glassare: The Early Years: 1896-1924. Krause Publications. 2011. (advertisement)
Rebecca S. Graff (photograph) Public Domain (advertisement
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 Charnley-Persky House in 2010. Scherer’s Pharmacy suffered a massive fire in 1943, and, when Scherer died later that same year, the store was closed. Today, the building houses a CVS. RRH
Rebecca S. Graff (photograph) Chicago Tribune (Scherer image)
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 Rye, continued to be sold by other whiskey distributors until Prohibition, advertised below by Uncle Sam himself. A sherd of glass found at the Charnley-Persky House in 2010 bears the distillery’s name (pictured below). RRH
AbilenA Natural Cathartic Water, CHAP 2010.
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.
The Cosmopolitan. 1910. Schlicht & Fields, 49.
Teyssonneau Conserves Alimentaires, CHAP 2015.
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