A rose by any other name?

Glasses from the Southern US States (FL, GA, AL, MS, LA) are relatively rare; a quick search of the sales database turned up only 10-20 from each of the States listed above. If I were pressed to name a liquor dealer from each of these States, I’d maybe come up with Sprinkle or Moog from FL; Loeb, Lion & Felix (LA); Arey (AL); and Rufus Rose from GA. Rose gave us the “Four Roses” brand name that was later sold to the Paul Jones Distilling Co.

Rose was originally from CT but he settled in Atlanta, GA. When GA went dry in 1907, he moved his operations 100 miles up the road to Chattanooga, TN., but he also maintained sales outlets in Jacksonville, FL. and New York City. Rose glasses that show up for sale most frequently are Ask the Revenue Officer glasses bearing the Rose shield, as shown below. “Frequently” does not mean common; I’ve only seen a handful of examples of each of these.

Three-city Rose glass

Rose glasses from Atlanta are very rare and typically in iffy condition. All of this is a long-winded way of saying that I was interested to see a Jacksonville/Atlanta glass list recently.

The glass was listed by gator-ben for $49.99 – not an insignificant amount – but was quickly bid up into the three-digit range. Unltimately, it sold in a bidding war between 1***j and 5***a for a whopping $510.00.

gator-ben also did pretty well on a Forefather Corn “porc” from Rose:

This is a porcelain bottle-stopper that was have been used on the back-bar of a saloon or hotel bar. The porcelain would have a cork glued to it originally, but these usually get lost over time. The example above sold for $420.

Here’s another pricey glasses, especially considering the poor condition.

Although it’s difficult to tell form the listing photo(s), the glass reads “COMPLIMENTS / OF / (line) / DALLAM (slanted) / (line) / DISTRIBUTING CO. / OLD GOODS EXCLUSIVELY / PADUCAH KENTUCKY“. The glass was first listed back in 2015 (left) for $44.99; the seller id back then was mantiques1946. It closed without a bidder and did not relist until this month, the seller id now andrewshane. The seller first offered it for $194 and it closed without a taker (no surprise there), then relisted for $164. I figured the glass would slowly circle down the relisting drain until the initial offering price stood at $0.99, but someone grabbed it at the $164 mark in a buy-it-now (big surprise there). Um. Okay.

Here’s one to watch.

It’s a plain-text “HAYNER” with a dodgy gold rim, but it caught my eye because the seller is offering it with a box that I initially thought the glass must have come in. On closer examination, however, the box is far taller than the glass and probably held a mini sample bottle of Hayner hooch. An interesting find in itself – the auction is currently at $26.06 but will likely close much higher.

These taxing times

As I write, the number of coronavirus-related deaths in the US now stands at 20,109. 

I haven’t been buying as many glasses via eBay as I once did, so it was quite a shock to see that the final tally for a recent win came with a hefty $27.77 sales-tax bill. Yikes. eBay has been crying wolf re impending sales tax legislation for years now and I’d become desensitized to the frequent warning emails, so I was completely oblivious to the fact that they had begun collecting sales tax for my home state as of April 1. Yikes again. Sales tax is going to seriously impact the glass budgets of many collectors and may force some to rethink how badly they want that extra glass for the display case.

This past couple of weeks on eBay has been a story of extremes. I keep two different eBay watchlists under two different id’s and both are nearly maxed out (the watchlist limit per account is 300) because there is a ton of pre-pro glass offered for sale at the moment.

In the last post, I showed a Father Time glass with a viral conspiracy theory theme, and voila, princeweesl (better known to old-timers as bluroc) lists a more deadly strain that sold on April 1 for a $224.49.

princeweesl has been responsible for several high-end glass sales in the past couple of weeks, including a couple of hand-painted enamels that sold for $432.99 apiece. Phew. Nice if you can get them.

In case you’re interested, the past 4 weeks saw 262 glass auctions close, 94 of these failed to attract a bidder, the average price of glasses sold was $45.23.

While we’re on the subject of the weesl, here’s a dated souvenir glass that he offered for $24.99, but the auction closed with no bids. The glass had a gold label and came with interesting background info: “This glass was very mysterious to me until my very helpful wife (research librarian) found out that: Thomas Rowe was the president of the American Flint glass workers union. He retired in 1914 and the members evidently begged him to stay in his post, so this was made either to celebrate/toast his retirement, or to get him to return. Its quite an interesting piece with many cross collectable categories!

The glass didn’t ring any bells with me, but when I was entering the auction into the sales database, I was surprised to find that bluroc had one won (there is only one other example in the database, so it’s a rare one) for $9.99 back in September 2011. Except that this one had no gold fill. Hmmmm… maybe the “very helpful wife (research librarian)” is also very helpful when it comes to application of paint brushes…..

Then there were the head-scratcher auctions; glasses that would not have sold for an opening bid of $5 or a month or so ago but that are now hotties. The Hill and Hill (Rock Spring Distilling Co., Owensboro, KY) was first listed by artswhirld back in February for $100. It’s a highball, a size that has typically been treated with distain by most pre-pro collectors. Presumably it’s too close to beer-glass size to appeal to the specialist shot collectors, although highballs make for a great collecting niche given their rarity and low sales prices. Not surprisingly, the glass went unsold, despite a nice provenance lifted from the pro-pro database. The glass relisted in March and sold a day later in a buy-it-now for $125. Go. Figure.

The Old Keebros is a semi-regular on eBay, typically selling in the $15-$30 range. The one above listed at $75 and sold for $125.69. Huh??

The A. E. Shields “The Whiskey Man” glass is a) from MN and b) a dose glass, two characteristics that usually spell the kiss of death so far as glass values are concerned. Yet the one above, which was listed by sparrowantiques, was binned for $99.99. Huh?? Maybe I’m missing something….

At the other end of the spectrum we have the Caron’s XXXX below – a stellar example of quintessential display-case-worthy pre-pro glass that was listed by napa-capecod for only $35 and then took a lower-price offer on it!! Whoever bought that got a steal – it’s a great glass.

napa is apparently closing out an old collection that he’s had packed away since 1994 – it’s worth bookmarking him, especially if you’re interested in New England glasses. He’s already listed and sold several previously-unknown glasses. The only downside is that shipping is $8 per glass and he does not combine shipping. And, oh yes, don’t forget to factor in f*&#^$’ sales tax.

That’s all folks – stay home, stay well. See y’all on eBay.