{"id":641,"date":"2026-01-10T12:28:00","date_gmt":"2026-01-10T17:28:00","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.pre-pro.com\/new_and_shotworthy\/?p=641"},"modified":"2026-01-10T12:34:46","modified_gmt":"2026-01-10T17:34:46","slug":"flattened-and-rare","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.pre-pro.com\/new_and_shotworthy\/2026\/01\/10\/flattened-and-rare\/","title":{"rendered":"Flattened and Rare?!"},"content":{"rendered":"\n

I had to wait until the auction closed to talk about this one<\/a>, mainly to see if anyone had any interest in bidding on it. Sadly no-one did, because I had high hopes of finding a good home for the dozen or so glasses that have been murdered by USPS over the years. I haven’t had the heart to throw them away, which is sad, sad, very sad. But who knows, flattened and crushed could be the next big thing in the pre-pro collecting world. You read it here first!<\/p>\n\n\n\n

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Death by USPS<\/p>\n\n\n\n

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The saddest of these broken goods were a minty Beaver Run<\/a> from O’Keefe and a similarly minty Harvest Home Rye<\/a> from Hayner, both valuable (and rare) glasses in any condition.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Here’s the road-kill “shot glass” that was listed by kansascrazysales<\/a> for $50 (or best offer): <\/p>\n\n\n\n

\"\"<\/a><\/figure>\n\n\n\n

It’s a metal shot-glass size cup from M. Wollstein Mercantile Co<\/a>. of Kansas City, MO. Here’s one from the database <\/a>to show you what the non-flattened version looks like:<\/p>\n\n\n\n

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<\/p>\n\n\n\n

There are at least five variants of this cup that I’m aware of and, because they’re metal and fairly resilient compared with the glasses, they’re not uncommon. This particular version shows up for sale about once every 18 months or so, with an average sale price of $20.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

The rare flattened version was, according to the seller, dug out of the ground by a metal detectorist. You have to admire the sales pitch:<\/p>\n\n\n\n

“For sale is an ultra-rare, 100% authentic pre-Prohibition aluminum advertising shot glass from the famous Kansas City mail-order liquor dealer:<\/em><\/p>\n\n\n\n

M. WOLLSTEIN MERCANTILE CO.
MAIL ORDER LIQUOR HOUSE
KANSAS CITY MO.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

This is the real deal \u2013 circa 1905\u20131916, made of lightweight aluminum with crisp raised (embossed) lettering inside a shield cartouche. These were given away as premiums by big mail-order whiskey houses right before National Prohibition killed the legal liquor business.<\/em><\/p>\n\n\n\n

Condition notes:
Recovered with a metal detector (dug relic).
Completely flattened \/ pancaked (no longer holds 3-D shape)
<\/em>Lettering is sharp and readable \u2013 displays beautifully flat<\/strong>
Nice even silver-gray patina
No polishing or alteration \u2013 exactly as it came out of the ground
<\/em>Even in this flattened state, it is still one of the scarcest Kansas City pre-Pro advertising shot glasses known<\/strong>“<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Someone should make him an offer, really…<\/p>\n\n\n\n

In case anyone is interested, 133 shot-glass auctions closed in the past 28 days. Sixty-four of these closed without a buyer (including the flat one above); average price of glasses that sold was $32.46<\/strong>.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

I had to wait until the auction closed to talk about this one, mainly to see if anyone had any interest in bidding on it. Sadly no-one did, because I had high hopes of finding a good home for the dozen or so glasses that have been murdered by USPS over the years. I haven’t … Continue reading “Flattened and Rare?!”<\/span><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[1],"tags":[],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"","_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.pre-pro.com\/new_and_shotworthy\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/641"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.pre-pro.com\/new_and_shotworthy\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.pre-pro.com\/new_and_shotworthy\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.pre-pro.com\/new_and_shotworthy\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.pre-pro.com\/new_and_shotworthy\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=641"}],"version-history":[{"count":6,"href":"https:\/\/www.pre-pro.com\/new_and_shotworthy\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/641\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":653,"href":"https:\/\/www.pre-pro.com\/new_and_shotworthy\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/641\/revisions\/653"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.pre-pro.com\/new_and_shotworthy\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=641"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.pre-pro.com\/new_and_shotworthy\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=641"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.pre-pro.com\/new_and_shotworthy\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=641"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}