Milk bottles

Milk bottles are bottles used for milk. They may be reusable glass bottles used mainly for doorstep delivery of fresh milk by milkmen. Customers are expected to rinse the empty bottles and leave on the doorstep for collection. The standard size of a bottle varies with location; common sizes are 1 pint or 1 quart, although cream may be delivered in smaller bottles.

More recently, plastic bottles have been commonly used for milk. These are often made of high-density polyethylene (HDPE), are used only once, and are easily recyclable.

Before milk bottles, milkmen filled the customers' jugs. For many collectors, milk bottles carry a nostalgic quality of a bygone age. The most prized milk bottles are embossed or pyroglazed (painted) with names of dairies on them, which were used for home delivery of milk so that the milk bottles could find their way back to their respective dairies.

It is not clear when the first milk bottles came into use. However, the New York Dairy Company is credited with having the first factory that produced milk bottles, and one of the first patents for a milk container was held by the Lester Milk Jar. There are many other similar milk containers from around this period, including the Mackworh Pure Jersey Cream crockery type jar, the Manorfield Stock Farm, the Manor, the Pa glass wide mouth jar, and the Tuthill's Dairy Unionville, NY.

Lewis P. Whiteman held the first patent for a glass milk bottle with a small glass lid and a tin clip. The next earliest patent is for a milk bottle with a dome-type tin cap and was granted September 23, 1884 to Whitemen's brother, Abram V. Whiteman. The Whiteman brothers produced milk bottles based on these specifications at the Warren Glass Works Company in Cumberland, Maryland and sold them through their New York sales office.

The Original Thatcher is one of the most desirable milk bottles for collectors. The patent for the glass dome lid is dated April 27, 1886. There are several variations of this early milk bottle and many reproductions. During this time period, many types of bottles were being used to hold and distribute milk. These include a pop bottle type with a wire clamp, used by the Chicago Sterilized Milk Company, Sweet Clover, and others. Fruit jars were also used, but only the Cohansey Glass Manufacturing plant made them with dairy names embossed on them.

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