{"id":4017,"date":"2016-04-11T20:57:16","date_gmt":"2016-04-11T20:57:16","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.archivingwheeling.org\/blog\/?p=4017"},"modified":"2016-04-11T20:57:16","modified_gmt":"2016-04-11T20:57:16","slug":"baseball-soda-pop-part-2","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.archivingwheeling.org\/blog\/baseball-soda-pop-part-2","title":{"rendered":"More Baseball & Soda Pop"},"content":{"rendered":"

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Spring Time in Wheeling, Continued\u2026<\/h2>\n
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Nothing says spring quite so clearly as an April day at the old ballpark, with the sun shining warmly on your face and tiny, cool bubbles bursting on the tip of your nose as you raise an ice cold bottle of sweet soda pop to your lips for a refreshing drink. Well, that\u2019s our theory anyway, as we celebrate spring with a new exhibit of baseball artifacts combined with Thad Podratsky\u2019s amazing collection of early Wheeling pop bottles \u2014 on display now at the Ohio County Public Library. As a complement to this display, we present a two-part post on the history of baseball and pop bottling in old Wheeling.
\n\u25b6\u00a0Read Part 1: \u201cA Social Game of Ball\u201d<\/a><\/em><\/p>\n

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Part 2: The Pop-Post<\/h1>\n
\"An<\/a>
An assortment of Painted Pops. Thad Podratsky Collection.<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n
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\u201cI do Sierra Mist commercials not because they pay me a lot of money or because it only takes a couple of days. I do it because I have a respect for all sodas and I like to communicate that. Some people say soda, some people say pop. Where I\u2019m from in Indiana they called it breakfast.\u201d<\/em>
\n-Comedian Jim Gaffigan<\/em><\/p>\n<\/blockquote>\n

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\u201cLet us have wine and women, mirth and laughter, sermons and soda water the day after.\u201d<\/em>
\n-Lord Byron<\/em><\/p>\n<\/blockquote>\n

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An Englishman, a southerner, a New Yorker, a Wheelingite, and an Irishman walk up to a concession stand at a baseball game. The Englishman orders a \u201cfizzy drink.\u201d After snickering, the southerner orders a \u201cCoke.\u201d The New Yorker sneers and orders a \u201cSoda.\u201d The Wheelingite snorts, \u201cYuns are all crazy. It\u2019s a Pop!\u201d<\/p>\n

After all the others have their orders, the Irishman says, \u201cI\u2019ll have a glass of \u2018Minerals.\u2019 Swish it around and when the glass is clean, pour the stuff out and fill the glass with whiskey.\u201d<\/p>\n

Bad jokes aside, this seemingly innocuous nomenclature debate has divided a nation. \u201cSoda?\u201d Or \u201cPop?\u201d Or even just,\u201dCoke?\u201d You can weigh in here<\/a>.<\/p>\n

So who is right? Well, maybe this guy<\/a>. Or maybe this guy<\/a>.<\/p>\n

But the truth is, my grandmother settled the issue back in the seventies.<\/p>\n

Click to enlarge.<\/p>\n

\"Click<\/a>
Click to Enlarge.<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

Whatever you call it, we Americans have always loved our carbonated sugar waters, and Wheeling was always been on board. Back in the day, we bottled our own product, right here in town\u2014lots of it. And super-collector Thad Podratsky has the Wheeling embossed\/labeled\/painted bottles to prove it.<\/p>\n

\"Baseball<\/a>
Baseball & Soda Pop Display. Now through the end of May, Ohio County Public Library.<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n
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Bottle Town<\/h2>\n
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In it\u2019s manufacturing prime, Wheeling could credibly lay claim to titles like Nail City and Stogie Town<\/a>. It was also a city well known, at one time or another, for products like tile, pottery, indigo-dyed cloth<\/a>, beer, chewing tobacco, steel, and glass.<\/p>\n

But Wheeling was also once home to a surprisingly large number of soft drink bottling works.<\/p>\n

Bottle Town?<\/p>\n

Well. why not?<\/p>\n

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Squat Sodas<\/h2>\n
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\"Squat<\/a>
Squat Soda bottles or \u201cLightning Sodas\u201d are the oldest and were common in the Victorian Era. Thad Podratsky Collection.<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

Before plastic bottles and metal cans, soda was sold in glass bottles, the varying colors, sizes and shapes of which make them beautiful little works of commercial art, especially when compared to their modern counterparts.<\/p>\n

\u201cSquat Soda\u201d bottles are the oldest style of American beverage bottle. They were used in the Victorian Era and are often dark green or aqua green in color but can also be cobalt blue, amber, or topaz. Samples in this exhibit include: J. Lukens, L. Snider, Geo. Matthews, C. & A. Matthews, and Chris Siebke Birch Beer, all of Wheeling.<\/p>\n

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Hutchinson Bottles<\/h2>\n
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\"Hutchinson<\/a>
Hutchinson soda bottles with spring stoppers. Thad Podratsky Collection.<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

\u201cHutchinson Soda\u201d bottles were invented in 1879 by Charles G. Hutchinson, who patented a spring stopper.<\/p>\n

\"Hutchinson
Hutchinson soda bottle U.S. Patent Office, original drawing.<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

\u00a0<\/p>\n

\"Shipley
Shipley Hutchinson style with stopper inside. Thad Podratsky Collection.<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

The spring stoppers replaced corks and were later replaced themselves by crown top caps. Hutchinson bottles in this display include\u00a0Geo. Matthews, Speidel Bros, E. F. Hartmann, W.L. Rose & Co., Magnesia Spring, Co., L. Auth, Meyer & Radcliffe, Geo. Cornette & Co., and Jas. S. Lynch, all of Wheeling.<\/p>\n

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Crown Top Caps<\/h2>\n
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\"Crown<\/a>
Crown Tops. Thad Podratsky Collection.<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

Patented by William Painter in 1892, the crown cork or crown top cap had 24 metal teeth and a cork seal. After a lot of scarred hands, Painter also invented the bottle opener in 1894.<\/p>\n

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\u201cPainted Pops\u201d<\/h2>\n
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\"Painted<\/a>
Painted Pops. Thad Podratsky Collection.<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

Applied Color Labels or ACL Bottles (also known as \u201cPainted Pops\u201d) first appeared around 1936 and by the mid-1950s were very common, due to improvements in manufacturing. The \u201cpaint\u201d was actually ground colored glass, silk-screened and baked onto the outside of the bottle.<\/p>\n

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Stratford Magnesia Springs<\/h2>\n
\n
\"An<\/a>
An array of bottles from Stratford Springs in Woodsdale and a large format photo of the hotel. Courtesy Thad Podratsky.<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

Opened on May 1, 1907 in Woodsdale, the grand Stratford Hotel<\/a> was built as a spa resort near a natural \u201csaline-chalybeate\u201d spring said to have \u201ccertain healing powers,\u201d powers to cure everything from headaches, indigestion, and rheumatism to \u201ckidney trouble\u201d and even \u201cbad teeth.\u201d In addition to being used to make carbonated beverages, the pure spring water was bottled and sold as an \u201cinvigorating and health giving\u201d tonic. Stratford Springs Bottling Company was thus an outgrowth of the hotel. The hotel burned down in 1918, but the spring house, where the water and carbonated beverages were made by the Stratford Magnesia Springs Co., survived the fire and continued to bottle product for many years.<\/p>\n

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Shipley Ironbrew Soda and Iron Brew Baseball Club<\/h2>\n
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\"S.J.<\/a>
S.J. Shipley\u2019s Iron Brew Baseball Club and soft drink, courtesy Thad Podratsky.<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

\u201cOtherwise, the team is elegance itself in its striped knee breeches and loose shirts, colored stockings and peaked caps. Except for brief moments of sliding, you can see them all in one eyeful, unlike the muddy hecatombs of football. To watch a football game is to be in prolonged neurotic doubt as to what you\u2019re seeing. It\u2019s more like an emergency happening at a distance than a game. I don\u2019t wonder the spectators take to drink. Who has ever seen a baseball fan drinking within the meaning of the act? He wants all his senses sharp and clear, his eyesight above all. He gulps down soda pop, which is a harmless way of replenishing his energy by the ingestion of sugar diluted in water and colored pink.\u201d<\/em><\/p>\n

-From God\u2019s Country and Mine By Jacques Barzun<\/em><\/strong><\/p><\/blockquote>\n

Typifying the many company-sponsored teams in Wheeling at the turn of the century, S.J. Shipley\u2019s Iron Brew Baseball Club poses with their favorite soft drink, Ironbrew, \u201cthe ideal tonic,\u201d circa 1907. Shipley\u2019s bottling company was located at 2121-23 Main Street (later the location of Wheeling Stamping and now Orrick) from about 1900 to 1915.<\/p>\n