Fact or myth? Mason Jars with number 13 on the bottom

[racer117]

I have heard that mason jars with a number 13 on the bottom were either not used or broken because of superstition. I have a couple of the aqua jars with this number on them, given to me from Grandmas estate. I have seen them on ebay,from 10.00 and up to believe it or not ,399.00 buy it now price. any info would be appreciated.

 

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[cti4sw]

Idk if you collect (or know anyone to collect) sports cards, but Panini, Upper Deck, and Topps will short-print cards to a given print run. The term "eBay 1/1" refers to a card whose short-print serial number matches the featured player's jersey number. While it's not a true "1/1" (which is a print run of 1 card), it's a marketing device that is a sort of unique card because there will only be one jersey number in the print run.

I feel like these jars you're referring to are similar to that. People were far more religious in those days, and thus very superstitious, so I could see the superstition against the number 13 being a fact. As to rarity, I don't think they're particularly rare (that I'm aware of) and the high sell price is based less on actual supply and moreso on the historical superstition. If you're interested in selling them, I would do the pricing research and then sell them one by one (keeping supply low) for as much as you can get. Hope this helps...

 

[epackage]

Judging by the sheer number of #13 jars sold monthly on Ebay I'm gonna say it's a myth that they were destroyed...

mason 13 in Bottles & Insulators | eBay

 

[mammoth29]

From Bob Clay on a website titled "How to date Ball Fruit Jars"

-"And just one final word concerning a recent phenomenon that involves certain Ball jars. This concerns the "rarity" of the #13 Ball Perfect Mason jars. These jars ARE NOT rare at all, and the stories you hear about superstitious people or moon shiners breaking all of them for fear of bad luck is an old wive's tale, or a tale conjured up by someone to try to make the jars appear rare to the unknowing to jack up the price. While these stories may indeed have "some" merit to them, there are still MANY of the #13 jars out there; far too many to be classed as even scarce jars. And as recently as five years ago, there was NO PREMIUM attached to these jars, it was just another mould number on the base. While the #13 jars are indeed just a little bit harder to find than some other numbers, they ARE NOT rare, or even scarce, by any stretch of the word."

 

[jeff of pa]

Yea I'd say Myth & if they are selling at High Prices occasionally it's
like when someone buys a Moldy Peanut & jelly sandwich where the mold looks
like their favorite religous character.

 

[CoilyGirl]

Or a cinnamon bun looks like Mother Teresa,true story.