✅ SOLVED Clay Bottle or Jug Stopper?

[BuffaloBob]

This looks like it was a bottle or jar stopper. It's made of fired clay, has no markings and is about 2-1/2" diameter and 2" high with a tapered end. It doesn't look water tight and I'm curious what it might have been used for.

 

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[jgowans]

My guess is a Lightning type closure. The cross groves could accomodate the closure from several directions.
http://www.sha.org/bottle/closures.htm
It may have had cork or rubber to seal it but I have seen glass on glass stoppers before.

 

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[Bigcypresshunter]

My guess is a Lightning type closure. The cross groves could accomodate the closure from several directions.
http://www.sha.org/bottle/closures.htm
It may have had cork or rubber to seal it but I have seen glass on glass stoppers before.

Great link. Here is a quote from it:
Glass
Excluding cork and crockery, a glass stopper was likely the most common material that was used as a bottle stopper

I dont think it would work well for concrete pours unless there was a way to attach it to the wire mesh. The steel is usually attached.

 

[Angelo]

Here's a bottle stopper on ebay. Seller claims, clay or resin.

Tony

 

[cival war hunter 2 !]

There is surveyors pipe that they used to use back in the 1800s, maybe its like a thing to put in the hollow pipe.We use re bar and the yellow cap.

 

[cival war hunter 2 !]

This is some what I'm thinking.
http://www.landsurveyor.us/jspw3_po...veyor%27s%20License%20No.%20etched%20in%20cap

 

[surf]

Hey You Guys,

There's been a trail of these with no denouement...

Hopefully, I can bring a degree of closure on these. I've found a number of the ones like yours over the years. I always wondered what they were. I thought some sort of plug or stopper for vitreous clay pipe, and I still hold on to that as a possibility. Only because I have found them in close proximity to small size vitreous pipe.

I was later told that they were stoppers for carboys. That made sense to me, but I wondered about alternative or additional uses...

It wasn't until I found this porcelain example that I pretty much closed the book on them.

The Gem Stopper Co, of Philadelphia patented these guys, though I've not yet found the patent drawings. The Smithsonian has their catalog: [Trade catalogs from Gem Stopper Co.] | Collections Search Center, Smithsonian Institution

"[Trade catalogs from Gem Stopper Co.]
VARIANT COMPANY NAME:
Established 1875
COMPANY NAME:
Gem Stopper Co.
RELATED COMPANIES:
Gesco
NOTES CONTENT:
Universal acid carbon stoppers ; asbestos gaskets ; metal fasteners ; "Gesco" brand."

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~​

From a lawsuit concerning their milk bottle stoppers:

"That at all said times, the Gem Stopper Company, the defendant above named, was and now is a Pennsylvania corporation engaged in the business of the manufacture of bottle stoppers, including tin milk tops, and a special variety thereof known as Lightning Tin Tops for milk bottles and the wire trimmings for fastening the same. Bradbury's Lawyers' Manual and Clerks' and Conveyancers' Assistant

These stoppers, I believe were afixed with wire bail closures, a la the Lightning stopper bail. I also think for that nice tight seal, they would have had a rubber gasket.

I hope this will serve as a semi solution to some of the long running discussions that have periodically graced these forums.

 

[Bigcypresshunter]

Ah I remember being scolded by then moderator PBK for not accepting the surveyor cap ID because he was a young man and this is a family forum.
You dont always know the age of the member you are trying to debate.


Old thread finally SOLVED.

 

[jennb]

Hello surf,
Would you be willing to let me use your photos of this white Gem Stopper Co. stopper in a television show? I'd love to hear from you. [email protected] Thank you!