Pretty PURPLE small SUN - BURST or COB - WEB pattern PUMPKIN SEED PICNIC flask

Description

A smaller
4 5/8 inch tall
PRISTINE PURPLE
antique
PUMPKIN SEED PICNIC
style flask.
This type of flask was mainly used to hold hard liquor; BOURBON WHISKEY, corn liquor, rye, but sometimes flavoring extracts or medicines.
What makes this particular example stand out is the embossing that covers the sides of this bottle, a spider web or sunburst pattern just makes it really stand out.
This is an ORIGINAL ANTIQUE hand
B
lown
I
nto
M
old (
BIM
) bottle with a ground
top
, dating back into the 1800's
.
Condition
:  Bottle is in nice clean condition.  It has some content residue, some traces of wear, but nothing in particular.  The very top of the lip is rough as it was ground down by the glass blower after he snapped it off the blow pipe, which is how they made pre-1900 screw top bottles.  It has NO cracks, chips, dings, damage, etc
.
Age
:  An early hand-blown bottle (Blown-In-Mold = BIM) with a ground top, ca. late
1800's
.
Shipping
: All
DOMESTIC
shipping charges
INCLUDE
insurance. We have enjoyed shipping our items all over the world and are happy to offer most of our items to international buyers. Yet insuring International parcels is very expensive so PLEASE NOTE; we do
NOT
insure International orders unless winning buyer specifically requests this and we are able to provide an insurance quote. We do not falsify information on the Customs Form, such as a price other than what the actual purchase price is, so please do not request us to do so. We ship several times a week and send payment acknowledgments and shipping confirmations. Your prompt payment will assure a very quick turn-around time.
IMPORTANT NOTE:
If our shipping charge is much more than the actual shipping cost, we will refund the excess so what
YOU
pay for shipping/insurance is very close to, if not exactly, the
ACTUAL
shipping costs! This is especially important for foreign buyers to know as most of our foreign shipping charges are rough estimates
.
This type of flask is referred to as a PUMPKIN SEED flask as they are shaped, literally, like a pumpkin's seed.  In case you aren't familiar with these, they are a flat flask, not a globe or sphere shape, but uniformly flat, something that the picture's don't really show.   Anyway, some of them have the word 'PICNIC' embossed on them, so they are also referred to as Picnic Flasks. Though these are found throughout the United States, they were most commonly used out west as WHISKEY FLASKS or pocket flasks.   This is about as nice as an example as we've seen, a small thin little 'punkin' seed, covered with embossing.  And then there is the purple color which really accentuates the embossing!   With a clear glass bottle, you see through it, and the embossing reflects what ever patterns are captured in the background.   Yet with this deep purple color, you are looking, not through the embossing but AT the embossing, which totally intensifies it and jumps out right back at you!.  About the
lavender color ... You hear about old glass turning purple ... this purple color is the result of having manganese in the glass.  Manganese is a mineral, a rock, that was mined, crushed, and pulverized into a powder, then added to vats of molten liquid glass, and acted as a decolorizing agent to turn the natural aqua-tinted glass into a pure crystal clear colorless glass.   Then it was blown into a mold to create a flask like this.  But when exposed to the ultraviolet rays of the sun or other sources of UV rays, it triggers a chemical reaction and the manganese starts to oxidize and slowly turns a lavender or amethyst color.   The end result is what collectors refer to as SCA (Sun Colored Amethyst) glass.   The longer it is in the sun the purpler it becomes.  This pumpkin seed or picnic flask was exposed to some concentrated UV rays which had the same affect as the sun, but a lot faster.   It has not been colored, stained, or altered.    No matter how a glass bottle has turned purple (direct sunlight or UV rays in controlled environment) they all turn the same purple color as it is the same chemical reaction taking place.   The only difference is the time it took to turn purple.  What is important is that an item is old enough to turn purple as with few exceptions, only clear glass from before 1915 have manganese in them and will turn SCA.
After this, with the start of WWI, manganese was no longer available as foreign imports decreased and domestic resources turned towards the war effort.   Selenium sulphate then replaced manganese as a glass de-colorizer and when exposed to UV rays, it turns a yellow / straw color, and a dark burnt amber color.
Generally speaking NO MORE purple glass after 1915!
Not only does this deep purple/amethyst color make this a great looking antique pumpkin seed flask,  but it also authenticates it as being truly antique, check it out!
,
check it
out!
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: Our goal is 100% customer satisfaction. We put our 30+ years of experience in antiques to use in describing every item we list. Items are sold in a store front format and your purchase is a binding contract, so please don't be hasty when looking over the listing. We find that communication is the key to successful transactions so PLEASE completely read the item description AND ask questions before purchasing,
thank you
!