Thursday, May 13, 2010

Portland Hotaling T-55




This year has simply been one of the best years in memory for GOOD whiskeys! I am feeling like a broken record, but it has. Here is one that turned up far from it's home...along with 17 other glob fifths! This hole started out with Bromo Seltzers and similar quality for the first 5 ft. Then a 2 foot clay cap, and PRESTO CHANGO instant embossed glob fifths for two solid feet in depth, and 5X8 feet in demension. This one is now on the shelf. A HAMMER whittled T-55 Portland Hotaling. I believe there are perhaps 8-10 of these at the most in collections. Most are a light honey amber, and are remarkably plain given their age (late 70s) and being non air vented. Every once in awhile "the one" comes out, and this example qualifies to me! It is a chocolate with 100% diamond whittle, bubbles galore, and an enormous top. The embossing is bold and crude. Best of all, in spite of being completely covered in other whiskeys,it is mint. My photographic skills are not good enough to show the crudity, but maybe they can provide an idea of how crude it is.It was not dug in Oregon, and the people involved wish to remain nameless and faceless, but all in all it was one of the most stacked whiskey holes in awhile.
Posted by at 5:15 PM
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19 comments:

  1. WOWSER! M.E. What a great looking fifth! Is there any other embossed fifths that can be named? Multiple fifth hole.... what I have always wanted to excavate. Out here on the fringe of the globby universe, even singles are a rare treat. Congratulations to someone??
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  2. Congrats Dale ! Any layer shots of the dig ?
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  3. There were 18 embossed fifths. One extremely rare slug plate with some agent from the coast, the rest were Cutters including a yellow with STRONG green tone O.K.(like the broken one A.P.posted awhile back), and a circle Cutter in the same color,even more green with jewels, and whittled to death. along with several others of each. A few unembossed fifths, unembossed flasks, a unique medicine, and of course the KILLER ketchups and Bromo seltzers. Sorry, I do not believe the diggers took any "layer shots" during this event. I will encourage them to do so next time!
    M.E.
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  4. Sweet example. Anyone open to the idea of the T-55 being a mid 80's bottle ?
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  5. WOWZERS!! That one looks even better than your landline description. See you tomorrow to "compare notes".

    T-55 is late '70s, T-56 follows in the early to mid 1880s. T-57 is probably his last embossed Portland fifth, as he sold out to Rothchild Bros in 1893/94.

    At the time of these bottles' use, Hotaling had Agencies in San Francisco, Cal, Portland, O.,Seattle W.T., and Spokane Falls, W.T. It has been said he also had an Agency in Boise City, Ida., but records are somewhat vague on this. He did file a lawsuit there, but little else is written. I need to get up there and hit the Library.
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  6. Outstanding example of western glass
    Dennis
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  7. OldCutters,
    Hotaling did have an agency in Boise City, Id. but was very short lived. The first listing is in the Idaho statesman, June 20th 1888 saying that new stock is arriving daily. By March 19th the fallowing year B. H. Coleman Co. ran an ad stating they were the successors to the A. P. Hotaling office.

    David Storey
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  8. Being one of the 2 people who helped dig this bottle I say it is mid to late 1870's. this is based on the fact that all drug store bottles and other bottles in that layer were 1879 or eairlier. But who is to say, perhaps the mole people carried it to that layer from above: Or it settled down through the shit pile.
    Correction on the shit house size: it was 12 foot long 4 foot wide and 8 feet deep. There were
    at least thirty plus broken embossed whiskies in the whiskey layer. I found it strange not one single soda any where in the hole. The guy drank in straight.
    The late 1870's-early 1880's hole next to it had more whiskies, the best being an upside down embossing fleckenstine-mayer flask. Super crude,heavy whittle, honey amber with a touch of green tone. still probing for the for late 1880's-1890's hole.
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  9. Perhaps someone can shed some light as to where whole examples and parts have been found?
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  10. was the pit for a Hotel, Boarding House, House, or Unknown ?
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  11. Anonymous, I am very well informed of Hotaling's later involvement in Boise, but there is no record of him having an "Agency" in 1880 or before. I have in my collection a tin sign from the late 1870s that lists all of his known outlets at the time. My issue is with a revered previous author claiming that Hotaling was in Boise in 1880. I would very much like to make that fact.
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  12. every privy I seem to dig has some kind of whiskey in it,but like most of us longtime diggers ,it's worth the wait when a good one comes out of the ground. In just selling my last circle cutter,and o.k. cutter,and then to dig more just months after selling them was a thrill,but the hotaling was one I never even dug a piece of one.digging two millers in years past was great too, but this hotaling was as crude as anything we all could hope for,except being green.sold my last jessemoore fifth too,and dug one of those too,and light amber.I know only digging parts of a clubhouse doesn't count,but the first whiskey I dug in 1969 was a red bear and the next was a broken clubhouse and broken auqa wonsers thrown in whole and smashed on top of each other,so maybe in another hole it might happen. dig anything,the beargrass,and united we stand wilmerding came out of holes with 7-up bottles for two feet,and other good bottles came out of what we thought was newer holes,So the bromos in the hotaling hole didnt stop me,and look what I found,18 more whiskeys that I didn't have the day before.keep on diggin.I will.
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  13. far from home, what....was this hole dug in Arizona ? HA
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  14. Sounds very "Portlandish" to me.....
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  15. that many 5ths could never come out of Portland, come on. maybe the pit was dug in San Francsico.
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  16. you do not have to be a rocket scientist to figure out where we dug these bottles. We would like very much to share a list of all items, the type of building that once was there, the sanborne location, layer shots, and photos of the bottles. But there are 2 major factors that determine why we can't. We must remain out of the spot light.
    the first is: the bottle police. but we can deal with that, a night in jail and some community service. Been there and done that: no problem.
    But the real factor is other individuals in our area digging community. There are certain people that feel all bottles above and below ground belong to them. They have no morals or respect for any thing. While on digs we have had ours cars vandalized, digging equipment stolen from under our noses, bottles taken from beside the hole. One instance while down 20 feet in an outhouse, a brick was tossed in the hole---thank God for hard hats and no one was hurt. Several times they called the authorties and reported us digging. One individual who I have had to put with for more than 30 years, was watching us dig a good bottle, he jumped in the hole and tried to take the bottle. A couple of good jabs in in the ass with the probe got rid of him. I could go on but enought said. The point is we fear at time for our property even our lives. It is a sad state of affairs, when digging has got to this low level.
    I hope none of you have these problems in your area, they are no fun. Now see why we must dig and collect off the grid and in the shadows.
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  17. I see the far north has "digging vultures", too. Sadly, those types don't usually associate with fellow diggers, but choose to remain on the periphery like jackels, darting in to "claim" a tidbit now and then. I'm afraid the a "jab in the ass" with a probe wouldn't be good enough for that type. Aanyone that would vandalize a digger's vehicle needs some serious "attention".
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  18. Sounds like Deeno and ole Harprick are still at it up there !
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  19. unfortunately the beavis and butthead gang are still in the pacific north west, some what alive in their old age, but still functioning. Locally they are known as demented stringbean deno, blowhard smash crash and grab hardpick, along with their apprentice in training miguel loot.
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