Saturday, October 27, 2012

3.50" Phillips' Milk of Magnesia Tablets Cobalt Glass Bottle

This Phillips' Milk of Magnesia bottle is on the smaller side, with the dimensions 3.50" x 1.80" x 1.25".  I found it underneath a pile of driftwood along the Kansas River on a sand bar.  In terms of color, it is very similar to this one that I picked up around the same area:  a vibrant and deep cobalt blue.



The main panels of the bottle have no embossments at all, meaning this bottle once had a paper label.  There is an evident ridge, or beveled edge, that protrudes from each side of the bottle.  The finish is threaded, and the cap is disgusting.


The base has the embossments: "PHILLIPS/ MILK OF MAGNESIA/ TABLETS" with a sideways '9' to the left of the text and a sideways 'G' to the right of the text.  This is clearly a cup-bottom mold produced bottle, as there is a mold line on the upper edge of the heel, running the circumference of the bottle.

Below is an exact replica of the bottle I found:




As far as dating this Phillips' Milk of Magnesia bottle, we know for sure that it was made after 1931, which is when the Phillips' Milk of Magnesia Chewable Tablets were first introduced.  As we also know that it was made before 1976, which is when company stopped manufacturing the blue glass bottle at the Glenbrook plant.  Hard to say when the exact year of manufacture is, but based on extremely similar bottles found around the interwebs, I would hazard a guess that it's a 1950s-1960s bottle.

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