Antique Bottles and Bottle Collecting

I am a third generation antiquer. My Grandfather made his living dealing and knocking doors, as did my father while I was a child. I remember long afternoons of sitting in our brown station wagon, as my dad went door to door getting his name out into the community. This was about the most boring activity I could think of as a child. Sometimes my mother and I would spend hours in the car sitting and waiting for my father to finish talking with " Old Farmer Joe" about the boxes in his dusty attic. Yet still I consider myself a third generation antiquer. Why is that if the activity was so boring you might ask. Simply because the thrill of the hunt has been taught to me since my very earliest years. You see for every afternoon I remember spending bored out of my mind in a car, I remember twice as many when my dad or grandfather ( who lived just up the road at the next house) would come home with a truck piled high with boxes, paintings, frames, furniture, paper, coins, postcards, jewelery, and things of such randomness that I could not even begin to describe. I have had such experiences as a child from this business, that I cannot believe anyone else from another walk of live would every have. I distinctly remember at the age or 9 or 10, having my grandfather toss me a small round object. It was a shrunken head... yes a very real very shrunken head that he had found in a box in the attic of an old sea captain's house. I remember Native American artifacts, bows, arrows, full quivers, Huge headdresses from the western tribes like you seen in movies and think that they must be fake. I have held signed photographs of Abraham Lincoln, documents hand written by George Washington, and original stock in the Wright brothers airplane company. I have seen gold coins by the pounds be bought and sold, I have seen scrimshawed whales teeth, harpoons, and sailors valentines all dressed out in shell. I have held civil war muskets, bayonets, and use to run around in the fields sporting my very own original Civil War hat. I collected everything. Throughout my life, I have collected jackknives, stamps, coins, bottles, art glass, globes, comic books, jewelry, toy guns, and random art work... just to start the list. So as I remember the long car rides, and the even longer waits at each house we stopped at, I cannot think of myself as anything but a third generation antiquer. Will I pass this onto my son? Of course, I already have. Our weekends are spend trolling through piles of junk at flea markets, lawn sales, junk shops, and group shops. I have taught him to access the global market for his finds using ebay and other such tools. Has he caught the bug? Will he be a fourth generation? Its hard to say, much of the most amazing things were seen during my childhood years, but as time marches on the market changes. There will always be a desire for the things people remember their grandparents owning, we all have that attachment to the past that trill of finding that one amazing thing that we remember as a kid. And that is the true connection of antiquing as a family, not only the experience, but the heritage and the memories. J.White

Tags: Abraham Lincoln, Airplane Company, Bayonets, Boring Activity, Civil War Muskets, Dusty Attic, Farmer Joe, Gold Coins, Harpoons, Headdresses, Lincoln Documents, Long Afternoons, Native American Artifacts, Old Sea Captain, Paper Coins, Photographs Of Abraham Lincoln, Quivers, Western Tribes, Wright Brothers, Wright Brothers Airplane