Found St Pierre Smirnoff Bottle

Pickles

Recently found this St Pierre Smirnoff Bottle buried in our yard. Wondering if the markings on the bottom have any meaning or clue to it's date of manufacture? R-105 in the center with 18 to the left and 59 to the right of a diamond marking with a number 6 next to it. Thanks so much

fate

I found one, still seal but it look very old. My late aunt was in her 90s when she pass

backyardarcheologist

The US has pretty specific rules on what needs to be included on a liquor bottle.

1. Glass manufacturers must have a permit issued by the federal government if they want to make liquor bottles. You can find an unofficial list of permit numbers here and an official but very old list here.
2. Bottles must also be marked with the year of manufacture.
3. Bottles must also identify what company the bottle was made for, either a rectifier (R) or distiller (D). This is the R-105 you see at the top.
4. From 1935 to 1964 liquor bottles were also required to prominently display somewhere "Federal law forbids sale or reuse of this bottle". The fact that this bottle includes that means it was likely made during that time range. (Source)

So at the top you have R-105; this is the rectifier. From what I've been told on this forum, there's no published list of rectifiers. The only way to figure out which number corresponds to which distiller is to find a bottle with the label still on it. Occasionally a kindly soul will post lists like this one but R-105 isn't on here.

As for the rest of the numbers -- we have 18, 59, and 6 at the bottom. There's no layout mandated by law so we have to guess. From this guide to numbers on bottles:

Most commonly, single or double-digit numbers embossed on the bottom of a glass item are mold numbers [...] Date codes are often seen, especially on soda bottles from the 1930s to date, and many of these codes are embossed on the base of the bottle, placed to the right of the glassmaker’s logo. This is true on the products of some manufacturers, but not all.

Based on that:

• The 18 can't be the year because that means it's either 1918 or 2018, outside our time range.
• 59 is a plausible year of manufacture, as that falls within the 1935-1964 constraint we established earlier.
• Because it's offset, smaller, and at the bottom, 6 is probably a mold number used by QA to track down the originating mold if they see a defective bottle.

Looking at the permit list I linked to above, permit 18 was issued to Diamond Glass Company, based out of Royersford, PA. There's a comprehensive list of descriptions and photos of logos here. It does appear to match their logo (specific page here).

So, in summary: The bottle was made by Diamond Glass Company in 1959.

It's in really good condition considering it's 65 years old!