Yama Farms Milk Bottle VERY RARE value?

ednmart

I am interested in trying to find the value of this milk bottle.

This is a One Pint Milk Bottle from Yama Farms. It is in excellent condition - it was from an estate in the Catskills - it was not dug.

It is a clear bottle with the embossed words- One Pint Liquid, and Yama Farms in an embossed circle with three Japanese symbols. It is translated as “Yama-no-uchi” or “Home in the Mountains” (sometimes translated as “Home Within the Mountains”). According to Yama Farms founder and owner Frank Seaman, this name was bestowed upon his property in Napanoch, New York by Marquis Ito Hirobumi, the first prime minister of Japan. It became the symbol of Yama Farms Inn,

The Yama Farms Inn - was open from 1913 to 1939 - was one of the most widely known resorts in the United States. Located in Napanoch NY in the foothills of the Catskill Mountains. It was owned by Frank Seaman, an advertising Executive, and friend of Thomas Edison.

This deluxe resort was open by invitation only. Frequented by J.P. Morgan - Henry Ford - George Eastman (of Kodak) - Nelson Rockefeller - John Burroughs - David Abercrombie - Ernest Seton - Firestone - and many other notable people of the era. The resort believed in nothing but the best for its guests and served them anything they wanted to eat at any hour - but it only served its own milk, from its own diary, as they believed it was the best available.

Chris

Thanks for posting.

I am no expert on milk bottles but have been a collector for decades so can at least give you some guidelines for getting to value. Ideally, you want a New York state based collector of milk bottles to help you if you can find one.

• Your particular bottle has a great story to it but it raises several questions. Who is the potential buyer and what is their motivation for buying this example? Do they just want to fill out their collection of milk bottles from this state or region, or are they someone who is drawn to items of local history?
• How can you be sure this is a rare bottle? It is machine made and therefore was mass produced. Undoubtedly there are other examples out there.
• What is the highest price paid for a clear embossed milk bottle? Let's leave out examples in green or amber glass or painted label milks or other examples that have pictures along with the embossing. Ideally you probably want to further limit your comparison here to NY state or the northeastern US. Find that # then you have an upper bracket for the range.
• Get various "shoot from the hip" values from collectors like myself. With all that said, my best educated guess would be in the $20 to $100 range.