What is it? Set 446

[Sonny]

I don't have experience with bitters, as Uncle Jed may have had, but I do have a 4000+ count bottle collection (or a collection of bottles, depending on who you ask). I don't search or collect any more, as that was a hobby starting during high school days. My collection is mostly boxed and stashed away, now. Lots of interesting aspects of knowing and collecting bottles. Those times were fun.

Not too long ago, I gave some bottles to an elderly friend, whose 6' bottle tree was blown over by a storm.... the post had rotted at the bottom. I brought her a 15' long old sinker cypress, 5" top-8" bottom diameter log and fixed her up with lots of spikes for holding lots more bottles. Her lawn decor is really nice and she's delighted with her new bottle tree. ....Which reminds me, I'm due to go visit her.

And speaking of more bottles, today, I'm cleaning canning jars and doing other preps, for picking and canning figs and fig jam, tomorrow.

Sonny

[G. Ross]

My brother used to add strawberry flavor and some red color to his fig jam and pretend it was strawberry jam. Pretty good, though.

[Sonny]

Strawberry jello. About 2 or 3 packs per dishpan of figs will give the not so overpowering strawberry flavor (I like to taste the figs' flavor, also) and slightly reddish color. Use the over-ripe figs for the jam, as they mash best for the creamy jam texture. Some folks peel their figs, before cooking, which also helps when mashing them.

*Add the jello just before the figs are done (ready for canning), just as regular jello is prepared, i.e, add the jello to the hot water for jello.... add the jello to the cooked figs 1 minute before filling the jars, stir it in well. If you wait more than 1 minute, to start filling your jars, the jello will start setting up and you'll have some problems filling the jars quickly enough, before the rest of the mash, remaining in the dishpan, starts setting up, too. Either have some help to fill jars, when cooking a dishpan at a time, or if alone, cook half a dishpan at a time, so you'll have time to get things done before it starts jelling.

Sonny

[Rob H.]

I agree that the inside jaws were probably meant to be a nut cracker. A few people have suggested that this tool is a can opener, one person specified it was for sardine tins, I think that can opener is correct and will have it as my answer until I find proof otherwise.

Still not sure about the last item but the rest of the answers have been posted:

[Zz Yzx]

How does one go about determining the age of a bottle?

-Zz

[Sonny]

Surely you jest, with a question as that? There are a number of ways, if the bottle, like the older Coca Cola bottles, doesn't have a date (and place of make) embossed (raised) on the bottom. Clear glass starts to turn blueish, after about 75 yrs, with exposure to UV light. Some old bottles are blown whole, whereas later bottles were made from molds.... 2 halves of the body, the top seperate and bottom seperate..... and you can see the seperate seams. Newest bottles are

2 halves only. Older Avon bottles are pretty special, ie., unique designs and designs are date specific. Makers change their design, so those changes are date specific. Makers go out of business (date specific). Businesses had bottles made specifically for them, and they no longer exist, so those bottles are date specific. All sorts of ways to determine age.

Sonny

[DoN. Nichols]

suggestion sort of related to my first opinion but which I did not write down as being particularly likely -- until I just considered some more features.

The eye in the bottom piece appears to be beveled from both sides. This suggests to me that a possible function for it would be:

It slides along the beam of a fairly heavy balance -- with a weight hanging from the eye. The sharp pin could fit into holes along the beam for fairly repeatable precision of locations, which would be multipliers for the weight added by the sliding device and whatever hangs from it.

Enjoy, DoN.

[Rob H.]

I didn't have much time in the past couple of days to research any of the guesses, but now after spending a few minutes looking around the web I think that flaring tool is correct for the last item in this week's set. Similar ones can be seen on these links:

changed my answer for this item and added the three links above to my site.

[Leon Fisk]

See if this picture/link looks the same or not:

that image/site, it is suppose to be a can opener, nutcracker like others have speculated from 1877...

[Rob H.]

> Per that image/site, it is suppose to be a can opener, nutcracker like

Thanks, I'll pass that link on to the owner of the tool.

[Stormin Mormon]

I'm disappointed, I didn't get the flaring tool. I own two sets of the modern kind. That did look like the single flare device, but I didn't make the mental connection.

Christopher A. Young Learn more about Jesus

.

[DoN. Nichols]

> Per that image/site, it is suppose to be a can opener, nutcracker like

While it is at "

", the text identifying it (above the photo, not in the photo) says "Shearer or Snip", which is closer to what I was suggesting for the end jaws. Certainly the upper of the two looks pretty close to what you had up there. The lower one does not have the projections for the auto-opening spring.

Enjoy, DoN.

[Leon Fisk]

>>> Per that image/site, it is suppose to be a can opener, nutcracker like

Thought you might find this particular patent of interest here:

"IMPROVEMENT IN CAN-OPENERS Patent number: 191416 Filing date: Apr 21, 1877 Issue date: May 29, 1877"