We found Antique Bottles Of  Baltimore and enjoyed his short stories of small digs. Here is his link. Be sure to check back as there are plenty more.

We Dig Wisconsin! The site that chronicles the bottle digging adventures of three friends with a passion for uncovering buried glass. These guys have some great stories to tell. Don't we all wish we could have found that Coke ( a CBC Chi-town crown WOW)    Check it out here and read their stories.

Here's a story submission:

Airplane

You know how a prive digger likes to talk about his hobby. During a recent
plane trip returning from Puerto Vallarta, Mexico. Roy Mize from Midwest
City, Oklahoma was talking about bottle collecting and privy digging to a man
sitting next to him. When he told me about it, I couldn't help conjuring up
memories of the 1980 movie " Airplane " which starred Robert Hays. In the
movie Hay's character was talking and talking, while the person seated next
to him was on the verge of suicide from listening to the endless story.

While Roy was putting the person next to him into a coma, another passenger,
who had overheard the conversation, started talking about a property he owned
in Ada, Oklahoma and how they had recently uncovered a bunch of old pop
bottles.

Roy knew that the Ada bottling works had been uncovered a couple of months
ago, so he began to question the guy on what had been found. After a
conversation that lasted most of the flight, Roy had permission to dig as the
owner seemed to think that not all of the bottles had been found.

I'm not sure, but I think Roy called me from the airport. I could tell he was
excited when I answered the phone. The first thing out of his mouth was, "I
told you we should have gone to Ada the day we found out about the bottling
works." I must have heard him repeat that statement ten more times during the
next seven days. We set up a dig for Sunday.

Roy pulled up about 7:30 a.m. and naturally the first thing he said was, "
Next time you hear about a bottling works move a little faster." We loaded my
tools a headed for Ada.

When we got there, it didn't take long to find the lot. We tried to find the
owner but we were told he was gone until noon. We pulled out our tools a
started looking around. Iv'e learned from digging other bottling works that
there are usually a few bottles missed.

We started sinking test holes in the lot searching for a pocket of bottles.
We would dig a hole then move on. After looking for three hours we still
hadn't found anything.

About noon the property owner showed up. We talked for a while and he showed
us where they had found most of the bottles. They had found over 150 Oklahoma
soda bottles. He then pointed out a spot where they had just removed a slab
of concrete and told us nobody had dug under it.

We grabbed our shovels and started digging. You could tell that the dirt
hadn't been disturbed. I got down about twelve inches when my shovel hit a
bottle. I reached down and pulled out a ADA BOTTLING WORKS ADA, I.T. crown
top in great shape. I looked over at Roy and said, " I think we found the
spot."

Apparently I was wrong because after an hour of digging we had found nothing
else. How many times can that happen, you find the best bottle in the first
five minutes and spend the next hour just moving dirt. we'll we both knew it
was time to give up, but we had been lucky enough to find one good territory.

We loaded up our tools and headed home and oh yes, I had to listen to Roy all
the way.

Scott Leiter -----THANKS SCOTT-------

Here is a great article from Digger Odell that some of you may have run across but I thought I might include it again. Kinda gets the digging juices going. Digger has a way of doing that.

Fremont man has an antique bottle collection that numbers more than 6,000

By Debra Jacobsen/Tribune Correspondent
Joe Dickmeyer digs gold.

Every morning he awakens to the hits of the '60s and '70s on KFMT Gold 105.5.

But Dickmeyer really digs old bottles — the bottles that others discarded.

The Fremont bricklayer's bottled-up passion for the past began in 1970, when Daniel Drug of Fremont closed after 90 years in business. Dickmeyer's father worked for the store, so Dickmeyer and several other high school students were recruited to help clean out old bottles. Interest in that inventory became the foundation for a collection of more than 6,000 antique bottles.

The bottles, carefully secured in display cases, are just part of his extensive historical collection.

The early years were slow.


"I'd find a bottle of two while hunting," said Dickmeyer. "I had the interest, but no knowledge," he added.

Eventually he met fellow collector, the Rev. Joe Baumgartner, and joined the Nebraska Antique Bottle and Collectors Club.

"I kind of got him started 27-28 years ago," Baumgartner said.

Dickmeyer learned to dig for bottles at dump areas along the river or close to where outhouses had been in the city. As a mason, Dickmeyer said he also comes across bottles while digging footings.

The first bottle he unearthed was Healey and Bigelow's Kickapoo Indian Oil, valued at about $1.

For every one bottle he finds intact, Dickmeyer said, he finds 10 broken bottles.

"And 10 plain (bottles) to one embossed," he added.

But even the broken bits serve a purpose.

"I save all the pieces, so I know what's out there. Then, I may finally dig one (intact)," he noted.

Occasionally Dickmeyer will swap or buy, but his collection mostly is comprised of bottles he has hand dug.

Twenty-five years ago he found a broken Fremont Brewery glass. But he never found one intact. Dickmeyer said he recently acquired it — the Holy Grail of his collection — through eBay.

About 10 bottles were found by Dickmeyer's wife, Cheryl. One of her early digging experiences was in 98 degree heat following her brother's wedding in 1981. She was fortunate enough to find an unbroken Royal Bitters bottle, worth about $60.

"The contents of old bottles interest me," said Cheryl, a pharmacist. Many are not ideal products, she added.

The cure bottles that line the shelves of Dickmeyer's collection include the "Keeley Cure for Tobacco Habit" and the "Keeley Cure for Drunkenness." produced by Dr. L. E. Keeley.

The only full bottle Dickmeyer ever found was "Dr. Killmer's Swamp Root," a kidney cure.

Baumgartner once had more than 200 cure bottles in his collection. But the cures were short-lived. Following the 1906 Pure Food and Drug Act, putting the word "cure" on bottles was prohibited, Baumgartner said.

For Dickmeyer, a unique find near a Fremont outhouse was 500 little bottles that once held a Dr. Bernie's cure. "There was cocaine in that," said Dickmeyer.

Other favorite bottles from Dickmeyer's collection include Hutchinson Sodas, Grant's Sasparilla and, of course, any Fremont bottles. The oldest bottle in his collection comes from Magenau & Bruner Pharmacists, dating to the 1870s.

Dickmeyer's great-grandfather, Ulrich Dickmeyer, homesteaded near Arlington in 1869, noted Dickmeyer.

A history buff, Dickmeyer enjoys the stories behind the sparkling glass. A rare find was a bottle from the office of Dr. H. Chambers, veterinary surgeon. Dr. Chambers had a little brick building between Main and D on Third," said Dickmeyer.

But Dickmeyer's collecting has been so extensive; he has exhausted most of the Fremont bottles, adding a new Fremont bottle only every 5 years now.

But that hasn't stopped him.

In 1981, after Uehling's 75th anniversary, he started a display of Uehling memorabilia. Prepared for the 100th anniversary in 2006, he plans to exhibit his collection, which includes knives, graters, salt and pepper shakers, coin purses, pens and bottle openers.

And in the winter months when the ground is frozen, Dickmeyer collects items such as old tokens, plates, calendars and thermometers — most depicting area advertisers. His yardstick collection could outline the perimeter of a football field.

He locates tokens with metal detectors, from auctions or through trade. Most of the more than 80 tokens were "good for" items or services at Fremont businesses from the turn of the century to the 1950s. Represented are merchants, Eagles and Elks clubs, schools and transportation companies.

"My collections tie into each other," added Dickmeyer.

Other items in his collections include figurines he has unearthed while hunting for bottles. The most recent collectible was found near Cedar Bluffs, a porcelain figure of a girl with a lamb, dating back to the 1890s.

Old photos are another useful collection — helpful in locating where Fremont businesses once stood.

He tries not to have too many duplicates in his collection. If digging bottles with a friend, and given first choice, he will pick a $2 bottle over a $25 bottle if it's one he doesn't own, he said.

And clearly, Dickmeyer won't be headed to the glass recycler anytime soon.

"I'm a collector and not a seller," said Dickmeyer.

If you have a story to tell send it to us via email. We would love to post it.

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