The Saint Paul globe., 1899-12-10

several dealers show th7tdhe weekly col;
lections Of mixed bottIesd In Ma n4iaftan
alone amount to 500 wagon loads At
SIS a lead, which IS the usual price, this
means about. $4,000 a yearspatd to the
scoW-trimmers. e4a .e~ss es1 ~ 49,
MILLIONS OF BOTTLES. -
Tho mixed bottles are put together in
sugar barrels at, the dump. and then sold
to small dealers in the neighborhood, who
sort and wash them. and turn them over
to the wholesale dealers. The yard of one
bottle shop exhibited g. most bewildering
variety. The cleansing is almost always
done by hand, after which the bettless are
sorted and stored. One dealer, keeps in
his warehouse the enormous number of
100000 bottles, shipping his stock to and
from various states in this country, and
even across the Atlantic
Beer. bottles and other Registered"
bottles were once handled freely In the
junk trade, and sold from the dumps to
their original owners, Or to any one else
who cared to buy them. But through the
agency of the Bottlers and Manufacture
erS' Association Of New York and SINH
Tar organizations elsewhere, laws have
been passed making 1t a crime to deal In
labeled and registered bottles. How i'm
portant the bottling interest Is may be
seen from recent report giving the cap
ftal invested IN it as about $50, ,00O 900;
while the annual loss in bottles, in spite
OF all efforts to prevent 1t, amounts to
nearly 81, 900 900.
For some years the New York associa-
tion has had a contract with a member
Of the bottling trade for the recovery
from the dumps of bottles belonging to
Its members. He arranges with the les
sees Of each dump for the collection of
registered bottles, for which he pays a
small price, afterwards washing and
sorting them. and finally delivering them
at the exchange building of the associa-
ton. whence they are distributed to the
members. The contractor receives a fixed
price for all bottles accepted from him,
the monthly cost to the association ris-
ing of late to nearly $1,000 The dump
lessees get only small part of this sum-
REGISTERED BOTTLES.
A portion of this money also Is paid for
the recovery of bottles from the Brook
lyn dumps, in additionr3to sthe collections
made there for the Brooklyn and Long
Island association. More than 1000, 900
bottles are annually collected for these
two associations. These figures do not
cover all the registered bottles which
the scow- trimmers are prohibited from
selling. There are many bottlers not
members of any association, whose bot
Ties are lawfully feSlStSfeQ, and who
make individual arrangements with the
association contractor f9E-the recovery
of their property from the dumps This
contractor has In, his establishment more
than 200 compartments for holding the
bottles OF as many different bottIers of
this Grass The collections of this class
Of registered bottles are estimated by
persons acquainted with the trade as
amounting to at least 100000 bottles an
nually. Besides the two chief assocta-
tions named there are in New York an
association OF mineral water 1nanufac-
turers. whose members recover some bot
ties, and a federation of milk bottlers.
whose annual recoveries of bottles from
the dumps amount. according to a for
mer contractor, to about 10000
About two-thirds of the registered bot
ties recovered by the association con-
tractor are soda bottles; next come lager
beer bottles, amounting to less than one
quarter; while siphons, quarts and weiss
beer bottles make up the remainder
Even the rubber shoppers on beer bottles
are cleaned and used again, even when
they come from the dumps How thor
oughly the dumps are searched will ap-
pear from the fact that even broken
glass has its market value. In the form
of broken bottles and window glass more
than 800 bags of this material are col
lected each week, commanding a price
of 10 cents bag, or over 81 800 a year