Codd-neck bottles, often known as "marble bottles", due to the marble actually trapped in the neck are a remarkable feat of engineering. By 1864, Americans, like Josiah Beard and Moses Fairbanks of Boston, were patenting a “new and useful method of bottling still liquids or stopping bottles containing still liquids, those not charged with gases.” The idea involved using a rubber marble trapped in the bottle neck and stoppered with a cork. A few years later, a slightly different style was invented by Hiram Codd with the help of Richard Barrett of England who registered their own patent in 1872. This version used a glass marble instead of one made of rubber and was used largely for carbonated drinks. Today, owing to the fact that children of the past would break these bottles to get the marbles out, "Codd-neck" bottles are prized by bottle collectors everywhere.
How Codd-Neck Bottles Work
Designed to replace stoppers and corks, the ingenious idea was developed to prevent carbonated drinks from going flat. These bottles would be filled upside down. A marble, held against a rubber ring by the gas in the bottle, ensured a proper seal. When in use, the marble would be poked down a little to let some of the gas out. Then, it could be trapped within a narrowed opening in the bottle neck, allowing one to take a swig without losing all the "fizziness". When tilting the bottle at an angle, the opening would allow some of the liquid out, while the remaining effervescent pressure pushed the marble back in place against an upper rubber seal.
When you examine the neck of these bottles closely, you can see that in fact there are several positions for the marble to fit. When the bottle is being tilted to one side, the marble is positioned to one side to allow the liquid out. When the marble is tilted the other way the liquid flows out as well. Vigourously shaking it, then turning the bottle upside down, and upright again and the marble seals and blocks any further exit of carbonation. It was an engineering marvel that bottling companies continued to use for the next sixty years.
Codd and his associates perfected and altered the invention little by little. They even came up with a "coddscrew", somewhat like a conventional corkscrew but designed both to open a cork on a bottle and to move the marble by inserting it into the neck. (Apparently, the idea didn't catch on in America, however, as most people preferred to use their fingers to push the marble down.) Eventually, American bottling companies dropped the manufacture of these bottles - perhaps in favour of more sanitary methods.
Description
The bottles come in a variety of colours ranging from aquamarine to amber to the more rare cobalt blue. Likewise, there are some versions with cobalt blue marbles or just a cobalt blue across the lip. Usually, the name of the manufacturer is embossed in the glass. Sometimes, depending on the conditions under which the bottle has been kept over the years, the rubber stopper is still intact. There are forgeries out there, however. Buyers interested in acquiring genuine Codd-neck bottles, must do their homework!
Use of the Codd bottles remained popular in England, Europe and Asia, until alternatives were invented more than 50 years later. Not all marble bottles were made exclusively by Codd and there are numerous manufacturers around the world who adopted the idea as time went by. However, the term "Codd-neck" honours the original inventor. In America, there were are around 30 known manufacturers of Codd neck bottles. Interestingly enough, in Asia, there are still companies that produce them to this day.
For further reading; ( sources confirmed, July 11, 2011)
- Odell, Digger, "An Act of Codd"
- "Codds and Ends"
- Historic Glass Bottle Identification and Information Website
- Antique Codd Bottles
- Antique Bottles: Colourful Codds
Jennifer Wilson - By the time you've marched around for five decades and earned a few degrees, you've learned a few things about a few things....
Join the Conversation