Bottle Pickers

E.C. DEWITT & C. W. BEGGS : BITTERS BOTTLES

E. C. Dewitt while being a resident of Elkpoint, Dakota, Territory was manufacturing and selling patented medicines. He was selling his products to the local market. In 1880 Charles W. Beggs proposed a partner ship with E. C. Dewitt. They would create the firm of Beggs & Dewitt. In 1883 the patented medicine firm would relocate to Sioux City, Iowa. Three years later in 1886 the firm would move again now located in Chicago, Ill. Eventually the partner ship would discontinue. Both men then would establish separate patent medicine companies. Both men were very successful with the products they made and sold.

From the April 5 1906 of the Pharmaceutical Era. "E. C. Dewitt & Co. manufacture of Dewitt’s Stomach Bitters and Attwood’s Lagroppe Specific, announces the withdrawal of these preparations from the market"

Below are photos of the square and flask style bottles embossed DEWITT’S / STOMACH BITTERS / CHICAGO. Note the second picture has peenout embossing. One has a weak peening and the other has a more defined peening. Also a Dewitt 200 year Calendar and Book of Horoscope which was one form of advertisement that they used.

Below is a trade card for two of Dewitts other products.

Below are photes of the Beggs square and flask style bottles embossed BEGGS / DANDELION BITTERS // CHICAGO / ILL and the flask BEGGS / DANDELION / BITTERS in a harder to find in the clear color. The flasks also were amber and yellow olive. Which yellow olive being a rare bottle. The Beggs square style Bitters bottle embossed with Sioux City, Iowa is a lot harder to find.