I found the bottle at a show—small, embossed, with a colored paper label and an intriguing tax stamp on the base. I knew the Tallman name from Janesville’s early perfumery trade, and the bottle looked pre‑1900, so I bought it. It sat on my shelf for years before I finally decided to dig into its history. That’s when things got interesting.

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For collectors of early Midwestern bottles, few names spark as much curiosity as the Taylor Brothers. Bottles without a city name turn up in Wisconsin and Illinois – in Milwaukee, small Wisconsin towns, farm fields, plus Chicago and surrounding areas — leaving diggers and historians to puzzle over their origins. The trail the Taylors left behind is written as much in glass as it is in the historical record.

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Carole presents her research into the history the tiny village of Fussville, located near Menomonee Falls Fussville had several pioneer breweries. Although details about them are scarce, she has managed to piece together a fascinating story about the breweries, the town and the people that lived there.

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One of the more unusual privy digging finds recently was this teal blue pressed glass object. It is embossed “COLLAR PAD NO. 3 PATD JAN. 31, 1888”. It is broken into two pieces and is missing a corner but is still an interesting and attractive piece of old glass. We assumed it was part of a neck brace for a human, but a review of the patent proved otherwise.

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