Antique Stoneware Fruit Apple Butter Crock Preserve Jar

Pottery : Antique : Stoneware

 

We are offering this late 1800s early 1900 stoneware crock or preserves jar that was marketed, with contents, by Sears Roebuck and Co., Chicago. Crock has the creamy gray color bottom, with the brown glazed top section and cover.

It has both original labels, which have developed spotting and fading over the years, but still show the graphics and most of the text. Top label says FIG – APPLE (?), and bottom label reads: Rivera Brand Fruit Butter Distributed By Sears Roebuck and Co Chicago Contents 6 Pounds. The Sears logo with the lady can be seen to the left on the bottom label.

Closure is cast iron, retaining most of the original black finish, and has a two piece clamp. Cover has a sealing gasket that has sealed the cover tightly to the jar, and I have not attempted to try to dislodge it. This came from a very old local estate and I am sure has been sealed since the contents were removed 100 years ago.

Crock, or jar, measures 9 1/4 inches to the top of the clamp and 6 inches wide. Condition is very nice. There is one old shallow chip (flake) to the top surface of the ledge where the jar changes color, but it is really not distracting. There is a 1/2 inch separation line on the right side at the top of the jar, that only affects the brown glaze (not a crack). It has the original shiny glaze covering it, so was apparently a stress in the outer glaze when it was made.

Cover has a one inch long loss of brown glaze color, that also has the original shiny glaze covering it, so also a manufacturing flaw. There are no chips or cracks to the cover. When made, the brown glaze did not fully cover the edges of the cover, and appears as a lighter color in the images. This fruit crock has only the expected manufacturing defects and the one shallow chip, as detailed.

A very nice antique stoneware fruit crock, with all original components.

Item ID: 1076