This green glass seltzer bottle is 11 inches tall including the metal siphon spout. It measures almost 12 inches around the girth of the bottle and 3 inches across the bottom. Etched in the bottom are the words: BOTTLE MADE IN CZECHOSLOVAKIA. Engraved around the metal top are the words: SILK CITY BOTT. CO. INC. On the front of the glass bottle itself is etched the "label": Silk City Bottling Co. Inc. 10 Amity St. Paterson, N.J. Registered Cont. 26 025 In the center of the "label" there is a Star of David with a seltzer bottle in the middle section. This logo is in between the words Trade and Mark. There is a thin glass straw inside the bottle as well.

This seltzer bottle was hand blown in Czechoslovakia for a company owned by Jews in Paterson, New Jersey. Seltzer was a very popular drink in Eastern Europe and the immigrants who came to America brought it with them. At one time, there were hundreds of seltzer bottlers and delivery companies in the New York metropolitan area. In 2009, a New York Times articles stated that there was only one bottling company left in Canarsie, and only a few delivery men in New York City. According to wikipedia, seltzer is still made and delivered commercially in Argentina, Vienna & Toronto.

This artifact is important to me because my grandparents all lived in Paterson, New Jersey, and we used to go visit them every Sunday after Hebrew School. They always had seltzer bottles in their house. Paterson was called Silk City because it was the largest producer of silk fabric outside of China. Paterson had a very large Jewish population.

My family also had seltzer in the house. It was often my job to go to the garage and pull up the garage door (no remote) so the seltzer man could take out the cases of empty bottles and bring in the cases of filled bottles. My father loved drinking seltzer. He would drink seltzer with meat meals instead of soda. Sometimes he would make us egg creams, which is seltzer mixed with chocolate syrup (Fox's U-Bet, I remember)and milk. This seltzer bottle is a reminder of fond childhood memories and a disappearing part of Jewish culture.