at estate sales, I love the dirty old garage and nasty basements to go through. I use to sell on ebay also. I once picked up an White Castle mug for a buck...It was quite rare and what I though I’d get 20 bucks for went for 300 dollars. I want to find a whole case of them....withiin 24 hours of listing it was at 100 dollars. I couldn’t believe it, but the final 300 dollars ended up in my bank...
One of the best cistern digs in our city we barely missed out. There was a rush among bottle collectors to locate the cistern for the first tavern in the city. Someone beat us there by maybe a day or two we picked up some nice bottles they left though. Even old Coca Cola bottles have value> The old amber bottles are getting hard to find and there were also a few white ones before the green ones. The Christmas Coke as it's called the green colored embossed letters with patent December 25 1923. But what's more valuable now is the old wooden Coke Bottle Crates. Believe it or not I found a blue quart Mason Jar Patent I think Nov 15, 1858 laying off the side of an old rock road.
I used to spend time in areas TVA had isolated and the land went to public use when TVA bought the owners out. 40 years later with all the houses gone you could still tell where they stood even if the foundation wasn't there. In the spring the flowers gave the location away LOL. Then it was a simply a matter of figuring out where the people threw their trash at. Look for screw top medicine bottles {likely prohibition era as the medicines were high in alcohol content LOL} then look deeper for the more older ones near by.
Biggest mistake we ever made was not getting an old hand gas pump. Once we decided to go ahead and get it next time we went there it was gone. The globe was even still intact. Likely most valuable find though was a grist mill stone.
Number 13 mason Jars used to be hard to find in the south. Seems shine makers didn't like them too well LOL. If you think you have an old cork top bottle there are several ways to tell. First is the top itself. Older cork top bottles were made in two pieces the top was applied to then and the seam will be off set from the seam going down the bottle. Another clue is if it's clear hold it up to sunlight and see if the bottle has a purple and blue tint. Some of those bottles that have sat out in the sun have a real unique coloring to them.