The Heritage Center recently received the donation of a large glass bottle labeled “Port Byron Bottling Works,” which again brought the history of the small concern to the top of rabbit hole topics. It brings to light another small business that seemed to operate in the shadows of history and sadly, there isn’t a lot of information about it. So, let’s gather up what we do know and make some assumptions.
The Kick bottling works was located at the end of First Street, near what would become the location of the current Town of Mentz offices. It is said that the metal clad shed behind the town offices is the sole survivor of the business, but this might be a bit of folklore. The business does appear on the 1884 and the 1906 Sanborn Fire Maps as four buildings and sheds.
The 1884 Sanborn Fire Map of Port Byron
The one time the business received a lot of mention is in 1887 when it was lost in a fire, although the concern was not for the bottle works, rather then the seven horses that were killed in the adjoining barn. The business was owned by John Kick who was born in 1849 in Throop. In 1870 he married Clara Zeluff, who was also from Throop, and soon after moved to Port Byron to set up a retail store with his Zeluff in-laws. An ad from the 1874 newspaper advertises the new Zeluff and Kick drug, grocery and confectionery store. In the 1875 census, we find John as the owner of the grocery and drug store, with his brother-in-law Fred Zeluff as a drug (store) clerk.
Then in the 1880 census, John is listed as “making small beer,” while Fred was running the store. Small beer was a type of low alcohol beverage that was considered safer to drink then the water, even for children. The beer could be made as a second run using the spent mash left over from first run brewing. Penny Heltzer, the past village historian, noted that the business purchased kegs of beer from a brewery in Auburn, although it is possible that Kick was purchasing the spent mash and running his own brewery. In either case, it is certain that the beer was likely safer then the local water as we learned in a past column that any water in Port Byron was basically sewage from Auburn and the pollution from the many cess-pools used in the village. Another mention of the business was found in a May 1940 Chronicle that said that John Kick was bottling “pop,” otherwise known as soda. Both could be true. Aside form the mention in the 1880 census, the only other time that Kick is associated with beer is found in 1896 when he was given a license to sell liquor. So, it is not clear if he was making beer, or bottling it, or both.
Bottling works were not unique to John Kick or Port Byron. If you search on the web, you will find a great variety of bottles left over from this time period when each village and city appeared to have their own plants. Our friends in Weedsport and Jordan each have bottles from their own local works.
I had seen the smaller blue-green bottles before, but the two larger bottles were new to me. They were embossed with a “not for retail sale” which seems to indicate that the bottles were used in a store or tavern to fill glasses or mugs. And as I could not find any advertising for beer or soda made by Kick, it makes me think that the product was more for local use in his or neighboring stores and taverns. Around 1900, Fred Zeluff opened a small hotel just across from the Port Byron Hotel which would have been another outlet for this product. Although what is baffling is that in a hotel or tavern, it would have been easier and cheaper to pour directly from the keg, and this leads me to believe that the Kick and Zeluff works were more akin to the home brewer, aging the beer directly in bottles then in larger vats. It appears that Kick sold the business to the Zeluff brothers around 1900, and in any case, the soon to be adopted prohibition laws would have caused the business to close down.
The bottles we have came from the Clyde Glass Works, perhaps made in the 1895-1912 period. It would be fun to find some older bottles, and who knows, perhaps more are out there.