If we judge from past experience this post could be destined to be very popular. Many users of our blog check in every day but quite a lot of posts are found by people using search engines. As the ‘owners’ of the blog we at the museum can see just which pages are most popular. The home page wins that competition by a huge margin. That’s had over 100 000 views, mostly that will be by regular viewers. But amongst individual pages sought out by far the most popular is the one about a Virol Jar and the one about a Shippams Paste jar is catching up fast.
So we reckon a blog about an Oxo bottle, a late entry at this stage, will soon be sought out. People who find the blog may well have found or just own one of these items.
So here is our Oxo jar.
A 1930s Oxo Jar at Market Lavington Museum
We think this elegant dark brown glass bottle (or jar) dates from the 1930s. It looks like similar bottles which contained Bovril, but there is no doubt that this is an Oxo container.
Vital information – moulded on the bottle
It says it very clearly on the bottle and also gives the quantity as 4 oz – 4 ounces or about 55 grams.
And really we have no further information – not even what Oxo in a jar looked like.
Market Lavington Museum 
December 16, 2014 at 7:52 am |
2 Black 5’s at Parham Wood today (Tuesday) at 1330 hours.Weather should be good for pictures.
December 16, 2014 at 4:28 pm |
Couldn’t find the time to get there today!
December 16, 2014 at 9:05 pm |
By coincidence I read only today in Bill Bryson’s excellent book ‘At Home – a Short History of Private Life’ that Oxo was invented by the German chemist Justus Liebig in the mid-19th century as a way of using some of the surplus beef that Argentinian cattle farmers raised. As they had no way to ship or preserve the meat at that time, most of it was wasted and the carcasses merely boiled down for their bones and tallow!
December 30, 2014 at 10:22 am |
Sorry for delay replying – fascinating information, Maurice. Is this Liebig the one who invented the water cooled condesnsor we used to use when distilling dirty water in school science?
Rog
Curator
May 18, 2016 at 10:38 pm |
I found a 16Oz oxo bottle tonight with 774 written on the bottom, are the worth anything?
May 19, 2016 at 6:08 am |
Not much is my guess. Cash value doesn’t interest us. We are only concerned with local provenance.