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If your work colleagues haven't been wondering why the heck you've been wandering around all day with your mouth wide open, jaw locked in "gasp!" position, then you missed this auction, because it's probably the Shot of the Year.  Maybe even Shot of the Decade.  If I didn't have  to write this edition of SOTW, then I'd be speechless which, I must confess, might not be a bad thing for one and all.

Let's cut straight to the chase: the auction was for a multi-colored enamel glass from Rome, GA.  It closed  on March 19 with 6 bids for a record-shattering $710.00 with bluroc firmly in the driving seat.

Record-shattering as in all records. 

For a label-under, for an enamel, for a shot,  p - e - r - i - o - d. 

Can you imagine putting down $710.00 on a shot??????  Not me.  I sure hope his wife never finds out....!!!

Now if truth be told, I did actually wonder if this might not be a jaw-dropper, perhaps even the first shot to  make $1,000.  Not so much on account of "drop-dead gorgeous glass-lust appeal", which it has in abundance, but because it's from Georgia and because it's a saloon glass.   Although saloons could be found on virtually every street corner in pre-pro land, relatively few put their name on shot glasses.  This fact alone adds value (interesting to note that Rich Lucchesi's collection includes a similarly embellished enamel saloon glass).   Then there is the fact that we know of only a handful of pre-pro glasses from Georgia (see the Cumulative Database), so:

rare x rare x desirable = big bucks.

But there is a huge IF in all of this - it's a valuable glass only IF it is indeed pre-pro.  That's the big question that's kept my e-mail inbox well-stocked over the past few days. 

Why all the doubt?  Because look at the glass more carefully.  Remind you of anything?  Doesn't that gold fill line below the gold rim look familiar?  Doesn't the glass look a little too sturdy to be a traditional pre-pro shell? 

To me, this glass looks like a Barclays Gold Label or Red Label or Black Label, or any of a number of  Hiram Walker's glasses:

Same thick glass, same gold rim, same height. 

The Barclay and Walker glasses are something of a mystery because we can't date them precisely.  In fact we don't know anything about Mr Barclay.  Hiram Walker did operate out of Detroit but lived in Canada and moved his still across the US border when Prohibition swept through the States.  The company continued well into the late part of the twentieth century and we've always felt that all of these glasses were produced during Prohibition or after Repeal. 

So is the GA glass also post-Repeal?  If anyone lives near Rome, GA, maybe they could stop by the library and check the directory listings under "saloons". 

No matter, the record for a pre-pro -- and most likely a post-pro (perhaps the Kentucky Derby shots have made it into nose-bleed territory) -- stands at $710.00

Gulp.

Last updated: Saturday April 22, 2006
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