Antique VAUGHN'S BUFFALO Lithontriptic Bottle Applied Top New York NY MINT For Sale

Few 19th-century patent medicine bottles display as beautifully as this outstanding VAUGHN'S BUFFALO Vegetable Lithontriptic Mixture. Standing tall with its elegant, unusually long neck, rich deep aqua glass, crisp square form, and attractive applied drippy lip, it is a wonderful survivor from the golden age of American patent medicines. This example has all the eye appeal collectors hope to find—bright, clean, and virtually untouched by time.

• Attic mint.
• Exceptionally clean inside and out.
• Brilliant, shiny surface.
• No chips.
• No cracks.
• No haze.
• No scratches.
• No scuffs.
• Crisp embossing throughout.
• Applied, drippy hand-finished top.
• One original manufacturing flaw along a vertical edge where an air bubble opened during production and was naturally glazed over by additional molten glass—a fascinating and completely original factory-made feature that adds character without affecting integrity.

• Height: 7.25"
• Base: 2.5" x 2.5"

Embossed:

VAUGHN'S
VEGETABLE LITHONTRIPTIC MIXTURE
BUFFALO

This bottle was produced in Buffalo, New York, most likely during the late 1850s through early 1870s, when applied finishes and this style of square medicine bottle were standard. The unusually long neck and hand-applied lip firmly place it before the widespread adoption of fully machine-made bottles.

The word "lithontriptic" comes from Greek roots meaning "stone dissolving." During the 19th century it referred to medicines advertised as dissolving or relieving kidney stones, bladder stones, gravel, urinary complaints, and related ailments. Like many patent medicines of the era, Vaughn's formula was marketed as a botanical ("vegetable") remedy, appealing to consumers seeking gentler alternatives to harsh mercury- and mineral-based treatments.

Although advertised with impressive claims, these medicines generally offered symptomatic relief rather than truly dissolving stones, relying on herbal extracts, alcohol, and various botanical ingredients common to patent medicine formulas of the period.

When this bottle was made, Buffalo was one of America's fastest-growing cities. Thanks to the Erie Canal and Great Lakes shipping, it had become a booming manufacturing and transportation center. Railroads, grain elevators, steamships, and expanding factories transformed Buffalo into one of the nation's great commercial cities.

Medicine manufacturers flourished in this environment, shipping embossed bottles like this across the expanding United States.

Owning this bottle transports you back to a fascinating period in American history:

• Physicians still had limited understanding of infection, decades before antibiotics.
• Most families kept several proprietary medicines on hand for everyday ailments.
• Glass bottles were individually blown into molds and hand-finished by skilled craftsmen.
• Railroads connected distant cities while telegraph wires carried news almost instantly.
• The nation was rapidly industrializing and expanding westward, creating enormous markets for bottled medicines and household remedies.

Today, bottles like this survive as beautiful reminders of that remarkable era.

A truly exceptional example with outstanding color, condition, and eye appeal that would be difficult to upgrade.