The Unusual Codd Bottle

Hiram Codd’s 1872 idea: a marble for a stopper

In 1872 Hiram Codd realized that a marble inserted and captured in the neck of a bottle could seal mineral water and soda without a cork or any outside stopper. His bottle used the pressure of the carbonated water itself to force the marble up against a ring inside the top of the neck. The result was a tight, durable seal, good enough that some Codd bottles have stayed sealed for more than 100 years.

The problem Codd was solving was a real one. Carbonated drinks were popular in Victorian Britain, but keeping the gas in was difficult. Corks dried out and shrank unless the bottle was stored on its side, and they had to be wired or tied down against the pressure. A closure that the drink sealed by itself, and that could not be lost, was a practical answer for bottlers who reused their bottles again and again.

Codd’s design meant the bottles were filled upside down, so the gas pushed the marble into place the moment the bottle was turned upright. A rubber or cork ring in the lip helped the glass marble seat firmly.

How the Codd neck works when you drink

At first glance the idea seems simple. Like many things that look simple, the Codd bottle is cleverer than it appears. Once opened, the marble would block the mouth every time the bottle was tipped to pour or drink, so Codd shaped the neck to hold the marble aside. Pinched indentations in the glass form a small chamber where the marble rests while the bottle is tilted to one side.

Tipping the bottle to the other side lets the marble roll back and reseat itself after only a measured amount of liquid has passed, which limited the drinker to one swig at a time. The bottle could be resealed by shaking it hard and then turning it upside down so the marble settled back over the mouth.

The pinched neck is the feature that makes a Codd bottle instantly recognizable on a shelf. Collectors look at it closely, because the shape of the pinch and the chamber varies from maker to maker.

Why Codd bottles never caught on in America

Codd also designed an opener, a small plunger pushed into the neck to press the marble down far enough to release the trapped gas. The marble then dropped into its chamber and the bottle was open. Codd’s opener was widely used in public places, but in private most people simply pushed the marble down with a little finger.

That habit is the reason only a few Codd bottles were ever popular in the United States. American drinkers were too impatient to hunt for a proper opener and used the finger method almost exclusively. That was fine for anyone with clean hands, but for the many people whose work left their hands dirty, it made the drink unappealing. American bottlers turned instead to a different internal stopper that suited American habits better.

The story of what Americans did drink is told in the history of soda pop and who invented it.

England, Europe and Asia: the Codd bottle spreads

In England the invention was such a success that nearly all the soda water makers of the period adopted it. Eventually any bottle sealed with a marble came to be called a Codd bottle, whatever its maker, design or color. Codd-style bottles were sold throughout Europe and Asia as well.

The design did not vanish completely. In Japan, the lemonade-style soft drink called Ramune is still sold in a marble-sealed bottle of the Codd type, and drinkers push the marble down with a plastic plunger supplied with the bottle. For most of the world, though, standardized external stoppers and metal caps replaced the marble once bottle manufacturing became more uniform, and the Codd bottle with its odd neck and bright marble became an artifact and a collector’s item.

Identifying Codd bottles: makers, colors and marbles

Over about 60 years, Codd and his competitors kept improving both the function and the looks of the bottle. They made different sizes, and some had oddly shaped necks. As a result, identifying an original Codd bottle, or even one by a particular competitor, became extremely difficult. Many Codd-style bottles are copies or variations of the original 1872 design.

Some manufacturers tried to mark their bottles by making them in distinctive colors or with a specially colored marble or lip. Most surviving Codds are in pale aqua or clear glass. Bottlers also usually had their name, town and sometimes a trademark embossed in the glass, and these embossed panels are often the best clue to where and roughly when a bottle was filled. Glassworks names or marks sometimes appear on the base or near the heel.

Collectors also check the condition of the marble chamber and lip, look for chips and cracks around the neck, and note whether the original marble is still inside. That last point is not a given. Boys often broke Codd bottles to get the marble out, which is one reason intact examples are harder to find than the huge numbers once made would suggest.

Glass collectors who enjoy colored and specialty glass can compare notes in the guides to Vaseline glass and silvered mercury glass.

Prices and the rare cobalt blue Codd bottle

In 2003 collecting Codd bottles was still affordable, with some common examples selling for less than $20. A cobalt blue Codd bottle, on the other hand, could cost several thousand dollars.

The reason is simple. Cobalt blue was generally reserved for bottles that held poison, so a sensible mineral water bottler avoided it. It is estimated that fewer than a thousand cobalt blue Codd bottles were ever produced. The same color code explains why cobalt glass is so common in another collecting field, antique poison bottles.

The variety of Codd-style bottles, combined with their limited production period, makes building a collection a real challenge. That challenge is much of the fun for collectors who enjoy tracking down a particular bottler, a regional variation or one of the rare colors.