The first mechanized production of bottles in the United States was on a semiautomatic “press-and-blow” machine patented by Philip Argobast in 1881 and used by the Enterprise Glass Co. of Pittsburgh to make Vaseline jars in 1893. Although the molten glass still had to be gathered and dropped into the mold by hand, the Argobast machine could produce completely machine-molded wide-mouth jars by pressing the lip and blowing the body in two separate operations. Semiautomatic production rapidly took over the fruit jar industry, and by the turn of the century most fruit jars were made on semiautomatic machines rather than in the traditional blow-back molds. Narrow-necked bottles, however, could not be manufactured on “press-and-blow” machines because the plunger for the pressing operation could not be withdrawn through a narrow opening. Although a “blow-and-blow” machine for narrow-necked bottles was developed in England in the late 1880s, semiautomatics for small-mouthed ware were apparently not introduced in the U.S. until after the development of the automatic Owens bottle machine in 1903. The Owens machine, invented by Michael J. Owens of the Toledo Glass Co., was put into production in 1904. It differed from the semiautomatics in that the glass was gathered into the molds by mechanical suction process, thus completely eliminating hand labor. Despite a series of improvements from 1904 to 1911, the Owens machine was slow to gain acceptance, both because of its expense and because of the restrictive licensing policies adopted by the Toledo Glass Co. In 1905 most bottle production other than wide-necked jars was still by hand. Semiautomatics came into increasing use, however, and a number of improvements made them a serious threat to the Owens machine. After about 1914, there was a proliferation of patents for automatic feeding devices that could cheaply convert the more modern semiautomatics into fully automatic machines. Use of feeder-fed semiautomatics, as well as the Owens automatic machines, reduced hand bottle production to 50% of the country’s output by 1917, and to less than 10% by 1925. More efficient feeder machines slowly replaced the Owens-type suction machines and are the type in general use today. MEDICINE BOTTLES As glass manufacturing expanded after the Civil War, so did the pharmaceutical industry. Pharmacology became a more exact science than it ever had been, and its practitioners dispensed their compound medicines in glass bottles that for the first time were available in precisely graduated sizes and a variety of shapes often tailored to suit specific products. Early post-war bottles were usually made in the aquamarine of “green” glass that had become traditional for apothecaries’ wares, but use of clear lime glass spread until by the end of the century most pharmacy bottles, like most of those from the Middleton Place privy, were made of clear glass.