Tool

How old is this bottle?

Pick what you see on your bottle. Each answer narrows the years, and every year comes from a federal law or regulation you can read for yourself.

Why can a bottle look older or newer than it is?

Because the glass, the strip and the label were each made at different times, and none of them prove when the whisky went in.

Old glass, later whisky. Lettering and base marks date when the glass was made. Bottlers used up glass they already had, so the whisky inside can be a little younger than the bottle.

Leftover strips. Strips stopped being required on July 1, 1985, but bottlers could use up stamps on hand, and some states kept their own stamps longer.

Refills. An opened bottle can hold anything. If the clues disagree with each other, a refill or a swapped label is the first thing to suspect.

Imports. These rules are for bottles filled for sale in the United States. A Scotch or Canadian bottle follows its own country's rules for most of its life.

How does a bottle change from 1890 to 1995?

Move the years and the strip, the label lines and the lettering in the glass change to match the rules in the table below. Drag the bottle to turn it, or read the strip up close.

1916

The distiller, serial number and seasons on the strip are made up for the example. The made date runs ten years before the bottled date, and Prohibition pints show whisky made in 1917 or earlier.

Which federal rules date a whisky bottle?

Each row is one federal rule and the years it was in force for bottles filled for sale in the United States.

What you see	Years	Where the date comes from
Green strip over the cap	1897 to 1979	Bottled in Bond Act, March 3, 1897. The separate bonded stamp ended January 1, 1980.
Red strip over the cap	1934 to 1985	Liquor Taxing Act of 1934. All federal strips ended July 1, 1985.
Federal Law Forbids Sale or Re-use of This Bottle	1934 to 1964	Authority from June 18, 1934. Dropped effective December 1, 1964.
D or R number on the base	1934 on	Required by 1937. The end date has not been pinned.
Medicinal labeling	1920 to 1933	National Prohibition Act. Repeal proclaimed December 5, 1933.
Proof and Distilled by line	August 15, 1936 on	Federal Alcohol Administration labeling rules.
Metric size	October 1976 on	Allowed October 1, 1976, mandatory January 1, 1980.
Fifth, quart or pint	Before 1980	Metric became mandatory January 1, 1980.
Government warning	November 18, 1989 on	Alcoholic Beverage Labeling Act of 1988. Dates the bottling.

What does a green Bottled in Bond strip tell you?

A green strip means the whisky was bottled in bond, and how much it tells you depends on when it was printed: before July 1937 the strip itself carried the distillery and both the distilling and bottling seasons.

Years	What is on the green strip	Where the date comes from
1897 to July 1937	Overprinted by the Bureau of Engraving and Printing with the distillery number, the state, the collection district, the distiller's name, the year and season of distillation, and the year and season of bottling. It was a coupon off the case stamp.	Bottled in Bond Act, March 3, 1897; House Report 791, 1937
July 9, 1937 on	The law now requires only the size and that the whisky was bottled in bond. Everything else is left to Treasury. Exactly which details stayed on the strip after this has not been pinned down.	Act of July 9, 1937, 50 Stat. 487
1960 to 1979	Still printed with the bottle size. The distiller's name overprinted on the strip has to match the label.	IRS Industry Circular 60-16, May 25, 1960
January 1, 1980	The separate bonded strip ends. Bonded bottles take the same strip as everything else.	Distilled Spirits Tax Revision Act of 1979

Prohibition medicinal pints were bottled in bond under the same law, but the strips used on them from 1920 to 1933 have not been pinned to a federal record yet.

What does a red tax strip tell you?

A red strip means ordinary tax paid spirits, not bonded, and it dates the bottle to between early 1934 and July 1, 1985, with the printing on it narrowing that further.

Years	What is on the red strip	Where the date comes from
1934 to July 1936	Bottle size printed on it. Domestic bottlers could still have their own overprint added.	Liquor Taxing Act of 1934; T.D. 4661, 1936
August 1, 1936 on	No more private overprints on red strips for American spirits.	T.D. 4661, 1936
By 1941	"Series 111," the bottle size (for example 4/5 quart), a serial number, watermarked USIR.	Smithsonian National Postal Museum, 1941 stamp
After July 1, 1960	A new strip with no bottle size replaces the sized ones, gradually as old stock runs out. The "less than 1/2 pint" strip stays the same.	IRS Industry Circular 60-16, May 25, 1960
1980 to June 1985	No serial numbers. The temporary rules for the 1979 tax law took them off.	T.D. ATF-198, 1985
July 1, 1985	Federal strips end. A closure you have to break to open takes their place.	Deficit Reduction Act of 1984

White strips went on bottles of alcohol, not whisky. From 1960, alcohol for export had them overprinted EXPORT (IRS Industry Circular 60-16).

Which bottle dating claims are wrong?

You will read that strips ended with a 1979 tax law. That law only ended the separate green bonded stamp. The strip requirement itself lasted until July 1, 1985.

You will also read that the Bottled in Bond Act required four years of aging. The 1897 law sets no age at all. A four year minimum was in place by 1937, from a later rule.

You will read that red strips carried no series number until 1945. The Smithsonian holds a Series 111 red strip dated 1941.

You will also read that green strips ended December 1, 1982. The law ended the separate bonded strip on January 1, 1980.

And the medicinal limit was not one pint for all of Prohibition. It was a pint per ten days until November 1921, then half a pint of alcohol per ten days, which is exactly one pint of 100 proof whisky. That is why the pint became the medicinal bottle.

Still stuck? Send it to me.

If the clues don't settle it, or you want to know what a bottle like yours has sold for, send me a few photos: the front label, the back, the strip or cap close up, and the base. I'll tell you what I can find.

This is an opinion from a collector, not a formal appraisal. Photos you send stay private and never go on the site.