This past winter I picked up a case of old 10 oz. glass Sprite bottles - the kind with the embossed dots. On the bottom of all of the bottles were different National Parks, none with just cities. These came from Southern LP of Michigan.
I recently picked up an 8-pack of 16 oz. Sprite bottles (with the embossed dots) in Southern Minnesota. Same thing, there were only National Parks on the bottom.
I then went to my bottle collection and pulled down a 10 oz. Sprite that I think I picked up in Southern Indiana. Yep, a National Park on the bottom.
What's up with this? Did they just put National Parks on the bottom of all Sprite bottles?

Good question,I've always wondered that too. Wish I had an answer. I've been buying 16oz Sprite since the early 90's from bottlers in Iowa, the Michigan UP and the one in Winona, MN, and they've all had this feature on them. I've got a 1964 Sprite bottle stashed away here that has a national park on the bottom.

-Andy

Hi, I just got a 28oz. Sprite bottle, still full, and was wondering if there's any way to tell when they were made. The bottle says Grand Canyon Nat'l Park on the bottom, has the number 61 on the side near the bottom, and says 1 pint 12 Oz on the label. Can someone help?

Old guy mode on.

Back in the day, Coke bottles had the names of cities and Sprite bottles had the names of National Parks. These were, at the time, the only two products of the Company, and, IIRC, as they expanded later, new products (Mr Pibb, Fanta, etc) did not have this feature. Although, again IIRC, TaB and then diet Coke had cities as well.

A common misconception was that, relative to Coke, these represented the bottler who originally had owned the bottle. This was not true because, in any particular area, the vast majority of bottles would be returned to the same local bottler and thus 80 or 90% of bottles should be local, or at least nearby towns, on them, and large cities would have far more bottles in circulation than smaller ones. However, the bottles were always a very random mix of bottles.

While I have no links or references, I think that the Company just issued a random listing of towns where it had bottlers on the bottom of bottles (the towns listed were always towns with bottlers, not small towns or suburbs) and when it launched Sprite it just came up with the National Parks variant, with no realationship to which of the then 100s of independent bottlers had purchased the bottle.

It was a common game for everybody to buy a Coke and play a game where whoever got the bottle "from" the furthest away or nearest to the current location had to pay or got his free or whatever the local practice was.

Slightly less old guy mode on.

Even into the 1990, it was possible to tell which company was the local bottler from the "Bottled by ____ " language on the side of the can or on the cap/crown. Today, even with only about seven companies (CCE, Northern New England, CCBCC, Swire, CCBCU, and Arbata, and Philadelphia) having 98% of the country, they all just read "bottled by a member of the CC Bottler's Association, Atlanta".

Originally Posted by vintagebottledude

has the number 61 on the side near the bottom, help?

Well, since Sprite was introduced in 1961, I'd guess your bottle was made that debut year.

I noticed that with Sprite returnables back in the 70's. I thought it was left over from some contest.

Thanks! i guess my bottle's pretty old. Anyone wanna buy it?

I was going through the Soda Spectrum back issue CD http://www.sodaspectrum.com/home that I just got and I found the answer in issue #5:

"The National Park Service, U.S. Dept. of the Interior - Keepers of Many Beautiful Lands and Historical Sites, wants every American to get out and visit one of more of the valued sites today, just like they did back in 1966. In 1966, the Federal Government began heavily promoting our National Parks and trying to get people to visit them. As part of this grand promotion, ‘Operation Golden Eagle’, the Coca-Cola Company produced a line of 7 & 10 ounce Sprite bottles with the names of 36 National Parks and monuments to promote further use and enjoyment of these Federal recreation areas."
The 36 parks are:
Acadia National Park
Big Bend National Park
Everglades National Park
Gettysburg National Military Park
Grand Canyon National Park
Mammoth Cave National Park
Olympic National Park
Rocky Mountain National Park
Saratoga National Historical Park
Sequoia National Park
Zion National Park
Hot Springs National Park
White Sands National Park
Isle Royale National Park
Great Smokey Mountains National Park
Ft. Sumter National Park
Shiloh National Military Park
Lincoln Memorial
Joshua Tree National Park
Yellowstone National Park
Glacier National Park
Crater Lake National Park
Wind Cave National Park
Mt. McKinley National Park
Cumberland Gap National Historical Park
Hawaii National Park
Petrified Forest National Monument
George Washington Carver National Monument
Death Valley National Monument
Mound City Group National Monument
Scotts Bluff National Monument
Platt National Monument
Grand Teton National Park
Statue of Liberty National Monument
Chickamauga National Military Park

That's cool, Although I have to wonder about the date of 1966. I have an old Sprite bottle in my hand right now with Grand Canyon National Park on the bottom and a date code of 1964. Maybe that's when they started doing that on those smaller bottle sizes, as the bottle I have here is 16oz.

-Andy

I have a old sprite bottle that has Fort Sumter national monu on it date on side is 75 does any one know about this ?