original and very rare intact medium cobalt blue squat root beer bottle manufactured for edward cronk in chicago, il. the high, tapered shoulders and squat neck are typical of a ginger ale style, and it is finished with an intact applied blob collar. the front body is embossed with block lettering "e.y. cronk / root beer / chicago". the base is smooth, manufactured with post mold. crudities are typical of its age and date of manufacture, including surface wear, slight discoloration or haze, and asymmetry. edward cronk was a younger brother of albert cronk of detroit, where albert was in charge of the main bottling plant producing "dr. cronk's" beverages, a business started in the early 1850's by their father. their famous entrepreneurial father was warren cronk, an early bottler and "medicine man". warren "cronkhite" was born in new york in 1804, and had shortened the family name to cronk by the time of the 1830 census, and had given himself the title of doctor by the 1850 census. dr. cronk began brewing in albany during the 1840's and his earliest glass bottling operation appears to have been in buffalo, ny, at about the time of the 1850 census. root beer and sarsaparilla beer were among the most popular products. dr. cronk also produced mineral water, sodas and ginger beer. by 1877 cronk's son albert had taken over the detroit operation. the firm ceased bottling operations and sold out to schafberg & jarrait in 1883. in 1870, warren and albert cronk had also established a windsor, ontario branch of the firm. albert's younger brother edward y. cronk joined in 1876. he had previously operated one of the ginger beer and soda water plants in detroit (1868-72). edward left the ontario branch in 1879 to attempt to start up a branch of the bottling operations in chicago. he is first listed in the 1879 city directory as a root beer manufacturer at 49 w. van buren. the listings continue during 1880-82 but by 1883 he and his chicago branch are gone. this is the same year that the dr. cronk operations were closed in detroit, so it seems to correspond with a general downfall of the family's great lakes area regional bottling empire, rather than a failure of business in chicago specifically.