Posted by Mark (leave feedback to contact me) on March 20, 2008 at 20:30:25:
In Reply to: origin of shotglasses posted by Gerald Kroeker on March 07, 2008 at 00:32:29:
Sample glasses pre-date the word shotglass (or phrase "shot glass") but then wooden and metal "glasses" were used to dring "distilled spirits" for years (centuries) before the invention of the sample glass.
The biggest question in the origin of the "shotglass" is not "when did people start drinking from small glasses" but "when (or why) did the word 'shot' get associated with drinking distilled spirits"
Mark
: I came across a shotglass many years ago that was authenticated as a sampler glass from the 1880's. It was clear glass with raised letters and the date of 1888 on the bottom. I was told that this was a sampler glass from the traveling medicine shows that were around in the 1880's and 1890's. They were not called shot glasses then but they looked just like a shot glass. I sold it for 850 dollars in 1991 to a antique dealer in California who said he had a buyer overseas. I don't know if this qualifies as the start of shot glasses, but many saloons in the western US had small glasses that were for whiskey and bourbon and larger glasses for beer.