Historical information

Bottled Phenyle cleaner was used throughout the 1900's in domestic kitchens, toilets and other "clean, germ free" environments. Some of these environments would encompass dairying milk handling rooms and hospital kitchens and ablution areas. It is a product which has resulted in the poisoning of some unwitting users (newspaper accounts of a woman in 1928 who drank some phenyle mistakenly for wine and died). The reliance of effective poisonous cleaning products in kitchens, especially in the 1900's was and is still a very hazardous element that the "most pivotal place in a house" contains. In the era when this particular bottle was used (1920's) the main means where consumed around the kitchen table, and this was especially so in rural areas. Keeping this area "germ" free was a mandatory requirement.

Significance

This bottle is significant to the Kiewa Valley because this area was mostly rural with "out houses" and milk collection areas that required that "extra attention" of sanitation. Rural areas also where more prone to have the kitchen area as a general meeting place for the family before dinner and other meals. Sanitation was of greater importance in rural areas, due to the greater distances to hospitals and doctors if contamination occurred. City homes at this time frame had lounge rooms for the daily get together of the family unit. This was an era before the television and computer age fragmented and isolated family members from one another. This was a time that family members grouped together in the kitchen to find out "the latest news".

Physical description

This amber glass, diamond shaped bottle with cork stopper once contained Phenyle. Phenyle is a highly poisonous liquid. The amber opaque glass was used and not a clear glass to highlight it's content. It has a cork stopper at the top of a slender neck. All the glass embossed writing is highlighted by a string of crosses. The cross was used to enforce a visual danger sign.

Inscriptions & markings

On one side "THIS BOTTLE IS THE PROPERTY OF" and in large print underneath "KITCHEN'S" and below this and underlined "POISONOUS". On the next side "NOT TO BE TAKEN" and next side in very large print and surrounded by a border "PHENYLE" with crosses enclosing it. On the bottom of a "blank side is "REGd. No. 2140" On the base is M 959 and M