“Back in the day” is the phrase he chose to begin his story, and it proved to be the phrase he most often cited while retelling it. Why? Well, because his story began about half a century ago, of course! Billy Ledbetter’s passion for collecting began in the 1970s. Since then, he has pursued an extremely rare “Model”to complete his collection.
In the 1970s, the young Ledbetter worked for Well’s Market along the 200 block of East 7th Avenue, bagging groceries for customers and organizing items, including returned pop bottles, in the back of the store. It was in the back of the store, during one evening’s work, where his passion for collecting began when he came across an empty Dr. Pepper bottle with “Bristow, Oklahoma” embossed on the bottom. Perplexed, he quizzed his boss, Roy Perry, about the reasoning for the town’s location to be stamped on the bottle.
Ledbetter recalled in detail Perry’s response, noting that his boss explained that “back in the day” a few decades earlier, several bottle manufacturers crafted bottles in Bristow, each embossing their bottles with the town’s name. Further intrigued, Ledbetter requested to keep the bottle, and after having paid a nickel for its purchase, he took it home. Little did he know that he would spend more than 4 decades searching for Bristow-made bottles.
Three local bottle manufacturers included Purity Bottling Co., Bristow Ice Cream and Bottling Co., and Model Bottling Works. Although Ledbetter added bottles from all 3 companies, the majority of the bottles in his collection were Long’s bottles. The rarest bottle of his collection— for which he searched for decades—proved to be a bottle emblazoned with “MODEL BOTTLING WORKS, BRISTOW, OKLA.” on its front and the letter “P” on the bottom for Powell, an owner of the company.
How did he locate and secure the extremely rare bottle? Well, with patience and a lot of luck, or as he best said it “If you would ever look up the phrase ‘I was in the right place at the right time’, then you would see my picture.” Perhaps no phrase could prove to be as apropos. To understand, we must rewind his story once again and go “back in the day” to the time when he worked for Bret Fadely at J.W. Measurement.
Decades ago, when his bottle collection remained young and unfulfilled, Ledbetter shared his passion with many people, who looked for Bristow-made bottles as well, adding to his collection as they found them. Ledbetter credits one Bristowan with making the greatest impact to his collection: Fadely.
Fadely not only directly contributed to his collection but introduced him to the annual Tulsa Bottle Show, which is typically held in June of each year. At the show, vendors from across the country convene to showcase their collections, sell items, and make connections. During a visit to the show “back in the day”, Ledbetter met a vendor by the name of Johnnie Fletcher, who authored a book: “A Collector’s Guide to Oklahoma Bottles 1889–1920”.
After introducing himself, he learned of a few rare Bristow bottles, 2 of which Fletcher owned. Since the vendor owned duplicates of one of the bottles, he sold one to Ledbetter; however, he refused to part with the rarest of the bottles made by Model Bottling Works as he only possessed one. Further, he declared that Ledbetter would “never find another”, igniting Ledbetter’s realization that “the fun wasn’t in having the bottle. The fun was in the hunt.”
For nearly 2 decades, Ledbetter hunted for the elusive bottle without success—until this year. In June, he found himself in the right place at the right time, indeed! At the Tulsa Bottle Show, he inquired about the bottle of a vendor, who told him he had just sold it to another man; however, the vendor explained that he could find the gentleman at the show, who might be persuaded to sell it to him upon hearing his story.
Losing the gentleman in the crowd, he became discouraged, but fate had other plans as he felt a tap on his shoulder. It was the new owner of the bottle! Travis Helms of Bixby agreed to sell him the bottle after reassurances that Ledbetter had no plans to sell the bottle but to donate it and his entire collection to the Bristow Historical Society and local museum, instead.
The evening of Saturday, August 3, Ledbetter donated his collection as promised. He wished to thank all involved, especially Helms, saying “Travis Helms just saved Christmas for me and the people of Bristow, OK.” He also shared his motto: “If I don’t tell the story, the story don’t get told.”
Stay tuned for an update once the collection display is assembled and ready for viewing within the museum, where Ledbetter’s original story will also be available.