| Welcome to the Official World's Largest Catsup Bottle® Web Site and Fan Club! Collinsville, Illinois U.S.A. Join us as we celebrate 60 years of The World's
Largest Catsup
Bottle® stands proudly next to Route 159, just south
of downtown Collinsville, Illinois. This
unique 170 ft.
tall water tower was built in 1949 by the W.E. Caldwell Company for the
G.S. Suppiger catsup bottling plant - bottlers of Brooks old original
rich & tangy catsup. In 1995, due to
the efforts
of the Catsup Bottle Preservation Group, this landmark roadside
attraction was saved from demolition and beautifully restored to its
original appearance. Recognized the
world over as an excellent example of 20th century roadside Americana,
the World's Largest Catsup Bottle regularly garners national attention
and attracts visitors and tourists every day. In August of 2002 it was named to the National Register of Historic Places. |
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For all the details click over to www.catsupbottlefestival.com right now!
Thursday,
July 2, 2009 We wake up to see a photo and story in the Belleville News-Democrat about the painting project and the upcoming festival.
Then later in the morning we get a call from our pal Wally Spiers who is writing another piece for the weekend tab section of the BND. Keep a look out for that real soon.
But wait, there's even more to be excited about! We had a really fun interview with host Jay Thomas on the Jay Thomas Show on Sirius XM satellite radio. We talked about the bottle and really plugged the festival coming. Excellent!
KPLR Channel 11 ran a really great 2 minute segment about the paint job and Rod did a spectacular job during his interview! Rod's a natural on camera! We should have had him as our spokesperson years ago!
Wednesday,
July 1, 2009 We spent the morning hanging out at the Catsup Bottle with Heidi Glaus, and her videographer Larry Johnson, from Show Me St. Louis. Heidi interviewed Judy DeMoisy, the Catsup Bottle Lady, and Rod Reinneck, the painter. Look for it to air early next week on KSDK Newschannel 5!
Also today, the St. Louis Post-Dispatch ran a nice story and a great photo with Rod hard at work at the top of the bottle. Plus, photographer Christian Gooden did a little videography as well. Look for it right here.
Well then, the next thing we know, the story is picked up by the Associated Press and by the afternoon it's out on the wire all over the country. Fantastic.
Work begins TODAY to repaint the Catsup Bottle!!! It's been 14 years since the previous paint job. We have been working behind the scenes for a while and late last week all the pieces came together.
Unlike the previous restoration, this time there is no need for a massive volunteer fund-raising effort. Thanks to the generousity of Bethel-Eckert Enterprises, owner of the catsup bottle, this project is under way! We can't thank them enough!
Click here, or the photo to the left, to read the full media release.
As a reminder, be sure to check back over the next few weeks as we post photos and status reports to keep everyone informed of the progress. Sign up to our free emailing list to get updates so you don't miss a thing! Email Sign Up Here.
Wednesday, May 27, 2009 Today we received a phone call from Eric Model, a producer for the Sirius-XM satellite radio program, "Left Jab," with the host David Goodfriend and Mark Walsh. We love the tag line: "Beer, Gear, and Politics." Hope we don't regret this... ...
Eric specializes in obsure, offbeat, and hidden Americana, and is setting up a live interview with us tentatively scheduled for the evening of July 12, immediately following the festival. We're also working on scheduling a podcast for earlier in the week on the program "Conversations on the Road." Check out Eric's Hidden America website right here.
Friday,
May 22, 2009 We received an email today from a Casting Producer for the ABC Television's hit primetime reality show, "Wife Swap." Currently they are attempting to cast a show that features families that own, run, or work at a roadside attraction. It sounded like a lot of fun!
After giving it some thought, we realized that we didn't quite meet some of the requirements in order to be on the program. So, we respectfully declined to move on through the casting process.
That having been said, producers are always looking for unique and interesting families for the show, and they may still be working on the roadside attraction episode. You can get in touch with Greg by emailing him at greg.delucia@castingrdf.com.
Tuesday, May 19, 2009 You just never know what you'll see parked at the Catsup Bottle. This afternoon we had some unexpected excitement as a bunch of specially painted RV tour buses appeared out of nowhere! Each with a different family, each with a film crew, and each followed by an auxiliary van of cameras and producers! It was quite a scene!
As it turns out, the filming was for a new reality TV show called "The Great American Road Trip." We're not at liberty to say much more here, but we can tell you the show is set to premier Tuesday, July 7th at 8:00/7:00 central. For a few more details, check out NBC's web site by clicking here!
| According to NBC's web site: "...the ultimate road trip across America. Seven families take the journey of a lifetime. Over eight episodes, the families travel classic Route 66 through cities large and small, all while competing in a medley of humorous games that will ultimately lead one family to victory. Although family fun is the centerpiece of the show, the competition is real. Only one family will return home with the grand prize." |
Check it out! The World's Largest Catsup Bottle is included in the Roadside Attractions photo gallery on CNN.com! We received all call from a CNN producer a couple weeks ago, and we provided them with a few pix and all the background information they could handle. Too bad we didn't make it into the story itself, but being in the photo gallery is pretty sweet. Keep pourin' it on!!!
Virginia Steffen and her crew from the PBS station, WILL-TV, in Champaign-Urbana, Illinois, paid us a visit way back on August 15, 2007. Shooting her documentary was a lot of fun, although it was really, really HOT!
The best part of the day was that it gave us the chance to see Rod Reinneck again. Rod and his team from Diversified Coatings in O'Fallon, Illinois, restored and repainted the Catsup Bottle back in 1995. Click here for a photo gallery of the 2007 shoot.
We finally saw the video!
The video appeared on WILL-TV's Prairie Fire program, episode #708 from Thursday, April 24, 2008. Everyone did a great job! We hadn't seen it yet until this week. The 5 minute documentary, with lots of interviews, video footage, and archival photos, is posted on the WILL-TV website. It's must see TeeVee, as far as we're concerned! Take a look right here.
A video so nice, we gotta show it twice! This is an encore presentation of a mini-documentary from March 2008. It was made as part of the KDHX Neighborhoods in Focus program and discusses The Bottle District development, the giant Vess bottle, the neon Brooks catsup bottles, and the catsup bottle water tower.
Keep your eyes glued to your screen to catch the Catsup Bottle Lady and the Big Tomato at 6:44 toward the end of the piece. Really good stuff!!!
The big news is we've set the date for this year's Catsup Bottle Festival Birthday Party & Car Show Bash! It will be Sunday, July 12, 2009. Save the date!
We have again partnered with American Legion Post 365, and many of our sponsors and entertainment will be returning. It's a guaranteed good time! See you then!
Email: bigtomato@catsupbottle.com
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