Manufacturer: Carr China
User: Hot Springs of Arkansas
Distributor: Dulin & Martin Co., Washington, D.C.
Date of cup (#194 Soda, Bell Top, Handled): Early 1920s
Notes: The Quapaw Indians were native to the land that is now Hot Springs in central Arkansas, but by 1832 they had been forced off Hot Springs Reservation and it was given federal government protection, the first such designation in the country. In 1921, Congress changed the name to Hot Springs National Park, and it was popularly referred to as Hot Springs of Arkansas.
Even before the name change, the federal government touted in earnest the healing wonders of the water. From a government pamphlet published in the last years of the 19th century: "Briefly stated, the use of the Hot Springs waters opens the pores and channels for the expulsion of matter injurious to health, arouses torpid and sluggish secretions, stimulates the circulation, the muscles, the skin, the nerves, the internal organs, and purifies the blood, removes all aches and pains, restores the exhausted, revives the debilitated, and helps build up and renew the entire system.
"They are administered in the treatment of the sick internally and externally, being drunk in large quantities and applied in all the different forms of baths."
In a circular for the guidance of the officers of the army in sending the sick to healing waters, the Surgeon-General of the U.S. army at that time, Geo. M. Sternberg, enumerated the ailments for which the sick should be sent to the army and navy hospital at the Hot Springs of Arkansas. This circular was approved by R. A. Alger, Secretary of War. As the pamphlet says, "The ownership and control of the Hot Springs of Arkansas by the U. S. Government is absolute, and its endorsement of them for the treatment of certain ailments in unequivocal."
According to the National Park Services chronology of Hot Springs, in January 1920 "a ground-breaking ceremony was held … for the construction of the new Government Free Bathhouse." It opened in 1922. (And as a side note that indicates the popularity of the springs, both the Pittsburgh Pirates and Boston Red Sox had begun holding their spring training there.)
By 1923, with the healing waters given the official stamp of medical approval by the government and the free bathhouse open, "the physicians of Hot Springs have adopted a standard drinking cup, in order to standardize the amount of water taken internally. These cups are made in two forms, porcelain and metal-collapsible, each holding two hundred c.c.'s. It is the intention to have them universally used by all patients taking hydrotherapeutic treatment here," according to a story in the Medical Herald shown above.
In 1924, the idea of the standard drinking cup at Hot Springs gained more traction and a little cachet when it was decided to emulate the European spas and not only "have a standard drinking cup for patients and visitors" that was to be made of white porcelain and hold 200 c.c., according to a story in the Oct. 6, 1924 issue of the National Hotel Reporter, and that it was "to be carried suspended on a strap across the shoulder, European style. … The wide variety of drinking cups on the market at present, no two holding the same quantity of water, is very unsatisfactory. By standardizing the cup, a basis for dosage in treatment will be made possible."
It was decided, per the story, that this cup "must have a name." Suggestions were made, but it is not known if a name was ever chosen and glazed onto a cup, but the plan was that the "name selected, together with 'Hot Springs of Arkansas,' will be glazed into the cup, making an appropriate souvenir of the Nation's Health Resort."
As shown above, it is not too hard to find images of the metal, collapsible drinking cups used at Hot Springs, but this cup made by Carr China and backstamped with the name of the distributor, Dulin & Martin Co., Washington, D.C., seems to be undocumented with photos but exactly what was described in those early reports as a Standard Drinking Cup holding 200 c.c.'s, with the understanding that 100 years ago, news writers didn't trouble themselves to parse the difference between porcelain and vitrified china.
There were other distributors in the South that could have handled this order, but it seems likely that the order for the cups came from the federal government since a Washington, D.C., distributor was selected for the job. Located at 1215 F Street and 1214 G Street in the District, Dulin & Martin opened around 1898 advertising pottery, porcelain, and glass. By 1937, its final sale of its remaining stock was held, and the company was out of business.
That gives a window between 1916 (when Carr opened) and 1937 (when Dulin & Martin closed) in which Carr could have made this cup, but it was probably made circa 1923-24 when there was so much enthusiasm reflected toward establishing a 200-c.c. standard drinking cup and when the government free bathhouse opened.
Sources:
Ebay seller bumpercrn – photo of metal collapsible drinking cup
Wikipedia – Hot Springs National Park
National Hotel Reporter, Oct. 6, 1924 –
National Park Service – chronology
Medical Herald, 1923 – standardized drinking cups