Cockburn 1957

[Sten]

On French e-bay there is a Cockburn 1947 for sale. I did not know that this existed. Have anyone seen this before?
Sten
www.vintageport.se

[djewesbury]

Is it a 57 or a 47? Please clarify.

[RAYC]

Broadbent mentions a "late-bottled" 1957 Cockburn ("unimpressive" when tasted in mid-60s) in his book.

In his notes, that could easily mean a bottling done 3-years after harvest rather than "LBV" (and late 50s / early 60s was presumably on the cusp of when practices regarding Vintage / Late Bottled Vintage ports started to become more defined anyway). A curiosity - it certainly doesn't seem to have been served at the big Cockburn vertical that the Symingtons did a couple of years ago

[jdaw1]

On French e-bay there is a Cockburn 1947 for sale. I did not know that this existed.

TNs: 2008 Mar; 2008 Oct; 2010 Jan; 2012 Nov; 2014 Feb.

[RAYC]

On French e-bay there is a Cockburn 1947 for sale. I did not know that this existed.

TNs: 2008 Mar; 2008 Oct; 2010 Jan; 2012 Nov; 2014 Feb.

those are 1947s - it is a 1957 on ebay

[jdaw1]

those are 1947s - it is a 1957 on ebay

Hence questioning of questioner. Ahh!

[Alex Bridgeman]

I've not seen or heard of a Cockburn 1957 - and handful of other shippers but not Cockburn. As far as I know, there was not even a small volume production for a family member.

[jdaw1]

Only one reference:

• Wine & Food No. 132, Winter 1966, page 72, a record of the autumn meeting of the Southport branch of the Wine and Food Society: “On Wednesday 28 September, 1966 a dinner was held at the Prince of Wales Hotel, Southport. The President was Mr. Alan V. Slater and the Chairman Mr. C. J. Park. The fare: Prawn Cocktails; Chicken Cordon Bleu, Petits Pois, Duchess: Potatoes; Cold Orange Soufflé Grand Marnier; Coffee. The wines: Bernkasteler Green Label, 1961; Rosé Clos Varenne; Cockburns, 1957.”

Port aficionados will know, of course, that Mr. Alan V. Slater appears in the History of Scouting in Southport Volume 3, 1951 - 1970.

[djewesbury]

Possibly a misprint if it's the only known reference.

[Sten]

It was on sale one week ago with photo so it was no misprint, but perhaps you mean misprint on the dinner where it was mentioned.
I know that Cockburn had some very unusual vintage such as 1911 (not so unusual perhaps) and 1916 which is or have been in my cellar but for me 1957 was strange and I have never heard of it

Sten
www.vintageport.se

[PhilW]

It was on sale one week ago with photo so it was no misprint, but perhaps you mean misprint on the dinner where it was mentioned.

I just did a search including completed listings on ebay.fr but did not see it; do you have a link (browser history) by any chance? I'd be interested to see the image.

[flash_uk]

Here: http://www.ebay.fr/itm/porto-COCKBURNS- ... 3ceb6085c1

Scroll down.

[jdaw1]

Odd bottle shape — slightly Burgundy. With selo.

[PhilW]

(thx for the link and posting the image)
All quite odd. Several things immediately strike me as unusual:
- the bottle shapes (only the '50 looks the expected shape for Oporto-bottled Cockburn of this age)
- the label position (usually at the base of the bottle at this age/style)
- the labels (which are more like 1970+ labels, with shipper text on the white instead of the black).
- the Selo's (being present)
I would have some concerns here; unless known to be from a later release (in '80s or '90s) of older bottles when the label style would be more typical, and could explain selos and similar capsules. Hmm... interesting.

[djewesbury]

Also thought the 57 label was rather clean and the others rather unconvincingly dirty!

[flash_uk]

And the text at the bottom of the label "Shipped by Cockburn's Smithes..." rather than all the other examples elsewhere of "Shipped by Cockburn Smithes..."

[LGTrotter]

I doubt that it could be fake, why would anyone bother? But they do look odd. The labels look OK, I just assumed they were facsimiles of one sort or another. The point about the selos made me wonder, as did the same wax capsules on all three bottles. And the shapes of the bottles is a bit peculiar too. I suppose the simplest explanation is that they were bottled with what they had at the time in a non commercial setting. But that doesn't account for the selos.

Actually I have no idea about these.

[djewesbury]

I agree that fakes seem very unlikely but these really don't look authentic. If they were 80s or 90s releases, did the company of Cockburn Smithe still exist then? If not, why mention them? Too many inconsistencies. Fakes don't necessarily have to be perpetrated on a Rudi-like scale. Could just be someone with a few odd bottles knocking about that they fancied getting a slightly higher return for.

[flash_uk]

One part of me says the label text issue signals definite fake. But I can't see someone going to all the effort of putting a selo in place, waxing, creating some faux leakage etc. which would then lead me to conclude that they are in fact bottles of some kind of port, on which the label has been faked and added. But then why Cockburn? Was that the easiest label to fake?

Edit: perhaps some distributor stored them and ruined the labels, and then subsequently created new ones, albeit not quite exact facsimiles...

[jdaw1]

Phil: you have the database. Please post images of 1947 to 1970 labels, so that we can compare.

[PhilW]

And the text at the bottom of the label "Shipped by Cockburn's Smithes..." rather than all the other examples elsewhere of "Shipped by Cockburn Smithes..."

Good catch, I missed that one.

I agree that fakes seem very unlikely but these really don't look authentic. If they were 80s or 90s releases, did the company of Cockburn Smithe still exist then?

Yes - see the '85 (and later) labels linked below.

Also thought the 57 label was rather clean and the others rather unconvincingly dirty!

Indeed; and new looking label with old-looking selo.

Phil: you have the database. Please post images of 1947 to 1970 labels, so that we can compare.

I don't necessarily have permission to post all the images here, but the following links will provide a display of bottle shapes and labels:
Cockburn bottles '47 to '70: Ck bottles '47-'70
All Cockburn labels '47 to '90 : Ck front labels '47-'90

[jdaw1]

In all three bottles above the “COCKBURN’S” and the “VINTAGE PORT” are in a sans-serif typeface, and all the same. Only one of Phil’s images has sans-serif there, a 1960, and that’s a different sans-serif typeface (compare the ‘K’ and the ‘1’).

[djewesbury]

In all three bottles above the “COCKBURN’S” and the “VINTAGE PORT” are in a sans-serif typeface, and all the same. Only one of Phil’s images has sans-serif there, a 1960, and that’s a different sans-serif typeface (compare the ‘K’ and the ‘1’).

That is because the font used here is none other than Arial Black. See my mock-up below - note that there is only one difference, in the diagonal tail of the R, but the G, the 1 and the other distinctive characters are identical:

COCKBURN'S.jpg (47.35 KiB) Viewed 6443 times

The interesting news is that this font was designed in 1982, but as that link shows, a TrueType version of the font was not made available until 1990, and a PostScript version not until 1991. These bottles were, I suspect, filled substantially after that date. And I do not believe that they are Cockburn's VP!

[jdaw1]

Very good.

Except that you made that image using Microsoft Word, whereas the labels seem to have been made with something better, perhaps Adobe Illustrator.

[djewesbury]

I made the image using Adobe Photoshop.
Sackcloth for you.

EDIT: I also had to select the straight quote glyph as opposed to Arial's distinctive and rather ugly curly quote.

I do not own Microsoft Word, or any Microsoft software (sorry Glenn).