Help with ID of a dutch oven

B

Brian Patterson

New member
Hello all! I'm a first time poster. I've been collecting and using cast iron for a while, but never had a problem identifying a piece before. I've tried google and ebay but either i'm searching the wrong thing or there isn't much out there...

I'm curious about it because it says made in the usa, but it gives the capacity in liters?

Anyway, Thanks in advance for any help!

Image

The piece is a dutch oven. On the bottom of the piece there are two areas of text:

one reads:

MADE IN USA
Click to expand...

below that reads:

NO. 10 W
DUTCH OVEN
3.765 LITERS
63 H-1 (could be an lowercase L, not sure)
Click to expand...
 
Though I've not seen those exact markings before, I would have to say it is BSR, Birmingham Stove & Range Co. It looks like it has a heat ring, although BSR dutch ovens I've seen are smooth-bottomed. The "Made In USA" places it after the early 1960s; the metric designation into the 1970s. After BSR's "Red Mountain" and "Century" series, there was a "Lady Bess" series which was sized differently to accommodate outsourced glass lids.
 
Upon further research, it is consistent with BSR's Lady Bess line. That's not a heat ring; the bottoms were like a raised flat disk. I'd say that's 3.785 liters, which is 4 quarts. For those of you who remember, the 1970s was when the oil companies tried to get America on the metric bandwagon by selling us gasoline in liters, mainly to disguise the rising price per gallon. Didn't work. Anyway, the Lady Bess line didn't last too long, only a few years, and only that one size dutch oven.
 
Yes, but I don't think they did much with anything they got from BSR besides the Sportsman Grill.

http://www.castironcollector.com/birmingham.php

Edit; Upon further consideration, this piece does have a lot in common with the later Lodge egg logo loop-handled DOs. Both companies were well into their automated production by the 1970s.
 
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