PLOP PLOP FIZZ FIZZ

Invention it must be humbly admitted, does not consist of creating out of void, but out of chaos. —Mary Shelley

The great man discussed in this story was born on January 8, 1831, in the small town of Knoxville, Georgia, near the city of Macon, but grew up in the city of Rome, Georgia located in the Appalachian foothills. He would later move to Macon Georgia where he enrolled at the Reform Medical College of Georgia, taking courses in pharmacy and medicine. He was trained as a so-called steam doctor in a system devised by Massachusetts doctor and herbalist Samuel Thomson. It was a system that relied on herbal treatments and steam baths that, it was believed, would help patients rid themselves of disease by sweating heavily. Pharmacy and the practice of medicine overlapped considerably in that particular branch of study. He received his degree in Macon at age 19. Later he acquired a more conventional pharmacy degree in Philadelphia. In the early 1850's he began studies for a medical-surgical career in Rome Georgia. At the outbreak of the American Civil War he received a commission in the Confederate Army as an officer due to his educational achievements. He eventually attained the rank of colonel. He would experience a relatively obscure career during the war, seeing minimal combat action. He was stationed near the Confederate stronghold at Vicksburg Mississippi during the great siege led by Union General Ulysses S. Grant, but saw minimal action their. participating in mostly patrol duty and a few minor skirmishes. On April 16th 1865 at the Battle of Columbus Georgia he would be severely wounded, thus ending his military career. He would eventually recuperate from the wounds, but suffered a lengthy and very painful recovery. At the time of the American Civil War, the only strong pain reliever available for serious conditions was morphine. The young colonel would ultimately become physically addicted to the drug due to being in need of moderate to severe pain relief for the extended length of his recovery. It was an addiction that would plague him for the remainder of his life. Many other American Civil War veterans suffered from this very enslaving addiction as well.

At the war's end he formed a partnership with Columbus Georgia physician Austin Walker. He expanded his laboratory with the aim of devising new pharmaceutical products. He also branched out into cosmetics, having success with a perfume called Sweet Southern Bouquet. By 1869 he joined forces with several larger investors in Atlanta. He moved to Atlanta in 1870 with his family and made a name for himself in the growing city's medical establishment, serving as a trustee of Atlanta Medical College (the predecessor to today's Emory University Medical School). His labs were state-of-the-art for that era in American history, and they remain in use today as a soil and crop chemical testing facility for the Georgia Department of Agriculture. Being a pharmacist by trade before entering the war, he searched diligently and desperately for some type of elixir that would help him to overcome his morphine addiction. He began to experiment with different types of wines, altering the ingredients by adding all types of herbal extracts and other elixirs. He tried Damiana, which is an extract of a shrub with yellow flowers that grows in Southwestern Texas. It bears a fruit late in the summer months very similar to a fig. The fruit extract has been used by some to make a tea mixed with sugar. It possesses a pharmacology that induces relaxation possibly by some form of sedative effect. It has recently been shown to increase the sexual activity in rats of both sexes. It is found to be especially stimulating sexually to exhausted or impotent male rats. Many have claimed it was an original ingredient in Margaritas. It is also still used today to produce a Mexican liquor. Interestingly, it is a banned plant in the state of Louisiana, due to it being used as an additive that is often smoked with marijuana.                                                     The young pharmacist eventually came across a product known as Vin Mariana which was marketed originally in France as a tonic. It was created by a French chemist using a mixture of ethanol and coca leaf extract. It was sold with the promise of providing increased energy and vitality to it's users. It would have certainly made any user feel quite invigorated considering that it had a shot of booze and a healthy dose of cocaine. The chemical action in the formulation is rather intriguing. The alcohol included in the mixture acts as a natural solvent and aids in extracting the drug inducing resin from the coca leaves. This makes the mixture of alcohol approximately 60-80 proof, (30-40%) by volume and also boosts the content of biochemically available cocaine in the product. Vin Mariana originally contained approximately six milligrams of cocaine per serving.                                                                                              Another ingredient the young pharmacist experimented with was the kola nut. The kola nut grows abundantly in the rain forests of Africa and is commonly used as a flavor additive in many drinks. It has a sweet flowery aroma to the nose. But to the tongue, the nut has a sharp bitter flavor initially, that slowly sweetens as it is chewed. The nut also contains an exceedingly high amount of caffeine. Kola nut is often chewed by many people in the Muslim World and is frequently used during religious fasting because it significantly curbs hunger urges. The kola nut's other medicinal uses include treating whooping cough and asthma. In addition to caffeine, the nut naturally contains the chemical theophyline which is used to treat asthma in many modern pharmaceutical preparations. By combining all of these ingredients, the young druggist came up with an elixir he called French Wine Coca. It was initially advertised as an aid or cure for anyone with a nervous disorder, a mental aid, a headache remedy, and (especially those who were morphine addicted), alcoholics suffering from depression, or women who were in 19th century times diagnosed as “flighty.”                                                 In the year 1886, the city of Atlanta Georgia and the surrounding county area would legislate and enact temperance legislation. This forced the young pharmacist to remove the alcohol content from the formulation in order to continue marketing the product. This left the concoction very rich, overtly thick and syrupy, and almost bitterly sweet. While still quite flavorful, the removal of the alcohol which with it's solvent properties left the elixir with a sticky molasses like texture. It had to be mixed with water to attempt to thin the texture. In addition to the textural problems created by removal of the alcohol, the therapeutic effect was now significantly altered. Since alcohol acts biochemically as a central nervous system depressant , this left the preparation filled solely with three central nervous system stimulants, cocaine, theophyline, and caffeine. It was now a therapeutic agent that would do anything but calm down a person with nerve problems.                                          The young chemist had to now solve these two major problems with his newly produced, yet suddenly illegal product. Still happy with the therapeutic effect his product induced in restoring energy and vitality, he sought primarily to improve the texture of the product. One key breakthrough occurred when he had the idea of adding citric acid to counteract the sweetness of the sugar-based syrup. In the beginning it was a syrup served at the drug store counter, mixed with water to create a beverage with a retail price of five cents. But it was an unsung pharmacy clerk that would make a purely accidental yet remarkably brilliant refinement to the libation. One day hen he found he had only soda water handy to mix with the syrup he asked a customer whether he could use it in place of plain water. It seemed to make the flavor even more refreshing. It was also fascinating to the customers to see the bubbly effervescence that the addition of carbonated soda water produced when added to the syrup. One of the greatest impacts in American history was unknowingly made on that day. The former Civil War Colonel, and pharmacist by trade, would never realize how this accidental mixture would eventually impact billions of people around the world and would become a household name that virtually everyone would recognize. The man’s name was John S. Pemberton.                                            Pemberton decided to market his new concoction as a fountain drink at the local corner drugstore. His bookkeeper, a man by the name of Frank Mason Robinson, said that the new drink should be called Coca-Cola. He even used the Spencerian Script commonly written with in that day and age to create the famous logo that is still used today. Coca-Cola was originally made in a large three legged kettle in John Pemberton’s backyard. The original mixture per serving contained approximately nine mg of cocaine. It was first introduced to the public at a place called Jacobs pharmacy in downtown Atlanta Georgia. At the outset, the average number of “cokes” sold per day was less than ten. The receipts from the first year of sales totaled around $50. It had cost John Pemberton approximately $70 to make the product. Yes it is true that Coca-Cola, in its first year of business, lost money. Gradually other pharmacies in the Atlanta area began to serve Coca-Cola at their soda fountains. By the late 1800's and early to mid-1900's, the local drugstore commonly had a soda fountain and often served lunch. It was a great place to go and socialize, especially in small town America. In 1887 John Pemberton would sell his Coca-Cola recipe to another pharmacist for somewhere around $2,300.                                                                   Sadly, John S. Pemberton would never break free of his morphine addiction and died on August 16, 1888. He died without ever knowing what an astounding impact he would eventually have on the entire world. After his death, there was a protracted legal civil war ver who truly owned the rights to the beverage The lawsuits involved his sister, his son, and several other business entities. It would take many years to completely settle the matter out.

Between 1890 and 1900, syrup sales for Coca Cola increased by roughly 4,000 percent. The product was suddenly being distributed to bottling companies regionally for mass distribution. The product had now developed massive popularity within the region of the south and was gradually spreading its tendrils into the midwest and northeast. However there was soon another great controversy in 1905. Many users complained that the cocaine and high caffeine content in the beverage was causing severe insomnia, nervousness, and jitters. I can’t imagine why, can you? In 1905, the cocaine was removed from the formula. A new chemical process was developed where dried coca leaves could be used to make the product. The actual cocaine chemical was contained in the resin of the plant. Properly dried leaves contained none of the resin and thus no cocaine. The new process managed to maintain the flavoring of the product while eliminating the drug effects. In 1935 Coca Cola would officially celebrate the sale of their one billionth gallon of syrup. Coca-Cola had by then, become a nationally recognized name and was as well-known in America as baseball and apple pie. Over the next seventy years, Coca-Cola would slowly and steadily reach into virtually every world market. It is today a one hundred-billion dollar corporation on the New York Stock Exchange. Other than very few isolated places on the globe, there is virtually nowhere or no one in the world that Coca-Cola has not touched.

John S. Pemberton, a drug addicted pharmacist from Georgia, never imagined what a monster he had created or what a profound effect he would have on the world over one hundred years later. It has often been said that had fate not intervened in Columbus Georgia in 1865, the world may never have seen, tasted, or even been aware of “The Real Thing.” Had a Confederate Colonel not been wounded at the Battle of Columbus Georgia in 1865, and become accidentally hooked on morphine due to his wound, the world would likely be without a simple yet incredibly impact filled product. Coke was a product that was invented practically by pure accident and one that has been enjoyed by nearly everyone worldwide.