bottlebugs
Well-Known Member
My wife got home late from work tonight and woke me up. I excitedly told her about
my first wish coming true. The genies changed the direction of my initial wish of a
26 oz drum Pepsi to its more appropriate companion for the cap I had at home. Then
she drifted off leaving my head buzzing with bottle thoughts.
I had dug out some of my figural flasks not that long ago. I thought I'd check their
values since I bought them years ago. Most of them were from the 1870s and 1880s.
There were some old pharmacy bottles too. One of the flasks wasn't from the post
civil war years. It was from the beginning of the civil war.
They've all appreciated nicely. Maybe I'll put some out for display. The kids have grown
now so there's much less risk of calamities.
I was thinking about the civil war and Pemberton's war injuries. An interesting history
of Auburn led me to its story of Pemberton. He had just come home from the war and
suffered a grievous injury requiring medication. He took up pharmacy work at Toomer's
in Auburn and was serving up a "magic" cocaine tonic to stimulate infants. Cocaine was
a new wonder drug and was being used by doctors and dentists as an anesthetic. Cola
was definitely a stimulant.
I laughed at the irony of this. My avatar is the What Me Worry Kid! His tooth gapped
grin was used to sling cocaine drops and painless dentistry long before being associated
with Mad Magazine. It sure beat the crap out of morphine.
So it occurred to me that maybe the Benjamin Kent story and the Pemberton story were
both revisionist histories. Its a little like reading the news today. I never rely on just one
source. I met things in the middle. French Coca wine was introduced through France, thus
the name. The Delatours were likely making their own version of an oft used beverage.
So was Pemberton...just remove the alcohol to make it "safe" for kids and tea-totalers.
It looks like every pharmacy from North to South was serving up a version of this Coca and Cola beverage. Naming it was a no brainer. Coca-Cola.
So...do I really want a Benjamin Kent Druggist bottle? Sure someday I guess. But if Kent got his idea for a name at the same time as Pemberton, for the same reason, wouldn't either bottle suffice? I told myself that if I had a Jacob's pharmacy bottle from the same 1880's time period a nice connection could be made to both Coke and Kik.
I poked around in the flask box and fished out three pharmacy bottles from that period, Two were 1900s and bore the familiar signature spencerian script. They were from Jacob's Pharmacy in Atlanta. I laughed and tried to remember how those got in the box. The third one was from Jacob's Pharmacy but was much older. No spencerian script and definitely from the 1880s.
Bingo! Just after midnight I had found my second wish sitting in a box of forgotten bottles.
It's Friday now and time for bed. I wonder what will happen on Saturday!
my first wish coming true. The genies changed the direction of my initial wish of a
26 oz drum Pepsi to its more appropriate companion for the cap I had at home. Then
she drifted off leaving my head buzzing with bottle thoughts.
I had dug out some of my figural flasks not that long ago. I thought I'd check their
values since I bought them years ago. Most of them were from the 1870s and 1880s.
There were some old pharmacy bottles too. One of the flasks wasn't from the post
civil war years. It was from the beginning of the civil war.
They've all appreciated nicely. Maybe I'll put some out for display. The kids have grown
now so there's much less risk of calamities.
I was thinking about the civil war and Pemberton's war injuries. An interesting history
of Auburn led me to its story of Pemberton. He had just come home from the war and
suffered a grievous injury requiring medication. He took up pharmacy work at Toomer's
in Auburn and was serving up a "magic" cocaine tonic to stimulate infants. Cocaine was
a new wonder drug and was being used by doctors and dentists as an anesthetic. Cola
was definitely a stimulant.
I laughed at the irony of this. My avatar is the What Me Worry Kid! His tooth gapped
grin was used to sling cocaine drops and painless dentistry long before being associated
with Mad Magazine. It sure beat the crap out of morphine.
So it occurred to me that maybe the Benjamin Kent story and the Pemberton story were
both revisionist histories. Its a little like reading the news today. I never rely on just one
source. I met things in the middle. French Coca wine was introduced through France, thus
the name. The Delatours were likely making their own version of an oft used beverage.
So was Pemberton...just remove the alcohol to make it "safe" for kids and tea-totalers.
It looks like every pharmacy from North to South was serving up a version of this Coca and Cola beverage. Naming it was a no brainer. Coca-Cola.
So...do I really want a Benjamin Kent Druggist bottle? Sure someday I guess. But if Kent got his idea for a name at the same time as Pemberton, for the same reason, wouldn't either bottle suffice? I told myself that if I had a Jacob's pharmacy bottle from the same 1880's time period a nice connection could be made to both Coke and Kik.
I poked around in the flask box and fished out three pharmacy bottles from that period, Two were 1900s and bore the familiar signature spencerian script. They were from Jacob's Pharmacy in Atlanta. I laughed and tried to remember how those got in the box. The third one was from Jacob's Pharmacy but was much older. No spencerian script and definitely from the 1880s.
Bingo! Just after midnight I had found my second wish sitting in a box of forgotten bottles.
It's Friday now and time for bed. I wonder what will happen on Saturday!
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