The Kent's Coca Cola Story

[bottlebugs]

There's great archival information about Kent's Drug Store and their
altercation with Candler's Coca-Cola. He was serving cola in 1884.
Kent was paid $400 to stop using the name so he did. However...
An earlier soda connection was forged in the name of Hannah Delatour.

Hannah was the widow of the famous NYC soda manufacturer. The business was sold to
an upstate NY bottler named Schuyler. She moved to New Jersey and made syrups for the pharmacies there (Kent's et al) and for her sons in NYC. She had all of the Delatour recipes.

Her husband's family was from France and made cordials and perfumes before immigrating.

 

[kolawars]

Kent wasn't paid to stop using the name Coca-Cola. The Commission of Patents made a decision between competing registrations of the Atlanta company and the Paterson company. While Kent claimed the earlier use of the name Coca-Cola, the evidence he sent to the Commissioner had a date later than the evidence submitted by the Atlanta Company. The Commissioner denied Kent's registration in favor of the Atlanta Company.

The Delatour information is interesting. I know the Delatour brand was sold all over the US around 1900.

 

[bottlebugs]

Thanks Kolawars...I got my information from...

Excerpted from The Oakland Journal

"In a tragic case of poor legal advice, Kent used a 1888 date for the establishment of his Coca-Cola product rather than the earlier 1884 date when it was only being sold in Paterson. Pemberton, in Georgia, had applied for a trademark using an 1887 date, and the government relied only on the dates submitted in the original paperwork to award the now famous trademark of Coca-Cola.

In an effort to avoid future legal entanglements concerning the name Coca-Cola, Benjamin Kent of Paterson was bought out for $400."