DR. PEMBERTON'S CURE

0:00Hi everyone, I'm John Hagridorn, and welcome to Found in the Put Notes. Amazing history in five to ten minute soundbites. Now ready to be discovered every Wednesday at 4 p.m. Easter time, right here at 1,001 Heroes. Another jam rises to the surface, and our story begins. Imagine it's a warm afternoon in Atlanta, Georgia. The year is 1886. Horse-drawn carriages rattle down dusty streets. Electricity is still a novelty, and medicine is questionable at least. Inside a small pharmacy a man stirs a dark syrupy liquid. That man was John Stith Pemberton. Pemberton wasn't trying to change the world. In fact, he was trying to save himself. He was a pharmacist and a civil war veteran who had been badly wounded in battle. To manage the pain, doctors prescribed him morphine, a common treatment at the time,

1:07and over the years Pemberton had become addicted. Desperate for an alternative, he turned to what he knew best, chemistry. Like many pharmacists in the late 1800s, Pemberton experimented with tonics, drinks that promised energy, focus, and relief from pain. These medicines were sold over the counter and often contained powerful ingredients. One of his early successes was a drink called French wine coca, made with wine and coca leaf extract. It sold well until Atlanta passed a law banning alcohol. Suddenly Pemberton had a problem. But instead of giving up, he went back to his lab. He removed the wine and replaced it with a sweet syrup. He kept the coca leaf extract and added colonut, which contained caffeine. The result was a thick, dark liquid with a sharp, pleasant bite. Pemberton believed he had created a medicine, something that could soothe headaches, cure morphine addiction, in the years after

2:11the Civil War. This was a real problem. Called nerves, settled in digestion, and left the spirit. On May 8, 1886, Dr. Pemberton's cure was sold for the first time at Jacob's pharmacy in Atlanta. It cost five cents a glass. It was recommended for, quote, all those who need a nervous tone and a pure delicious stimulant. At first, customers weren't exactly blown away. Sales were slow, only a handful of drinks were sold per day. Then came a small accident that may have changed everything. We'll return with that right after these sponsor messages. And now back to our story. According to legend, a pharmacy worker mixed the syrup with carbonated water instead of plain water. When customers tasted it, they liked it better. It was lighter, sharper, refreshing. It sparkled. Whether this was a mistake or a clever choice, carbonation

3:15stuck, and Dr. Pemberton's cure became less than medicine and more like something you drink for pleasure, but Pemberton didn't live long enough to see its potential. You are no doubt guessing where this is going. A name change was needed. The name change didn't come from Pemberton. It came from his bookkeeper, Frank Mason Robinson. Robinson suggested the name Coca-Cola, which was derived from the two major ingredients, extracts from Coca-plant leaves, and caffeine from cola nuts, and wrote it in flowing cursive script, believing the two C's would look good in advertisements. Coca-Cola. That logo, drawn in the 1880s, is still recognizable today. But even with a great name and a distinctive taste, Coca-Cola was feeling as a business. Pemberton was sick, broke, and selling off pieces of the company just to survive. When he died in 1888, Coca-Cola was barely known outside Atlanta. And that's

4:18when the story takes a sharp turn. Enter A's at Candler. A's at Griggs Candler was another pharmacist. But unlike Pemberton, he wasn't a dreamer. He was a salesman with an instinct for marketing. By 1891, Candler had quietly gained full control of Coca-Cola, and he immediately changed its destiny. He stopped selling it as medicine, and started selling it as a feeling. Candler flooded cities with Coca-Cola's name, offering free drink coupons, using posters and newspaper ads, calendars, clocks, and signs. He made Coca-Cola impossible to ignore. People who had never tasted it felt like they already knew it. Sales exploded. Then he expanded distribution. Originally, Coca-Cola could only be found as soda palms, places you had to visit in person. Then, in 1899, two businessmen asked for permission to bottle it. Candler thought the idea was ridiculous. But luckily for history, he agreed

5:24to it. Bottling meant Coca-Cola could travel. It could reach farms, small towns, and eventually other countries. To protect the brand, Coca-Cola created his famous curved glass bottle, designed so you could recognize it by touch alone, even in the dark. It wasn't just a drink anymore. It was that object people remembered, and at the heart of it all, of course, is the secret recipe. And yes, it has gone through changes. In 1903, while little cocaine was in it was pulled out. Later, the caffeine was reduced. Coca-Cola's secret formula became one of the most famous secrets in the world, only a handful of people were ever allowed to know it, and it was locked away like treasure. Did secrecy really protect the taste? Maybe, but it definitely protected the myth. People didn't just drink Coca-Cola. They wondered about it. High school teachers would leave a nail in a glass of coke overnight, and the

6:27next day, rest. Look what this does to your stomach. Yeah, but a sure taste good on a hot day. It wasn't a cure. It was a refreshment. During World War II, the company promised that every American soldier could buy a coke for five cents, no matter where they were stationed. Coca-Cola followed the troops across oceans and borders, and when the war ended, the world had developed a taste for it. Some insiders tried to get rich by selling the recipe to Pepsi, but the FBI caught them in a sting operation, protecting a formula forever. What's remarkable about Coca-Cola is that it wasn't planned. It was born from injury, saved by prohibition, transformed by marketing, and spread by war. A drink meant to ease one man's pain became a global icon, all from a glass ported in a small Atlanta pharmacy, and meant to be a cure for whatever else you.

7:29Thanks for joining us here at 1,000 One Heroes, ledges, histories, and mysteries podcast for found in the footnotes. The inescapable result of 10 years and over 700 stories shared, which left me with a mile high pile of really amazing footnotes that I've always wanted to share. But this time, in five to ten-minute soundbites, so I finally figured out how to do it. Sometimes, the best, the most amazing stories are found in the footnotes. See you next week. Remember to leave a kind review and tell a friend. This is your host, John Hagridorne. See you next week.