1865: America’s Civil War was almost over, and one of the final conflicts took place in Columbus, Georgia. The Union Army decimated the city.
A Confederate soldier named John Pemberton fought there and was stabbed in his chest. That would leave him in pain for the rest of his life.
Pemberton was a native of Rome, a city in Northwestern Georgia. After acquiring a medical degree, he became an apothecary in Columbus, Ga.
He married and had one child, a son named Charles.
Pemberton found the chest injury intolerable and prescribed himself morphine for the pain. He got addicted.
1866: Pemberton sought another drug to ease his agony. His first attempt with a poisonous plant extract failed.
Then he made a kind of wine from the coca plant, the source of cocaine. He added extract of kola nut (kola is the proper spelling), and Pemberton’s French Wine Coca hit the market.
He touted it as medicine - specifically for nervous women.
1886: Pemberton’s wine was successful in Atlanta, but recently passed laws forbid alcohol (however, cocaine was acceptable). So Pemberton had to take his wine off the market and try again.
Adding the concoction to carbonated water was purely unintentional, but it worked. The new drink was no longer considered medicinal, just a refreshing beverage and a “brain tonic.”
In naming the product, the K in kola was replaced with a C. Coca Cola was born.
However, John Pemberton was still addicted to morphine, and his health began to fail. Cancer was claiming him.
Suspecting that Coca Cola was going to be big someday, he left his portion of the company to his only child, Charles Pemberton.
1888: John Pemberton died.
But Charles sold off his share of the Coca Cola company for a quick payday of $300 (modern equivalent of less than $10K).
Atlanta druggist Asa Candler took control.
Charles needed the money because, like his father, he was also an addict. He died six years after his father from an opium overdose.
Around the turn of the 20th Century, cocaine was no longer used in the formula, and the company grew into the behemoth it is today.
Over 130 years since its creation, Coca Cola’s worldwide headquarters are still in Atlanta, Georgia.
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