When I noticed the signal for a Coca-Cola museum that includes “history and memorabilia,” I didn’t assume a lot of it. Instead, I figured it was simply one other place stuffed with the identical collectible Coke bottles and indicators I’d seen at a dozen different museums.
But I used to be improper.
The museum was extra than simply collectibles. It was a spot the place Coca-Cola historical past occurred. It was a spot the place a sweet retailer service provider crammed glass bottles with Coca-Cola for the very first time and altered every little thing within the soda business. It was a spot I used to be glad I visited.
I spent two days exploring Vicksburg whereas highway tripping alongside the Natchez Trace Parkway from Natchez to Nashville. I toured the 16-mile loop at Vicksburg National Military Park. I loved lunch at a rooftop restaurant with a view of the Yazoo River. And I walked the decks of a large riverboat on the Lower Mississippi River Museum.
But my favourite factor I found in Vicksburg, Mississippi, was the Biedenharn Coca-Cola Museum.
Origins of Coca-Cola
In 1886, native pharmacist Dr. John Pemberton crafted a thick syrup that created a “delicious and refreshing” soda when mixed with carbonated water. Pemberton’s bookkeeper, Frank M. Robinson, urged calling it Coca-Cola as a result of “the two Cs would look well together in advertising.” Robinson created the well-known trademarked script for the brand and scribbled out the identify by hand.
Pemberton took a jug of the syrup down the road to Jacobs’ Pharmacy in Atlanta, Georgia. The pharmacist arrange a soda fountain, mixed the syrup with carbonated water, and offered the primary glass of Coca-Cola on May 8, 1886.
Joseph Biedenharn – Candy Store Merchant
During the primary yr, Coca-Cola gross sales averaged merely 9 drinks per day. But the phrase of mouth and intelligent advertising fostered reputation, and by 1900 the drink was offered at soda fountains in each state within the nation.
Joseph Biedenharn was born in 1866, the oldest son of twelve kids. Biedenharn’s father and uncle owned a two-story constructing in downtown Vicksburg the place that they had established a sweet retailer known as Biedenharn and Brother – a retailer that Joseph ultimately took over because the Biedenharn Candy Company. He took observe of the recognition of Coca-Cola soda fountain drinks, realizing that individuals would typically stroll for miles into city simply to purchase a paper cup of the refreshing drink.
He contemplated a brand new option to get Coca-Cola into the countryside.
In 1894, Biedenharn approached Coca-Cola proprietor Asa Candler about promoting the soda fountain drink in a glass bottle. With Candler’s approval, Biedenharn developed a course of for bottling the soda fountain drink in Hutchinson bottles embossed with “Biedenharn Candy Company, Vicksburg, Miss.” He constructed the primary bottling plant in his sweet retailer on Washington Street and started promoting Coca-Cola in glass bottles for the very first time.
In 1899, Chattanooga legal professionals Joseph Whitehead and Benjamin Thomas acquired unique rights from Candler to bottle Coca-Cola within the South. Biedenharn, together with six of his brothers and one sister, bought franchise rights and opened bottling vegetation in Mississippi, Louisiana, and Texas, together with one additional down Washington Street.
The 24,000 sq. foot bottling plant nonetheless stands, however in the present day it’s house to The Open Market – appropriately, an vintage retailer the place guests can typically discover Coca-Cola collectibles.
Did You Know? In 1924, Collett Woolman and B.R. Coad established the world’s first crop dusting aviation firm in Macon, Georgia. The homeowners started on the lookout for buyers for Huff Daland Dusters to develop their operations. In 1925, Joseph Biedenharn and his son, Malcolm, invested within the crop-dusting firm and expanded the fleet to 18 plane – the biggest non-public fleet on the earth on the time. That preliminary aviation firm would later turn out to be Delta Airlines.
The Biedenharn Coca-Cola Museum
In 1938, the Biedenharns offered the constructing the place Coca-Cola was bottled for the primary time. The constructing was used for numerous industrial companies over the following 4 many years. But then, in 1979, the Biedenharns bought the constructing once more, renovated it as a museum, and donated it to the Vicksburg Foundation for Historic Preservation.
A go to to the Biedenharn Coca-Cola Museum begins with a stroll by means of the historical past of Coca-Cola, the Biedenharn Family, and the story behind Coca-Cola’s promoting and distinctive script emblem design. Interpretive displays characteristic historic images and plenty of fascinating data to learn. Displays circumstances are chocked filled with collectibles, memorabilia, and historic artifacts.
The museum’s centerpiece is a copy of the tools used to bottle Coca-Cola for the primary time. Each piece of kit features a description of how the method for bottling Coke labored in 1894.
The self-guided tour ends within the recreation of the places of work and sweet retailer, full with interval furnishings. The wall behind the marble counter is loaded with vintage Coca-Cola bottles with diamond-shaped labels, nonetheless unopened after practically a century. Display circumstances beneath the counter characteristic bottles ordered chronologically, making it an interesting examine of the evolution of the Coke bottle.
Before leaving, get a Coke float from the old school soda machine or an ice-cold glass bottle of Coca-Cola from the cooler.
1107 Washington Street, Vicksburg, MS | 601-638-6514 | www.biedenharncoca-colamuseum.com