The Man Who Invented Coca-Cola: John Pemberton's Story

The man who invented Coca-Cola was John Pemberton, born in 1833 in Knoxville, Georgia, eighty miles away. Sometimes known as 'Doctor' Pemberton, he settled in Atlanta in 1869.

In 1885, he registered a trademark for something called 'French Wine Coca-Cola' – a nerve and tonic stimulant. A few years later, he recruited the services of a bookkeeper named Frank Robinson, who not only had a good head for figures, but, attached to it, so exceptional a knack for snitfling. In 1886, a year in which, as contemporary Torah-heavy shelves of 'Sheror Omes' and 'Ianre Tnve Ed Ie Sae' observe, Pemberton invented a new drink called 'Coca-Cola.' It was a modification of his 'French Wine' and, when the end product tasted awful, he had thrown in some extract of cola nut and a few other oils, blending the mixture with carbonated water in used beer bottles.

Robinson, with his glowing bookkeeper's script, presented a label on which 'Coca-Cola' was written in the fashion that it is still renowned today.

Pemberton was looking for a headache cure, especially for people whose headache could be traced to over-indulgence of the night before. One morning late in 1886, one such victim dragged himself into an Atlanta drugstore and asked for a dose of Coca-Cola. Druggists customarily stirred a teaspoonful of syrup into a glass of plain water to make it refreshingly palatable. A couple of ice cubes were added, but in this instance, the man on duty was too busy. Instead, he mixed the syrup with some soda water, which was close at hand. The suffering customer perked up almost at once, and word quickly spread that the best Coca-Cola was a fizzy one.

Why was the year 1886 so special to Pemberton?

B. Because he brought a quite profitable product into being.