“Deluxe Quality Beverages”

Red Arrow soda is a brand that I haven’t been able to find much information on. But the name of the soda seems to have an interesting history. It appears to have come from the Red Arrow, or 32nd Infantry Division of National Guardsmen from both Michigan and Wisconsin that fought bravely in WWI and II. Due to this honorable history, Red Arrow has become a very popular name in the Michigan area. The name has been given to many landmarks and establishments. There is even the historic U.S. Highway 12 that has been renamed the Red Arrow Highway to honor the men of the Red Arrow Division.

Some of the flavors that Red Arrow produced were Cream, Wild Cherry, Cherry, Black Cherry and Birch Beer. Today there is a Red Arrow Products Company located in Manitowoc, Wisconsin that produces wholesale food products. I don’t know if this is a remnant of the former company, or something completely separate.  If you can share any history of the Red Arrow Bottling Co., please blog-in. We’d love to hear from you.

The Red Arrow Bottling Co.
Detroit, Michigan

“Beverages Supreme”

Elwino Root Beer was a brand of soda pop manufactured in the 1950s in Tulsa, Oklahoma. There isn’t a lot of information available about this brand name, but it appears to have been a local favorite. Its name appears in blogs that reminisce about Tulsa’s history featuring the old Tulsa County Stadium. Bottles of cold Elwino soda pop were served in the stands to the spectators back in the 1950s. The stadium has since been torn down but was the home of the Tulsa Oilers baseball team that existed from 1905 to 1976.

The Elwino brand branched out to include other flavors, such as Strawberry and Grape, as well as a Quinine Water. The company also operated under the name of the Joe Branham Corporation. If you’re an Elwino Soda enthusiast, perhaps you could blog-in and share some of the history of this soda brand.

Tulsa Bottling Co.
Tulsa, Oklahoma

The Cornrich soda brand was produced and bottled for Cornrich Cash and Carry Beverages of Schenectady, NY. It was produced in the 1960s and 70s and was distributed in their store, and probably as well to the local area around Schenectady. I have seen bottles and caps for both ginger ale and lemon soda, but would assume that they made a variety of flavors.

It was typical years ago, and it is still common practice today, for stores or restaurants to have their own brand of soft drink produced for limited distribution. If you’re familiar with the Cornrich brand, maybe you’d like to blog-in and share your thoughts on it.

Cornrich Beverages, Inc.
Schenectady, NY

Gateway Soda was started in Harpers Ferry, West Virginia in 1927 by Harry Longbrake and James Grimes. They operated the business there until the 1942 flood destroyed their building. They apparently moved to Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania, since many of their later bottles and caps are marked as such. Gateway was produced in many different flavors, including club soda, cherry and grape. There isn’t any evidence of Gateway soda being produced any longer. My guess is that they closed down production in the 1950s or 60s at the latest.

If you have some history about Gateway soda, please blog-in.

Gateway Bottling, Inc.
Pittsburgh, PA

There doesn’t seem to be very much information available regarding the Old Colony Beverages or their Old Red Eye soda. Old Red Eye was first produced in Carthage, Tennessee in the 1950’s, or earlier, and was sold to about the 60’s. It was a soft drink containing caffeine, and was probably marketed toward people in need of a quick pick-me-up. Old Colony Beverages began as an independent company and was later owned by the Orange Crush Company of Canada.

The “red eye” concept is a popular one today, with several other sodas being sold with high caffeine contents. There is a Jolt Red Eye soda available, that is loaded with caffeine, but I don’t believe this brand has anything to do with the former Old Red Eye brand. If you can shed any light on the history of this brand with the great name and striking bottlecap, please blog-in.

Old Colony Beverages
Bottled by the Orange Crush Bottling Co.
Johnson City, Tennessee

“Made from fresh oranges”

Orange Crush soda has become one of the most popular sodas in the world, being sold in South America, Europe, Africa and New Zealand. The orange soda that so many people love today began over 90 years ago as Ward’s Orange Crush. Neil Ward, a California chemist, partnered with Clayton J. Howell, president and founder of the Orange Crush Bottling Company in 1916 to make a more flavorful orange syrup. Together, they incorporated the Orange Crush Company, and Ward set to work trying improve the original Orange Crush formula invented in Chicago by J. M. Thompson in 1906. Howell was the creator of Howel’s Orange Julep, so they named their new Orange Crush syrup after Ward: Ward’s Orange Crush.

The new Ward’s Orange Crush was so successful that within just two years it was made available in Canada. The name was abbreviated to simply Orange Crush. By 1924 there were roughly 1200 Orange Crush bottlers internationally. They were success enough to be able to afford to hire Norman Rockwell to paint a series of 12 advertisements in 1919. The original Orange Crush flavor was joined by Lemon Crush and Lime Crush in 1919 and 1920. There was even a Crush Chocolate. Additional Crush flavors added over the years were Grape in 1960 and Cherry in 1962. Pineapple Crush was added to the lineup in 1966.

In 1962 Charles E. Hires, Co. purchased the Orange Crush brand. It was then sold to Proctor & Gamble in 1980. Cadbury Schweppes Americas Beverages (CSAB) acquired Crush International in 1989 and brought the Orange Crush name back to the forefront of the soft drink market with new packaging and the addition of Crush Tropical Punch and Crush Peach. Orange Crush continues to be available and enjoyed by millions of soda drinkers today.

Dr Pepper Snapple Group, Inc.
Plano, Texas

“Drink Pepsi-Cola. It will satisfy you.”

Pepsi-Cola was invented by Caleb Bradham, a pharmacist in New Bern, North Carolina. As a pharmacist, Bradham served refreshing drinks made with syrups to his customers at his soda fountain. His formulas for these soft drinks were his own. During the summer of 1893 he concocted a soft drink formula made of carbonated water, sugar, vanilla, oils, pepsin and kola nuts, and his customers liked the drink so well they nicknamed it “Brad’s drink”. Bradham called the drink Pepsi-Cola, referring to the pepsin and kola nuts it contained. And in 1898 Bradham purchased the brand name “Pep Cola” from a bankrupt competitor for a mere $100.

Bradham’s Pepsi-Cola was successful enough that he started the Pepsi-Cola Company in 1902 to market it. He trademarked the name in 1903, and an artist friend created a logo for his soft drink. That same year, Bradhams’ new company sold 7,968 gallons of Pepsi-Cola syrup. The slogan was “Exhilarating, Invigorating, Aids Digestion”. Pepsi was sold in 6-ounce bottles starting in 1904 and sold 19,848 gallons that year. In 1905 Bradham started franchising his Pepsi-Cola bottling business and sales increased to over 100,000 gallons of syrup a year by 1907.

Pepsi-Cola brought Bradham great success until the arrival of World War I. With increasing expenses involved in doing business and the economic downturn of the depression, Bradham began to take some chances. He invested heavily in sugar, believing the price would continue to rise. When it fell, he was ruined and had to sell off his Pepsi-Cola company. It was purchased by Roy Megarel, but went bankrupt again. In 1931 Charles Gut, executive of the Loft Candy Company, bought Pepsi and had turning it around and making it successful once again by 1933. In 1934 they began selling 12-ounce bottles of Pepsi for the same 5-cent price that competitors sold their soda for in 6-ounce bottles. They introduced an ad campaign in 1939 in the form of a cartoon, called “Pepsi and Pete”, to make the consumer aware that Pepsi gave them “Twice as Much for a Nickel”.

Diet Pepsi was introduced in 1964, the same year they acquired another drink, called Mountain Dew. Today Pepsi is manufactured by PepsiCo, Inc. that is headquartered in Purchase, NY. Additional flavors have been added to the Pepsi lineup, including Pepsi Max, Pepsi Wild Cherry, Pepsi Lime and Pepsi Vanilla.

Pepsi-Cola Company
New Bern, North Carolina

Before there was a soda by the name of “Sunkist”, the growers of citrus fruits in California and Arizona used the word as a trademark for their premium fruit. As a brand name, it appeared on all types of products, from vitamins to fruit snacks.

The General Cinema Corporation was a nationwide movie theater chain that began in 1935 with their first drive-in theater. Back then the company was called Midwest Drive-In. In the early 1950s they began to build indoor theaters and by the 1960s they had branched out into bowling alleys, restaurants and coffee shops. They changed their name to General Cinema Corporation in 1964.

In 1978 the General Cinema Corporation released an orange soda they created and bottled. They obtained license to use the name “Sunkist” for their new orange soft drink, and it was launched nationwide. It didn’t take long for Sunkist to become the number-one orange soda sold in America.

The license to produce Sunkist soda was purchased by Cadbury Schweppes in 1986 and is now owned by their American subsidiary, Dr Pepper Snapple Group. There have been other flavors added to the Sunkist soda line, including Diet Orange, Sparkling Lemonade, Cherry Limeade, Grape, Strawberry, Fruit Punch, Pineapple and Peach. To this day, the brand “Sunkist” is still owned by the Sunkist Growers, Inc.

Dr Pepper Snapple Group, Inc.
Plano, Texas

One of the oldest major brands of soft drinks in the country is Dr Pepper. It was created by Charles Alderton of Waco, Texas in 1885, in response to customers’ requests for a new syrup flavor. They were getting tired of the limited flavors that were offered, so Alderton mixed up a variety of fruit flavors to serve at the soda fountain at the Morrison’s Old Corner Drug Store where he was employed as a pharmacist. He developed a flavor he liked, and it turned out, the customers liked it too. It became so popular in town that other pharmacy owners bought the syrup from Morrison and he soon found that he could no longer keep up with the demand for the new soft drink flavor.

Morrison approached Robert S. Lazenby, the proprietor of the Circle “A” Ginger Ale Company, also in Waco, to see if he would agree to produce the syrup in his bottling plant. Lazenby had also taken a liking to the new flavor, and agreed to produce it. Although Alderton had created the drink, he was not interested in promoting it, and resigned that responsibility to Morrison and Lazenby.

Dr Pepper was introduced to nearly 20 million people at the World’s Fair Exposition held in St. Louis in 1904. It was presented by Lazenby and his son-in-law, J.B. O’Hara. The soft drink continued to increase in popularity and the two men formed the Artesian Mfg. & Bottling Company. The name was later changed to the Dr Pepper Company. The company was moved to Dallas in 1922.

The slogan used to promote Dr Pepper from 1910 to 1914 was “King of Beverages”. In the 1920s and 30s the trademark character for Dr Pepper was an old country doctor in a top hat and monocle. The soft drink was promoted as being able to provide energy and aiding in the energy lapse most people feel at different times of the day. The slogan used into the 1950s was, “Drink a Bite to Eat at 10, 2 and 4”.  In the 1960s Dr Pepper was promoted as a suitable soft drink for the viewers of Dick Clark’s “American Bandstand”. Probably the most memorable slogan used to sell Dr Pepper was the “Be a Pepper” slogan introduced in 1977.

Diet Dr Pepper was released in 1963 as “Dietetic Dr Pepper”. It didn’t sell well until three years later when the name was changed to Diet Dr Pepper. Sales increased steadily, and today Diet Dr Pepper is one of the top ten best selling soft drinks in the U.S. It’s now bottled by the Dr Pepper Snapple Group, Inc. of Plano, Texas.

The Mohr Brothers Bottling Co. was started in 1902 by Edward, Henry and William Mohr, as well as their brother-in-law, James Faurot. It began by supplying beverages to candy stores and social events, like ice cream socials and outdoor events. Later their market was mainly taverns and grocery stores, but they also sold cases of soda to church functions and other organizations.

Through the years, Mohr Bros. stuck to its line of old fashioned flavors, like root beer, ginger ale, lime, orange, blood orange, cherry, grape, cream, strawberry, grapefruit, lemon-lime and cola. Most likely, the bottlecap we have featured here for Pic-Up soda is for a lemon-lime soda, the Mohr Bros. version of 7-Up.

Mohr Bros. was sold in 1983 to John Kolb, who was formerly with Vernors, Inc. Richard Mohr, whose grandfather was one of the original founders, stayed on as company president. The company was renamed the Kolb Beverage Company and was selling a total of 16 flavors at that time.

Richard Mohr eventually bought the company back from Kolb. Mohr had a reputation for being very hands-on with the business. He could be seen on the factory floor in work clothes, mixing the soda flavors by hand, referring to the recipe book containing the company’s 80-year-old formulas. Richard Mohr had started working at Mohr Bros. in 1940 at the age of 14. He passed away in 2002 at the age of 75. There is no further mention of the bottling company after his death, so I doubt they are still in operation.

The Mohr Brothers Bottling Co.
Toledo, Ohio