The Birmingham age-herald., 1913-11-16
BEVERAGE HAS BEEN IN USE
SINCE 1920, BUT MYSTERY
SURROUNDS THE QUEST OF
NAME OF MAN WHO IN
VENTED 1T

who was the man? What did he look
Nike. anyway? Where did he come FROM
and where is he now? What man? The
one who put fizz into soda water. That's
a. question that there is time to spare
to ponder over now that the melting
days. are gone and Tom and jerry
have stated that when the snow begins
to fall they will be doing business at the
same old stand.
Away back in the days when people
from all over the country flocked In
droves to Philadelphia to visit the great
Centennial, it is said by some Of the
old-tirners soda water was one of the
features, and the fountains drew the
thirsty about them lke flies about a
molasses Jug. But when it comes down
to .s,rass tacks" the Centennial had
nothing to do with the beverage except
to popularize it in this country. AS a
matter of fact the records show soda
water is not modern, for II is mix
ture of the early part sof the sixteenth
Gentry Not that dee cream soda and
the sundae we're star features OF. say
the renaissance, but the principle OF
soda water was In use in Germany as
Paracelsus a German chemist and ply
sician, who seems to have been the first
to have a speaking acquaintance with
carbonic acid, which Is the essential con-
stituent of soda water Just how much
Paracelsus developed the possibilities OF
soda water as beverage Is rather hazy
point; unfortunately a Jealous band OF
druggists and chemists, SO rumor runs,
threw him down a hill and nipped the
of 1,a scientist In
the bud, says the Omaha World-Herald
The carbonic acid took root, neverthe-
less. One hundred years later Van Hell
mont, Belgian chemist, made further
experiments and coined the word gas, u
the term that is now used to designate
the carbon dioXide which puts the ffzz In
soda water More than 100 years later q
French physician, Gabriel Venel, tried his
hand at making drinkable mixtures OF
soda, muriatic acid and ordinary water
The idea crept into England, and a few
years before the American resolution DR.
Joseph Priestly, of Leeds, made the first
publicly acknowledged glass of drinkable
soda water. According to the Pharma-
ceutical Era, which gives in recent
issue the history of the development OF
the soda water industry. DR.. Priestley
prepared his beverage by pouring water
briskly back and forth between two COB
lets held In a layer of carbon dioxide on
the top of a fermented mash in brewery
vat.
Europe Adopts Idea
When this time had arrived Germany
France, Belgium and England had all
taken turn at the soda water fountain
idea, yet In 1880 It was comparatively un-
known and its virtues unheralded. 1t re-
mained for America to put her shoulder
to the wheel and push the fizz into popu-
larity so that 1t has become the drink OF
the land on days when the thermometer
is bobbing around the 100 mark 1t was
America that invented and perfected the
soda water fountain and appliances there
to. Thus 1t comes that 1t was America
that introduced the drink in England ant
on the continent, from whence the idea
first came.
Druggist Bell, one of the oldest pioneers
in his line in Omaha and an authority or
g good many good things, says ''Th'
manufacture of mineral waters upon cor
rect chemical principles was undertaken
IN America as early as 1905. This wal
merely charged water. but 1t was a great
novelty In the days when lack of travel.
ing facilities made the mineral springs
remote for many In 1909 the first estab-
lishment was started in New York city
'The American New Dispensary," by
Thatcher Interestingly describes the op-
Grafton of the early plants. The descrip-
tion Is this;
"The cisterns were placed in the eel
lar and the waters were conveyed into
the bar in block tin tubes, which pass
up into mahogany pillars. crowned with
gilt urns and lettered with the names
of the respective waters. The pillars
with their urns, stood a foot apart, and
the middle one was raised above the
others. Silver stopcocks inserted into the
side of the pillars give the whole much
neatness and richness of appearance"
1t remained for a Massachusetts, man,
G. D. Dows, to create soda water sensa-
tion In the early '5Os. Mr. Dows is known
as "the father OF the modern soda foun-
tain" and was the first to use marble
in its construction. with silver American
eagles. such as you will see on the stop
cocks of the soda fountains IN the coun-
try towns today. Mr.. Dows made a
reputation In the United States with his
sDows fountain" which sold for $22S
each, and In 1867 he went to France. where
he displayed his apparatus at the ex-
position universelle, in Paris. This was
the formal introduction of American soda
water on the continent and It made a
tremendous sensation. The report of the
American commission of the United States
Senate records the fact that 1.-The Dows
soda was popular with the mass OF the