The Mystery of Wardell's Ginger Ale

Here is our starting point.  It is a "hutchinson" style soda bottle.  These were pretty much the standard pop bottle in the 1880's and 1890's.  

The embossing reads R.T. WARDELL EAU CLAIRE WIS.  That little gizmo in the bottom of the bottle is the stopper.  Replacing earlier corked bottles this allowed you to open up a bottle, drink some of it, and reseal it.   

So, what's the story here?  Well, its complicated.

The earliest local clue is from the summer of 1884.  Summertime is generally when pop bottlers started a venture, or advertised an existing one.  From an Eau Claire paper of June 21st we read:

"R.T. Wardell, of Michigan, is opening up an establishment on the West side for the manufacture and sale of ginger ales, etc."

There is a bit of confusion in early reports.  At one point it was said to be an F. Wardell starting the business.  And embarrassingly, on the July 3rd, the paper described ginger ale as an alcoholic beverage.  A hasty 4th of July retraction was published:

The reference to three million bottles being sold in the previous year is rather audacious.  Where?  And by whom?

Wardell bottles from Eau Claire are pretty scarce.  R.T. gets mentioned briefly among citizens signing a petition in 1885.  After that there is but one enigmatic and somewhat jokey reference from 1886...and this from a Minneapolis newspaper.

It sounds like somebody the editor knew well, perhaps on a drinking buddy sort of level?

As it happens there was another branch of the Wardell family over in St. Paul, Minnesota.

John G. Wardell is said to have moved from Battle Creek Michigan to the Twin Cities in 1882.  After briefly being in Minneapolis he set up shop in St. Paul, doing business as The Spa Bottling Company.  He was quite successful, both at the original Spa Bottling company and later, in 1900, when he left that firm and started his own venture.  The Consolidated Bottling Company became Highland Spring Water company later in 1900, actually lasting until the mid 1960's.  For more on this branch of the Wardell clan I found THIS quite helpful. 

When Spa got started in 1882 it had Minneapolis and St. Paul branches, and was variously described as having relocated from Grand Rapids Michigan or being an offshoot of an earlier company there.  John G. Wardell is described as being "....long connected with the Grand Rapids house..." I'm not sure how that fits with the report of him being from Battle Creek, but they are not far apart. 

John G. was born in 1857.  R.T. is described as a young man in 1886.  They must have been related.  Same last name, both came from Michigan, both in the soda business.  The presumed difference in ages does not fit for father and son, but perhaps brothers?  Maybe he was a sort of black sheep of the family.  The claim of three million bottles sold in 1883 is hard to believe.  Maybe if the output of the Minnesota and Michigan branches was combined.  Interestingly there also was a Diamond Ginger Ale sold out of Connecticut starting in 1865.  Maybe that three million figure suggested an early franchise set up?

John G. lived a long and productive life.  He died in 1935, his son and grandson carrying on the business.  Heck, I might have had a swig or two of Highland Spring Water when I was a kid.

Eventually I tracked down an on line City Directory of Grand Rapids from 1880.  John G. Wardell is listed as a "clerk" for Mills and Lacey.  No listing of them in the beverage business.  Robert T. Wardell was, if I am reading the abbreviation corrctly, a cradle maker!   There is one soda bottler and one ginger beer manufacturer listed,  but oddly the Wardells do not seem to have been associated with either.  

4th of July - America at 250

Fourth of July is usually a surprisingly personal holiday for most Americans.  We  get the three day weekend off - ER docs being the exception - and are expected to go do summer things that please us.  If you have a lake cabin, go there.  If there are jobs to do, keep them at a minimum.  Grill stuff.  Have a cold beer.  That's the Midwest paradigm at least.  As for other parts of the country, well, YMMV.

250 years seems like a less impressive feat than the Bicentennial was.  It's kind of like one's 40th anniversary.  A big number but less substantive than say 25 or 50.  That's not really fair of course.  With longer life spans lots of people reach their 50th anniversary.  Very few countries on earth last for centuries.  I mean, obviously the land does, the form of government not so much.  

There is a tendency of late to be very downcast about America and the future.  I don't share this pessimism.  

1976.  The bicentennial.  I was in college.  My waistline was thin.  My hair was not.  We'd just waded through the apparent defeat of Vietnam and the difficulty of Watergate.  Gas for our horrid 1970's cars was expensive.  Interest rates were ridiculously high.  Current home seekers despair over 6.3% mortgage rates.  Hey, try 18% on for size.  (ok, that was a couple of years earlier, but still....).

And for all that I don't remember people being nearly as disturbed as some are today.  

Times are different.  We are different.  Which changes which?

Fifty years ago there were still certainties.  Our parents were of durable stock, having endured the Great Depression and the Second World War.  There were even plenty of "doughboys" around whose lives started in an agrarian, isolationist country.  These were not stupid people, they'd seen a great deal come to pass.  But they kept their focus on making their lives and that of their families better.

Odd times for America on its 250th.  We are now exposed to continuous outrage on our electronic marvels.  But at the same time we have as a culture been sleep walking.  So many important questions just kicked down the road like an old tin can...a can that contains the accumulated debt that our children and grandchildren will have to pay off. You can be supportive, neutral or antagonistic to this administration but at least difficult questions are being asked.  Hopefully the right answers will be forthcoming.  If not, we'll elect a different bunch.   

So Happy Birthday.  Life is not perfect.  It is in fact always going to be a mixture.  That phone that brings you Tiktok slop and panicky dispair...it also contains more information that we could have imagined 25 years ago.  We are smarter than we used to be: the percentage of Americans with college degrees is up markedly.  Wiser is another matter.....

Well enough of this.  Life, Liberty and the Pursuit of Happiness means, get out there and enjoy the day.  Burgers and beer optional.

Upstairs, Downstairs

Our house was built in 1908.  Not old from the standpoint of our community, which got going in the 1840's, but it does represent an interesting moment in time.  The Lumber Baron era was just over.  The modern age - indoor plumbing, electricity, telephone lines - had arrived.

It was also a time of class distinctions.  Oh, not so much as in England, but there was a definite expectation that people of quality lived on the top of the hill, while smaller houses full of working class folks were further down the slope.  

I should really know the story better, but evidently our house was built by a guy who worked in a bank during the lumbering era.  His daughter lived there after he passed.

It's a nice enough house.  But today's focus is on the Upstairs-Downstairs world of early 20th century servants.

They were mostly women, mostly recent immigrants.  Usually from Scandinavia or perhaps Germany.  They were probably some combination of maid, cook, nanny.  I don't know a lot about the woman who lived here as a servant.  I've seen her name on a census.  My "office" a small room where I am allowed to set up computer, files, random junk, used to be her bedroom.  When we were new in the house it still had a sink.  This was pretty handy when we made it the nursery for our three kids.

Downstairs there is one room that was a bit fancy.  A dining room with decent woodwork.  On the floor there is a metal plate that used to have a button.  When the Man of the House, or perhaps the Woman of same, pushed a button with a toe there'd be a buzzer or bell that would sound.  I think we found a few remnants of this system's wiring during an early remodel.

And going from the kitchen to the Dining Room there was a swinging door.  You certainly would not expect people of quality to see pots, pans and dishes!  The door swung on a hinge.  Specifically, here:

I did say it was not all that Grand.  But lets focus on a little area down at the bottom of the doorway.....

There is a little square of wood there that does not quite fit with the rest of the flooring.  There used to be something else there, something that could be removed. leaving a gap between first floor and basement.  Small people used to like to yell things and drop messages down from above.

What used to be there was a very fancy hinge, the sort of thing that would articulate a nice door.  I could see the Servant Girl gently pushing it open while carrying in platters full of whatever upper middle class folks dined on back in the day.

And as it happens, I still have that hinge.  It's more interesting than most bits of 126 year old hardware...

OK, that's only mildly interesting.  Let's flip it over to read:

BOMMER FLOOR HINGE  PAT. DEC 25 1900

I've seen other things patented on Christmas Day.  It must have been a thing back then.  Certainly the Patent Office would not have been open on December 25th, so they must have had some sort of paperwork gimmick to make this the patent date.*

The Bommer Company is, remarkably still around.  HERE'S their story.

Alas, on a closer read of their website it appears that in the summer of 2025 they decided to wrap up the business, no doubt in the face of overseas competition, and it looks as if they are selling off remaining stock.  😔

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* The most famous patent date of this sort is on the "Christmas Coke" bottles that are the classic shape for CocaCola when it came in glass.

Lumberjacks (and Jills)

Timber Sports.  Now there's a phrase you probably have never heard.  It's basically modern people competing in lumberjack activities.  To some extent using modern tools like chain saws.  And there are Lumber Jills as well as Lumber Jacks.

Hayward Wisconsin, near where our up north cabin is, has quite the center of Timber Sportsdom.  In fact they have the Lumberjack World Championship competition there.  Really talented people chopping, sawing, log rolling, climbing poles, that sort of thing.  

There is also a regular "show" for entertaining tourists.  Not quite World Champs level stuff but with lots of banter, and still many amazing things to be seen.  We had some out of town visitors with us recently and they went to see the show.

Afterwards I got them to split a season's worth of kindling.  Happily with no mishaps.

Tree Shaped Tombstone - Between Luck and Frederick (Wisconsin)

Like the example the other day from McKinley Wisconsin, this tree shaped tombstone was encountered on a little road trip.  Baseball tournament destination.  Prior to setting out I usually go to Google Maps and scan for small town cemeteries.  Sometimes you see interesting things, sometimes not.  A few are not even "on the map".  This little place - St. Peter's Cemetery - did not look like much, but I pulled in anyway.  And found another "one off" tree.  It is also another late one, and has an unusual inscription.  Perhaps related in some way to the one in McKinley?

Some purists might not count these "rugged cross" variants, but I rather like them.  The horizontal elements often have interesting features.  Like this "dying dove".

And another cryptic inscription.  This time Google helped out.  It seems to be Norwegian and say "Dedicated to your Memory".  

Lolling About

It's summer time.  And my dog alternates manic energy and exhausted sloth.  In the latter state he is often "lolling around".  For some reason I've always associated this particular phrase with dogs.  And with dog's tongues.  Turns out I was mostly right...

Like many of the best descriptive words it has obscure origins.  Possible Middle Dutch in the form of "lollen" meaing to doze or mumble.  By the mid 1300's it had changed a bit and now meant to lounge idly or to hang loosely.  You can see how, by the early 1600's, it picked up the connotation of a tongue hanging out.  And a century later being a generic term for lazy inaction.

Lollypop turns up in the late 1700's.  Although they originally did not seem to have a stick, it was certainly something you would pop into your mouth.  Lollygag is a later word, well into the 19th century.  It implies a more deceptive inaction rather than just being worn out.  Lolly, as above, plus gag, meaning a joke.

Lounging about is by the way much different from lolling about.  At least by the complexity of its etymology it seems like much more work

Tree Shaped Tombstone - McKinley Wisconsin

Oh, my.  The tree shaped tombstone in this photo is really the less impressive part...

Welcome to McKinley Wisconsin.  It's just a wide spot in the road really.  But it has a cemetery.  And next to it a church.

As you can see, the church has taken a big hit.  A lightning strike in the summer of 2025 started a fire.

At this point the building had been repurposed into a home, and the family was just barely able to escape unharmed.

Almost a year later there do not appear to be ongoing repair efforts.  

Now, on to that tombstone.  It is unusual in several respects.  For one thing, it is the only one in the cemetery.  My rule of thumb is that when you see one you will almost always see another.  Not here.  And it has some other unusual features.  It is a really, really late example.

As is common, its a husband and wife.  He died in 1918.  She in 1937.  Monuments of this sort were becoming uncommon as the 1920's approached.  Perhaps they were the kind of people who really planned ahead and bought this earlier?

Something else odd here, and this one really bothers me.  The inscription at the bottom is in some language that I can't make out.  I've run what I can see through Google Translate and come up empty.  Of course my policy is that I never scrub at such things, I keep my hands off.  But what is this?   (Note, based on another example from a few miles away I'm thinking it is Norwegian)