Hires Root Beer

Charles Hires, Philadelphia pharmacist, was on his honeymoon around the same time when he discovered an herbal tea. During honeymoon he was served root tea made up of sixteen wild roots and berries, including, pipsissewa, spikenard, juniper wintergreen, sarsaparilla, and hops. Charles persuaded his hostess to part with her recipe for root tea.

After taking the recipe of herbs, berries and roots home to Philadelphia with him, he began selling a packaged dry mixture to the public made from many of the same ingredients as the original herbal tea. Well received, Hires soon developed a liquid concentrate blended together from more than 25 herbs, berries and roots.

Hires originally developed his root beer as a medicinal syrup or tonic, while still living on his father’s farm in Stow Creek Township.

Hires decided to call his herbal tea “root beer” at the suggestion of a friend, Dr. Russell Conwell (founder of Temple University) who thought that given the popularity of beer at the time, more people would buy it.

The public loved the new drink and as a result, Hires introduced commercial root beer to the public in 1876 at the Philadelphia Centennial Exhibition. In no time, it became a popular drink of its day. The Hires family continued to manufacture root beer and in 1893 first sold and distributed root beer in bottle.

Charles Hires sold 115,000 glasses of root beer during their first year. That quickly expanded to 700 million glasses. The Hires Root Beer Company lost the patent for the name “Root Beer” in 1879. Charles remained in charge of his company until 1925, when his two sons took over.

In 1919, Prohibition was introduced in the United States. No longer were people allowed to consume alcoholic beverages, including beer. Prohibition lasted until 1933, and during that time, Hires continued to solidify itself as one of the most popular, and healthy drinks in America.
Hires Root Beer

Barq’s root beer

The Barq’s bottling company was in established 1890 in New Orleans, Louisiana by Edward Charles Edmond Barq and his younger brother, Gaston. The Barq brothers bottled carbonated water and various soft drinks. The most popular at that time was an orange flavored soda or called as Oringine.

Barq bought the Biloxi Artesian Bottling Works on Keller Avenue in Biloxi in 1897. Here Edward Barq, Sr., developed the formula for and first bottled the now-famous Barq's Root Beer in 1898.

Barq’s Root Beer was first bottled by the Biloxi Artesian Bottling Works. By day Barq and his wife sold the drinks, and then spent the rest of their time mixing the formula for them and refilling glass bottles.

Although root beer was never as popular as the cola products, Barq’s nevertheless spread throughout the United States and branched out with flavors such as Grape, Moon-Glo, Imitation Strawberry, and red creme soda.

The drinks popularity was unstoppable. By 1931 the enterprise had begun to expand seriously, having opened plants in New Orleans and Mobile. In 1936, Barq's operation was moved from Keller Avenue to a larger plant at 604 Lameuse Street, also in Biloxi.

By 1937, 62 bottling plants had been established in 22 states. The numbers peaked in 1950 at about 200, but by that time the "root beer" had been forced to undergo changes.

The first came in 1938 when the federal government banned caffeine in root beer. Barq simply changed the name of his drink to Barq's Sr. and then set about developing a caffeine-free root beer.

When the government reversed it caffeine ban in 1960, Barq's Sr. disappeared, and the original recipe once again appeared, as root beer. This created some confusion about what to call the drink. Many had inadvertently called it Barq's Root Beer, but it wouldn't take long for the old man to gracefully straighten one out by saying "Barq's son. Just Barq's". In 1995 The Coca‑Cola Company acquires the Barq’s root beer brand.
Barq’s root beer

Weber's Root Beer and Hamburger

Way back in 1891, Oscar Weber Bilby started making his own root beer on his farm in Tulsa, Oklahoma. Oscar and his wife Fanny moved to Oklahoma from Missouri to a 640-acre farm just north of Sapulpa to an area now known as Bowden, Oklahoma in 1884.

Oscar was a farmer but he enjoyed experimenting with different soft drink condiments. Through trial and error, he combined roots and barks and some 14 secret ingredients before stored and aged in birch bark barrels. The creation of sweet soda pop was for his family to enjoy.

His famous Weber's Superior Root beer was then served at the peak of the flavoring cycle. Oscar used yeast to carbonate his root beer. The syrup concentrate for the root beer is made from scratch in a 55-gallon drum every few days. One gallon of concentrate is then made into a 30-gallon barrel of root beer syrup. From the 30 gallons of syrup, about 300 gallons of root beer is produced.

Weber’s Root Beer is still made entirely by hand in Tulsa by the keeper of the secret recipe. That recipe for Web's root beer has been passed from generation to generation.

On the fourth of July, 1891, Oscar probably made his most significant contribution to society when the first real hamburger was made in his home. He then served them (along with Weber's Superior Root beer) to more than 100 people who were the Bilbys' friends and family. Oscar continued this 4th of July tradition every year for the rest of his life.

His hamburgers and root beer were the hit of the community. Decades of encouragement later, Oscar’s son, Leo Bilby actually started the root beer company back in 1933, selling it from a drive-through window in Tulsa's Brookside district and the tradition was continued by Harold Bilby.
Weber's Root Beer and Hamburger