For this issue of the Jewell County Record we had hoped a reader would submit and an unusural picture they saw while out shopping the Highway 36 Treasure Hunt. We made the request last Wednesday on Facebook and suggested someone take a cell phone picture of an unusual thing they saw being offered for sale or someone struggling to pack all of their purchased treasures into their vehicle.
Either Facebook didn’t work and or nothing unusual was seen for we got not one picture submission.
We did hear some stories associated with the annual 400-mile garage sale.
When one couple had plumbing problems and expected to be without water at their home until Monday, they loaded up and went on a Highway 36 junk jaunt. They hoped they could find motels with running water to stay in. Haven’t heard if they found a motel or had to sleep in their vehicle.
Another couple bought so many treasures about 90 miles from home they couldn’t fit them all into their vehicle and had to return another day.
A woman who purchased some old soda pop bottles at Phillipsburg looked up the editor of this newspaper seeking a history lesson about the 7 ounce bottle filled in Superior with a beverage known as Sparkling Life.
It wasn’t the first time the editor had been asked about Life and he had answers for her.
Sparkling Life was one of several popular lemon-lime drinks often marketed as hangover cures.
The bottle described the drink as being a highly carbonated, lithiated beverage containing dextrose and lithia citrate.
Sparkling Life was developed by Edward Meier as a competitor to the popular 7-Up. Meier entered the soft drink business after he received reward money in 1936 for catching a bank robber. He used the money to purchase a used bottling machine. Meier and his wife, Catherine, set up a bottling plant in her grandmother’s house which previously had housed a general store.
The soft-drink 7-Up was originally named Bib-Label Lithiated Lemon-Lime Soda when it was formulated in 1929 because it contained lithium citrate. The beverage was considered a patent medicine marketed as a cure for hangover. Lithium citrate was removed from 7-Up and its competitors after it was banned by the federal food and drug administration.
Early versions of Coca-Cola also contained lithium.
Lithium Citrate is still used as a mood stabilizer and is prescribed to treat mania, hypomania, depression and bipolar disorder. It can be administered orally in the form of a syrup.
The bottle found in Phillipsburg boldly proclaims the drink contains Lithium Citrate.
When the lemon-lime drinks contained Lithium Citrate, they were promoted as hangover cures. They have now come full circle and are often mixed with alcohol.
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