Cheerwine from Asheville, NC

[SODAPOPBOB]

Morb

This one's for you!

These guys have a 1952 Asheville directory but I'm not sure if you have to go to the university itself or if there is some other way of accessing it. They have an "Ask A Librarian" link that might be a place to start and/or possibly contact them by email. http://www2.lib.unc.edu/ncc/ref/phone/phone.html

 

[SODAPOPBOB]

Morb I called the University of North Carolina who has the 1952 Asheville directory and am in the process, via email, of finding out everything I can regarding bottlers, etc. Although I have not received any specific information yet, I wanted to let you know what I was up to so that both of us did not contact them at the same time about the same information. The directories are reference only and not transferable to other libraries. I am in contact with a library worker who is assisting me who I hope to hear back from soon. I will let you know just as soon as I hear from them. Bob

 

[SODAPOPBOB]

Here's the copy/pasted message I sent to the University of North Carolina library. I hope I covered all of the bases.
Good Morning:

I was given this contact address by a member of your staff in the hope you could assist me with the following.

I am seeking information from ...

1. North Carolina Collection
2. City Phone Directory
3. Asheville, N.C. ~ Buncombe County
3. 1952 Edition
5. Your online list shows the Call Number as Cp971.11 A82s2

I am a collector/researcher of soda pop memorabilia and specifically interested in anything in the 1952 Asheville directory listed under ...

1. Bottlers
2. Beverages
3. Carbonated Beverage Bottlers
4. Etc.

I'm not sure exactly how they would be listed but would appreciate it if you could check at send me a list of all the Soda Beverage Bottlers located in Asheville, N.C. in 1952. And especially if one of them includes the brand name of soda pop called Cheerwine. There might even be some advertisements in the directory that would be of interest to me as well. If you have the capability and time to scan any listings, I would welcome those attachments.

Please contact me if you have any questions and/or need clarification on my request.

Thank you in advance for your assistance - it is very much appreciated.

Bob Brown
California

 

[SODAPOPBOB]

The following is a copy/pasted portion of a message that I just received in response to my email inquiry ... "Thank you for your recent inquiry and for your interest in the materials held in the Louis Round Wilson Special Collections Library at the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill. Research and Instructional Services staff answer reference requests in the order in which they are received, and because of the volume of requests, the initial response may take up to fifteen business days (three weeks)." ~ * ~ So it looks as if I have no choice but to wait and hear from them and will post what they have to say once I receive it. In the meantime, I found this Cheerwine bottle cap that I believe is from the 1950s and has "Orange Crush Bottling" on it and is from Leaksville, N.C. I did a little research and discovered that the town name of "Leasksville" was changed to "Eden" in 1967. I also discovered that the Leaksville Orange Crush Bottling Company was in operation in 1952. My line of thinking is, if one North Carolina Orange Crush bottler was bottling Cheerwine in the 1950s that others, like the one in Asheville, also might have. ???

 

[SODAPOPBOB]

Another Mystery!

I wonder why the Sun Crest Bottling Company of Asheville, who produced this 1951 2-Way bottle, does not appear in the 1948, 1950, 1951, or 1953 Asheville directories?

Possible Answer:
Because the previously posted bottler's listings are from the Business/Yellow Pages section of the directories, I suspect businesses had to pay extra in order to be listed there. It's possible that some bottlers either didn't want to pay the extra fee or possibly would have paid but missed the publishing deadline. However, I checked the white pages of the 1951 directory and the Sun Crest Bottling Company was not listed there, either. So I really don't know what to make of it!

 

[SODAPOPBOB]

Directories ~ Business/Yellow Pages ... ( No Sun Crest Bottling Company ) 1. 19482. 19503. 1951

 

[SODAPOPBOB]

4. 1953

 

[SODAPOPBOB]

Here's a direct link to the 1951 directory. If you type Bottling in the search box (and wait a moment) it will pull up all of the listings in the directory that use the word "Bottling" and will include those in the white pages as well as the those in the yellow pages. The various listings will appear at the bottom of the page in the form of small, yellow teardrops. From there you can slowly move your cursor-arrow over the teardrops to see the listing or else click on a particular teardrop and it will take you directly to that particular page. However, if you type "Cheerwine" in the search box, it will say "No Matches Were Found." The same result occurs when you type in "Sun Crest." The closest wording to Sun Crest anywhere in the directory is the word Sunset ... Be sure to use the + symbol or the "Full Screen" option to enlarge ... https://archive.org/details/millersasheville1951hill

 

[SODAPOPBOB]

Hey, Morb Look at what I found ... (Close, but no cigar, yet) [] http://www.oldtelephonebooks.com/state/North%20Carolina June of 1952

 

[SODAPOPBOB]

P.S. Morb: In case you're wondering why I'm "bombarding" your thread, the main reasons are three-fold ... 1. I enjoy a good research challenge.2. I was born in 1952.3. I'm nursing an infected foot, can barely walk, and have been stuck inside for a week now. I hope you don't mind and will be sure to post the info about the 1952 directory just as soon as I hear from the University. However, in the event the 1952 directory is no different than the 1951 and 1953 directories and does not contain any useful clues, that will pretty much take us back to square-one. Which I am prepared for and why I am focusing my current searches on the Orange Crush Bottling Company. Based on everything I have seen so far, there appears to have been more North Carolina Orange Crush bottlers that handled Cheerwine than anyone else. I realize this is inconclusive and unconfirmed, but even with that said, my current money is on Orange Crush. If nothing else, I have to believe there is a Asheville Cheerwine bottle cap out there somewhere that will have the bottler's name on it and hopefully solve the mystery. Bob