TAZEWELL MANUFACTURING COMPANY
WAS-COTT / SUN-RISE BOTTLING COMPANY

In the town of North Tazewell, VA sits a large white building with bricked up windows. While this building is vacant now, it was once home of one of the largest carbonated beverage bottling plants in Virginia. This company would remain a North Tazewell landmark from 1910 until 1960. The company's name changed at least three times during its life starting out as The Tazewell Manufacturing Company 1910-1922, The Was-Cott Corporation 1922-1931, and finally The Sun Rise Bottling Company 1931 until its closing in 1960. This company started out as a wholesale grocery store established in the 1890's, by the Lynchburg firm known as Duguid Brothers with W. A. Scott as a partner. Scott soon bought out his partners' interest in the company. Sometime during 1910 Scott created his most famous soda Was-Cott Ginger Ale, along with the Tazewell Manufacturing Company, and placed the first ad for the drink in the September 8, 1911 Clinch Valley News.(1) Scott continued operation of the store until a fire destroyed the grocery, and its subsidiary the Tazewell Manufacturing Company on January 18, 1920.(1)

After the fire, W. A. Scott constructed a new two story brick and concrete plant, with a basement, and restarted bottling operations by April 8, 1921, with S. L. Drake returning as superintendent of the Tazewell Manufacturing Company.(1) Scott equipped it with the most modern machinery at the time. The Was-Cott Corporation was incorporated on April, 23, 1921, with W. A. Scott as President and Treasurer, George W. St. Clair as first Vice President, both of Tazewell, Va, Hiram T. Gates, of Richmond, VA, as Second Vice President, F. H. Forbes, or North Tazewell, VA, as Secretary. Jameson George Buston is listed as a director of the company, he will become very important to the company later on. For a long time Was-Cott Ginger Ale was distributed to the rest of the nation by the use of trains. W. A. Scott had been wise enough to build his buildings right next to the Norfolk and Western railway line. He engaged in a huge advertising campaign in 1923, which ran ads from New York City to Jacksonville, Florida, they even distributed it to a few foreign countries.

What really helped the brand attain its fame was the A&P grocery store chain distributing the brand in their franchises. I have seen A&P ads from various different eastern states where Was-Cott Ginger Ale holds a prominent place in their roster of ginger ales. Was-Cott Ginger ale came in three sizes of amber paper labeled bottles, the 7 ½ oz for five cents, the 12oz for ten cents, and the 16oz for twenty cents. By 1928 the Was-Cott Corporation is bottling all three types of Was-Cott Ginger Ale (regular, club, and Extra Dry), Orange Crush, Lime Crush, Cherry Crush, Strawberry Crush, Mandalay Punch, Hires Root Beer, and Apple and Peach products.(1) They were also manufacturing / distributing fountain syrups for all of these flavors.(1) The Was-Cott Corporation was still in operation as of 1928; however, like many businesses Was-Cott was hit hard by the Great Depression, and wound up having to liquidate. W. A. Scott has started selling life and automobile insurance by June 6, 1930.(1) According to the trademark registration of the name Sun Rise by the Sun Rise Bottling Company the first date of use of the name in commerce was September 1, 1931, with James G. Buston as proprietor. Of course Buston succeeded in keeping the company operating, and broadened the product line to several different products.

The first was a brand known as Chro-Mo which was touted in advertising as "the drink that everybody likes." apparently everybody didn't like it as the brand is gone by the 1940's, and unfortunately there isn't much left to give us an idea of what flavor this brand was. By the 1940's new brands have joined the homegrown ranks under J. G. Buston one of which is Tazewell Orange "A Delicious Drink" which may have very well been inspired by Orange Crush, and is obviously a Tazewell exclusive brand. The Sun Rise Beverages line, which most likely had been with the company from the start, was created as the flavor line for the company the first bottles were clear with a black and orange painted label that would later be redesigned with a rooster crowing at the sunrise. Then there is 2 TO 1 "Two to one you’ll like, because it’s two to one in your favor" which was another Tazewell exclusive most likely a lemon lime type drink much like 7-UP or a grapefruit type drink like Squirt.

Lucky Giant "A drink that tastes different because it’s made different" was a cola that was created by the company to market as a franchise drink, I doubt it went too far as the brand isn't advertised after World War II. The last of the Tazewell exclusive brands can be quite possibly described as the most promoted brand of the company aside from Was-Cott Ginger Ale itself, that being Rhythm Punch with the inspiring tagline "Tastes like grapes", which I suspect the flavor and even the name was modified from Mandalay Punch, which the company bottled in the late 1920's. Of course the company was still bottling Was-Cott Ginger Ale which was now in a green painted label bottle similar to a certain Canadian oriented ginger ale. They picked up other nationally franchised brands like Red Rock Cola, which most likely replaced Lucky Giant, Squirt, which most likely replaced 2 TO 1, and Hires Root Beer, which they had been bottling since the late 1920's.

The Sun Rise Bottling Company was registered as a partnership on March 24, 1947 between Jameson George Buston, Earl Stanley Wallace, and John Wharton Gillespie. By October 1948 Buston had sold his interest in the company to Wallace and Gillespie.(2) Was-Cott Ginger Ale died off after it could no longer compete with Canada Dry, which the company picked up to replace the home brand. It appears that Wallace and Gillespie sold the "Sun Rise" trademark to Sun Rise Inc. of Marshall, MN, who would take the brand national and eventually the brand would be bottled by Coca-Cola bottlers into the 1970's. Sun Rise Bottling Company itself would continue to bottle Tazewell Orange, Rhythm Punch, and the other national brands till their closing sometime in 1960, when the company would sell the plant to the Deskins Supermarket chain who converted it into a warehouse.

The W.A. Scott Wholesale Grocery building before 1920

The new Was-Cott bottling plant built in 1922

The Sun-Rise Bottling Company as it stands today

The first ad for Was-Cott Ginger Ale from September 8, 1911. If you will look closely you will notice that the ad on the right has the name of the product W. A. Scott's Ginger Ale which was quickly changed the following week to the ad on the right which is the correct name.

These are Was-Cott Ginger Ale bottles the one on the left is dated 1920, the middle one is dated 1919, and the last one is dated 1924. The 1924 is another one of those "Rosetta Stone" bottles that I have referred to on other pages. While the other bottles have the W.A.S. on the bottom, that one has the W.A.S. on the bottom, and Was-Cott embossed on the neck. This led me to the conclusion that the W.A.S. embossed on the bottom is indeed connected to Was-Cott, and that all bottles with the same bottom embossing would be the same brand. All of these bottles would have been paper label bottles most likely looking very close to the bottle depicted on the receipt below.

Tazewell Manufacturing sales receipt from 1921, note that the only drink advertised is Was-Cott Ginger Ale.

Above you will see a crate for the Giant Chro-mo flavor. I feel that this is the first of the new flavors that Buston created after his taking over the bottling plant. I have no idea what the bottle looked liked, or even the flavor. Aside from this crate, which I unfortunately don't own, I have only a copy of the 1936 letterhead, and a 1935 ad, that proves this brand even existed. Hopefully in time I will find a bottle or more information on this flavor.

Advertising for The Sun Rise Bottling Company from the Nov. 1, 1935 Coalfield Pioneer, touting Giant Chero-Mo (should be Chro-Mo) as the drink that everybody likes. They must not have liked it too much as it didn’t survive the 1930's.

7oz Was-Cott Junior Dry dated 1936. This bottle is a very early acl (painted label) bottle, the process was thought to have started around 1936 and the earliest examples were very simple, notice that this one has no neck label, back label, or the frame that was added to the later versions.

3/4 of a pint (12oz) Lucky Giant "Cola" bottle dated 1939

7oz 2 to 1 bottle dated 1940

A small 2 to 1 ad

7oz Was-Cott Junior Dry dated 1940

The Sun Rise Bottling Company bought a "sound car" which it introduced at the Tazewell County Fair in September of 1938. Here is a picture of the truck that was published in the Clinch Valley News on September 23, 1938.

3/4 of a pint (12oz) Lucky Giant "A Cola Drink" bottle dated 1940

12oz Sun Rise Beverages bottle dated 1940

3/4 of a pint (12oz) Lucky Giant bottle dated 1941

As you can see from this add from Janurary 19, 1940 Lucky Giant was indeed a cola.

7oz Was-Cott Junior Dry dated 1942

A Tazewell specific brand Tazewell Orange is one of the most interesting bottles produced by the Sun Rise Bottling company. There is a variation that I have found in these bottles. They can be found with and without the oranges acl on the neck as you can see here. The oranges on neck version is dated 1943, and the no oranges version 1939.

An add from August 18, 1939 for Tazewell Orange and introducing the "new amber bottle"

7oz Squirt bottle dated 1946

1944 Squirt ad

7oz Sun rise bottle dated 1948

Two 12oz Red Rock Cola bottles the one on the left is dated 1948 the other one is dated 1954.

7oz Sun Rise (blue and white label) bottle dated 1950

7oz Sun Rise (red and white label) bottle dated 1951

7oz Canada Dry dated 1955

10oz Sun Rise bottle dated 1956

7oz Squirt bottle dated 1957

1942 Rhythm Punch ad

7oz Rhythm Punch bottles the one on the left is dated 1947, the other one is dated 1960.

A Rhythm Punch "midget" match book cover produced by the Lion Match Co. from 1934-1943. It measures 3 3/16" x 1 1/8" in size.

There is one problem with trying to find a Hires Root Beer from the Sun Rise Bottling plant, and that is that every Hires bottle I have ever seen seems to have only two towns on them and they seem to be the corporate offices of the company. The only thing that I have been able to find that proves the existence of this brand at Sun Rise is the cap above. The bottle above is not from Sunrise, and is only there to show what a sunrise bottle would look like.

A Canada Dry crate from North Tazewell, VA

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