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 Giant Chro-Mo Ginger Beer 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

W. A. Scott from the April 23, 1909.

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.

7oz Was-Cott paper label dated 1920

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

12oz Was-Cott paper label with "Was-Cott" embossed on the shoulder dated 1924

16oz Was-Cott paper label with "Was-Cott" embossed on the shoulder dated 1924

Was-Cott Dry Ginger Ale paper label.

Was-Cott Club Extra Special Dry Ginger ale paper label bottle dated 1927

One of the most intriguing brand created by the Sun Rise Bottling Company is Giant Chro-Mo which it turns out is a Ginger Beer according to the coupon pictured above. The brand’s tagline was "the drink that everybody likes. Buy it with confidence and drink it with delight" according to the November 1, 1935 Coalfield Pioneer ad for the company pictured above. Also pictured is the crate for the brand.

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.

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 "Cola" bottle dated 1939

Janurary 19, 1940 Lucky Giant ad

7oz Tazewell Orange (no oranges on neck variation) dated 1939.

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

7oz 2 to 1 bottle dated 1940

A small 2 to 1 ad

7oz Was-Cott Junior Dry dated 1940

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

7oz Was-Cott Junior Dry dated 1942

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.

7oz Rhythm Punch bottle dated 1943

7oz Squirt bottle dated 1946

1944 Squirt ad

7oz Was-Cott Junior Dry dated 1947

7oz Tazewell Orange dated 1947

7oz Rhythm Punch bottle dated 1947

7oz Sun rise bottle dated 1948

12oz Red Rock Cola bottle dated 1948

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

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

12oz Red Rock Cola bottle dated 1951

A Canada Dry crate from North Tazewell, VA

7oz Canada Dry dated 1955

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 bottle above is a 1956 12oz Hires bottles that I can safely claim comes from the area having found several like it at a dump with a lot of other Sun Rise Bottling Company bottles, the only physical proof aside from ads are the bottle caps like the one above.

10oz Sun Rise bottle dated 1956

7oz Squirt bottle dated 1957

12oz Red Rock Cola bottle dated 1957

An advertising thermometer from the Sun Rise Bottling Company of North Tazewell, VA.

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