Lol imagine the naked people that used to run the streets back in the day....
Use of stimulants in formula
When launched Coca-Cola's two key ingredients were
cocaine (benzoylmethyl ecgonine) and
caffeine. The cocaine was derived from the
coca leaf and the caffeine from
kola nut, leading to the name Coca-Cola (the "K" in Kola was replaced with a "C" for marketing purposes).
[25][26]
Coca — cocaine
Pemberton called for five
ounces of coca leaf per gallon of syrup, a significant dose; in 1891, Candler claimed his formula (altered extensively from Pemberton's original) contained only a tenth of this amount. Coca-Cola did once contain an estimated nine
milligrams of
cocaine per glass, but in 1903 it was removed.
[27] Coca-Cola still contains coca flavoring.
After 1904, instead of using fresh leaves, Coca-Cola started using "spent" leaves — the leftovers of the
cocaine-extraction process with
cocaine trace levels left over at a molecular level.
[28] To this day, Coca-Cola uses as an ingredient a
cocaine-free
coca leaf extract prepared at a
Stepan Company plant in
Maywood, New Jersey.
In the United States,
Stepan Company is the only manufacturing plant authorized by the Federal Government to import and process the
coca plant,
[29] which it obtains mainly from
Peru and, to a lesser extent,
Bolivia. Besides producing the coca flavoring agent for Coca-Cola,
Stepan Company extracts cocaine from the coca leaves, which it sells to
Mallinckrodt, a
St. Louis, Missouri pharmaceutical manufacturer that is the only company in the United States licensed to purify cocaine for medicinal use.
[30] Stepan Company buys about 100 metric tons of dried Peruvian coca leaves each year, according to Marco Castillo, spokesman for Peru's state-owned National Coca Co.
[31]
Kola nuts — caffeine
Kola nuts act as a flavoring and the source of
caffeine in Coca-Cola. In Britain, for example, the ingredient label states "Flavourings (Including Caffeine)."
[32] Kola nuts contain about 2 percent to 3.5 percent caffeine, are of bitter flavor and are commonly used in
cola soft drinks. In 1911, the U.S. government initiated
United States v. Forty Barrels and Twenty Kegs of Coca-Cola, hoping to force Coca-Cola to remove caffeine from its formula. The case was decided in favor of Coca-Cola. Subsequently, in 1912 the U.S. Pure Food and Drug Act was amended, adding
caffeine to the list of "habit-forming" and "deleterious" substances which must be listed on a product's label.
Coca-Cola contains 46 mg of
caffeine per 12 fluid ounces, while
Caffeine-Free Coca-Cola and
Diet Coke Caffeine-Free contains 0 mg.
[33]