When Kurt Schmissrauter and his parents and siblings moved into the former Cartter Lupton home in Riverview in 1977, they found some cases of old empty Sprite bottles in the basement cellar.
The fact that these bottles had been owned and likely drunk by the family that enjoyed so much success bottling Coca-Cola products likely made the containers more valuable than they would have normally been.
However, Mr. Schmissrauter recently learned prior to moving out of the home that the bottles may have some additional significance.
The revelation came when he was recently packing up prior to the sale of the home at 1513 Riverview Oaks Road and he came across the bottles again.
“We started looking at all the things we were going to move and said that this is a piece of history,” said Mr.
Schmissrauter.
An online search to find some information about them put him in touch with Doug McCoy, who is currently writing a book on the history of Coca-Cola products. Mr. McCoy told Mr. Schmissrauter that he believes they are likely some original Sprite bottles filled by bottler T.C. “Bud” Evans and shipped to the Luptons and Paul B. Carter in the 1950s to establish proof of Interstate commerce. This was done so that the Evans’ bottling operation could establish a trademark for the name, as was required by law.
“They sent two cases. One went to Paul Carter and the other went to J.T. Lupton (Jack, the then-adult son of Cartter, who was also involved in the bottling operations),” said Mr. Schmissrauter. “They sent them to obtain the copyright. They were the first prototypes.”
Although the Sprite drink was not introduced by the Coca-Cola company until 1961 as a direct competitor to 7 up, Mr. McCoy told Mr. Schmissrauter that Mr. Evans had used the Sprite name for his Houston, Texas-based bottling operation to bottle such flavored drinks as strawberry and orange.
Later, the Coca-Cola Co. bought the name from Mr. Evans and used it for the caffeine-free, lemon-lime drink that is now world renowned, Mr. McCoy said.
Even if these bottles are not those first bottles, they are likely some very early ones, as Mr. McCoy told him that the ones with the word “Sprite” written in white letters on just one side of the base of the clear bottles were the earliest used by the Evans’ company.
Also written on the bottles is the name of the El Campo, Texas, bottling plant. El Campo is about 75 miles southwest of Houston and was apparently part of the Houston bottling operation.
The autobiography, “Paul B. Carter,” written by the former Chattanooga Coca-Cola bottler in 1977, said that the Houston firm was owned by several families. They included the Evans family, Cartter Lupton, and Mr. Carter and his wife, Anne, who was related to both the Evans and Lupton families.
Learning all this history about the bottles and their likely significance and connection to the Texas plant is quite surprising to Mr. Schmissrauter.
“They had been sitting here since day one,” he said with a laugh several days prior to the sale of the home. “I never gave them much thought. I never did think about them much.”
With all his work preparing for both his recent move and the recent wedding of his daughter, Maddie, to Ryan Weeks, he has admittedly not been able to spend a whole lot of time trying to figure out what to do with the bottles, either. “I don’t have any plans, really,” he said.
But he and his family did spend plenty of careful time deciding whether to sell the large 1920s-era home that was built in the Mediterranean style by the well-known previous owners and has features more ornate than the simplistic ones found on the Sprite bottles.
Mr. Schmissrauter, a former Alabama football player who works in his family’s TPC Printing & Packaging Co. business, had moved into the home with his wife, Julie, and their family after his parents, Joe and Virginia Schmissrauter, died just a few weeks apart in 2000.
After renovating the bathrooms, kitchen and other sections, the younger Schmissrauters lived in the home for more than 10 years and raised five children: Blaes Green (who recently became a mother to Emerson Eloise Green), Maddie, Kurt Jr. “Bogie”, Natalie Jo “Jojo” and Jon. With three out of college and only Jon still in high school at Baylor, the couple decided to downsize and sell the home.
But their appreciation for the residence is still large size.
“The home is so special,” Mr. Schmissrauter said. “I’ve always felt like a caretaker taking care of it for future generations. We’ve had a wonderful experience and time in the house. And it’s been a great place to live. But it’s time for a new chapter.”
And part of the new chapter will still likely involve enjoying some Sprite bottles found in a basement and once owned by the family that reached the upper levels of the soft drink bottling world.
Jcshearer2@comcast.net