Coca Cola Five Cents

by

Robert S. Ynacay©2011

Five cents for a green, special-shaped, five-ounce bottle of dark, sweet liquid that could soothe one's thirst on a summer's day!

The bottle was in the shape of curves, modeled in the form of a female with a girdle on, at the turn of the century, and this became their trademark and product identification. This was more or less how the Coke Company described their unique bottle and, they claim, even a blind person can identify their product.

During my younger years, they had only two sized of coke; small (five cent bottle) and the family-size quart bottle (twenty cents). Coke became famous world-wide because of the Second World War and the craving thirst of the American fighting men and women.

A few other nickel items that were popular amongst Americans were the chocolate Hershey Bar, a five-stick pack of Wrigley chewing gum, and others.

I believe the price of these items remained the same for a long time and did not change until the 1950's.

Everyone could afford these treats by turning in empty coke bottles for two cents deposit refund. The quart size brought about three cents; a stubby beer bottle with for a penny; and a real large bottle was a prize for a nickel.

A real beer bottle was dark brown in color, and clear beer bottles went for only a penny. Milk bottles, hardly ever found away from someone's yard or back porch, were rare.

Penny's grocery store would redeem your collection (no beer bottles) with a grilling where you got your collection by Mr. Penny, the proprietor, who paid cash money. Immediately you would run over to the penny candy display, which was huge in size, like the modern day meat counter display at the supermarket.

If he had no customers in the store, you could choose, change your mind, or even drool over all those beautiful pieces, behind the glass, for a length of time, before you had to choose.

The beer bottles were turned in at the Red Pig tavern on 82^nd and Halsey Streets, and if you were lucky, the customer would cajole the innkeeper into throwing in an extra nickle or dime so he would have enough to buy an ice cream cone on the way to the public swimming pool.

Those were the days! In my later years, I started redeeming soda cans. A young Marine claims he purchased a new car just by picking up and selling soda cans at the rate of four cents per pound. Now I see people with big garbage sacks, loaded with redeemable items, going through garbage cans on garbage day throughout the neighborhood.

This is real American ingenuity – to start a future business and find a way to keep off the welfare rolls.