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Making
things happen - with integrity. A weekly CyberMemo designed to keep you on task. Monday February 12, 2001 Volume III Number 7 |
FOCUS - Pemberton
When the Civil War ended, veterans returned to their families and farms, and many to commerce. Carpetbaggers from the North headed south to capitalize on reconstruction. Many considered that a second unwelcome invasion. Veterans of the Confederacy also got back to work. One such businessman, a pharmacist and inventor, was a Confederate veteran of the War and a middle-aged druggist, Dr. John S. Pemberton.
Trained in pharmaceuticals, Pemberton’s era long pre-dated the Food and Drug Administration. He, along with a legion of other primitive researchers, probed and experimented and explored looking for cures. Ointments and pills and lotions and salves and potions and concoctions of all sorts were sold off the back of colorfully painted wagons and over the counters of down-town corner stores with shameless claims and guarantees to cure baldness, slow aging, clear up skin rashes, eliminate headaches, calm indigestion, relieve soreness and generally take care of whatever else might ail the human body.
The US Government did little to protect consumers in those days, but it did protect the rights of inventors. The US Patent Office approved a flood of applications granting patents for the protection of medicinal formulas of all kinds, marketed with alliterative names like Botanic Blood Balm and Dr. Jordan’s Joyous Julep and Dr. Pierce’s Pleasant Purgative Pellets.
Pemberton of Atlanta wanted in on the action.
Suffering from chronic pain caused by wounds suffered on the field of battle and his own chronic indigestion, Pemberton’s meager profits were consumed by his own drug dependency. Morphine, in stiff and regular doses, dulled the pain that would not go away. He spent his days in research, looking for the ultimate drug.
In April of 1886, he painted a sign on the window of his corner drug store. He found his own magic formula. He called it a “temperance drink” because he certified that there was no trace of alcohol. It was a sticky sweet brown syrup laced with cocaine and caffeine mixed with carbonated water. The sign also claimed that this “valuable brain tonic” would cure "nervous affections, Sick Head-Ache, Neuralgia, Hysteria, Melancholy, etc."
My favorite part is the “etc.”
He gave his medicine a name: “Coca-Cola.”
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Today, our world has changed. It is dominated by consumer protection. Activists of all sorts have turned their energies and resources toward the eradication of those old habits and practices and dangers that can harm us vulnerable humans.
We expect warning labels. And proper padding. Not only seat belts, but high tech airbags inflating in an instant to protect us in a crash. Road workers and maintenance people set up bright orange cones and flashing signs warning drivers to slow and use caution. And attorneys stand at the ready to collect big settlements on your behalf should some government agency or giant corporation show neglect.
We also expect disclaimers. And full disclosure. So when the television states a monthly lease rate on a luxury automobile, prepare for a speed voice to race through the legal detail, including fees and mileage rates and credit qualifications and other small print information that prevents you from ever claiming that something may have been misrepresented.
And then check out those prescription drug ads suggesting that a prescription remedy just might be right for you. Prepare for a pleasant voice also to inform you that this drug is known to cause bleeding of the gums, digestive cramping, nausea, dehydration, drowsiness and or dizziness, sleep apnea, migraine headaches, swelling of the lymph glands and hearing loss in some people. In addition, the drug has caused tumors to appear in some laboratory rats. Before taking the drug, talk to your physician, they say.
Sounds like a good idea.
* * * * * * * *
Last night we watched an old movie. It was produced in 1943. Some people call it the greatest love story ever filmed. “Casablanca.”
It was filmed in the crucible of World War II. Europe was a dangerous place. Wealthy Europeans fled as Nazi troops occupied an expanding empire. Refugees huddled in cafes and taverns in places like Morocco in Northern Africa; they made plans to escape to New York or Detroit or Chicago. And as they did, they smoked cigarettes, holding them in their fingers with such panache, and tilting their heads and blowing smoke at just the right angle, punctuating their speech with such drama, and the lighting caught the smoke as though it were part of the scene, and, I suppose, it was.
None of the packages then had warnings from the Surgeon General that smoking causes cancer and premature death. I wonder if they knew. Bogart and Bergman seem blissfully unaware.
But not us. We know. We’ve been informed.
* * * * * * * *
Pemberton’s
financial problems caught up with him.
At age 57, sick and broken from injuries suffered on the battlefield and years of morphine abuse, he sold his patented formula to his partners for a pittance in 1887. Stomach cancer took his life later the same year. When he died, he had no idea that his formula would be taken off the market as a medicine, stripped of its cocaine and put on the market as a soft drink.
His Coca Cola would become the most popular soft drink in America, and later, around the world.
* * * * * * * *
Tom and Marty put up a “For Sale” sign six months ago. As their three children grew, they were ready for more room. They put a deposit on their dream home a couple miles away.
The real estate agent said, “No problem, your house will sell quickly.”
And every weekend, the family set aside their normal activity, getting the house ready for yet another showing. And for all six months, plenty of Looky-Lou’s, but no offers. Not one.
The new house took shape. They watched the progress. The concrete pad was poured. The plumbing, the framing, the electrical. Every weekend while someone else walked through the house with a “For Sale” sign, Tom and Marty and their three children would wander around the new property, checking on each new development, and dreaming of the day when they’d occupy their new home.
During the period of construction, the house they contracted to buy appreciated substantially. Tom and Marty knew that they would enjoy and instant jump in equity the moment they moved in.
But with each passing month, Tom, a high school history teacher and Marty, a hospital administrator, grew weary in the waiting. The dream began to fade as they approached the deadline to close escrow on the new place. The shiny new house in the new neighborhood seemed to be drifting out of reach.
Tom and I had breakfast a couple of Saturdays ago. Over huevos rancheros, Tom told me, “Ken, I think we’ve had enough. At what point do you finally say, ‘it was a good learning experience, but we’ve simply got to face the fact that it’s not going to happen’?” he asked philosophically. “I think Marty and I have reached that place.”
I affirmed him. I said, “Hey, you’ve still got a great house… and a great family. It’s gunna be OK.”
Tom nodded. “Yep,” he said.
And then he told me he planned to call the builder that afternoon and let him know that they were officially out. All they wanted was their deposit back.
Tom made that call. It wasn’t easy, but it seemed to be the right thing to do. As Tom put the phone back in the cradle, Marty hugged him. And they agreed; they felt relieved.
I saw Tom at church the next day. From across the parking lot, he waved and laughed, and as we approached, he said, “You’re not going to believe this.”
“What?”
He laughed again, “looks like an offer is coming in tonight.”
I laughed, too. “NO WAY,” was all I could say.
Tom smiled, Marty too.
“Way,” he said.
* * * * * * * *
Saturday morning this week Tom, Marty, Tyler, Tara and Travis moved in. Later in the afternoon, we stood on their new concrete driveway watching a spectacular sunset, laughing some more.
“Is God good, or what?”
“Indeed.”
* * * * * * * *
It’s Monday morning. You are a leader.
It may well be that you’ve been working on a project for a long time, and you have yet to enjoy the benefits of all the effort and planning and dreaming. You may well feel like a broken down veteran of a civil war looking for something that will bring relief. Like Dr. John Pemberton, you know there’s something there, but the world has yet to appreciate it.
And you may be surrounded by some who can only see the warning signs. They are not doers. They are not self-starters. They are policymakers. Rule makers. They want to protect you from pain. They want to figure out a way to prevent anything bad from ever happening again.
But you want to live. Achieve. Finish the work. Produce something of value. Real value.
Your company may never be numbered among the Dow Jones 30 Industrials (as is Coca Cola), but you plan to make your mark.
Don’t give up. Don’t be paralyzed by warning labels and caution flags and fears of calamity.
Keep on pressing on. Like Tom and Marty.
And give God a little time to take care of His part.
© Copyright Kenneth E. Kemp 2001
Special Thanks to my good friend David Belcher, owner of Rhino Media Group and creator of WisdomGram
LeaderFOCUS is a service of Good Stewardship Associates
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