Granite Fizz: The Untold Story of Spring Water and Flavored Tonic in New Hampshire

In the United States since 1825, more than 30,000 soft drink bottlers have created and sold fizzy soft drinks to everyday consumers like you and I. Amazingly, those companies produced in excess of 16,000 different brands and drink names – most of which survive only as part of our collective memories and because of ardent researchers and collectors. The demise of the golden age of remedies, elixirs, and tonics, along with the Temperance Movement and increased leisure time among working class Americans, led to the nation’s voracious thirst for non-alcoholic liquid refreshment. Many beverage companies rose to the challenge, including notable ones in the Granite State such as Lafayette Beverages, Cocheco Bottling, Cott Beverages, Lucky Strike Ginger Ale, Conner Bottling Works, and Coca-Cola Beverages Northeast.

New Hampshire also saw its share of historic spring water locations—some destination spa sites but also commercial bottling ventures; Londonderry Lithia Spring, Cohas Springs, Ponemah Springs, Castle Springs and Balsams Spring are but a few.

In Granite Fizz: The Untold Story of Spring Water and Flavored Tonic in New Hampshire, we explore the roots of the soft drink and water bottling industries and the Granite State’s historic and current role in these significant commercial ventures that touch virtually all of our lives today.

Author’s note: Throughout this book, tonic is used to denote the term many New England Yankees used when referring to any carbonated soft drink just as Midwesterners commonly call any soda, pop. Here in the second decade of the 21st century, the term tonic is primarily heard only in some enclaves of Boston or in more rural sections of northern New England. The term’s origins are likely rooted in the era when bottled nostrums and elixirs were part of everyday diets before they evolved into simple fizzy refreshments.