GOULBURN was once the hub of a vibrant cordial and soft drink-making industry, with at least six family businesses bottling the refreshments between the 1880s and 1950s.
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Only one of these family companies has survived: Hopes Cordials, known today as Goulburn Soft Drinks.
The making of cordial is the subject of a new exhibition at St Clair Villa Museum and Archives, called Goulburn Cordial Manufacturers.
Goulburn Mulwaree museums officer Claire Baddeley says that by the early 1880s there were six firms manufacturing ‘cordial and aerated water’ in Goulburn.
“In the 1840s, Tommy Jacobs and ‘Jack the Jew’ were known dispensers of soft drinks in Goulburn,” Ms Baddeley said.
“In October 1855, the Goulburn Herald reported that Lewis Samuel and John Jones had taken premises next to the Goulburn Hotel for ‘the purpose of manufacturing lemonade and ginger beer during the warm weather’.
“‘The beverages of Messrs Samuels and Jones are very refreshing and pleasant’, the report said.”
The exhibition features a comprehensive collection of cordial bottles, stone ginger beer bottles, soda siphons and demijohns from early Goulburn cordial manufacturers, she said.
“For centuries commercial products such as cordials were put up in generic containers,” Ms Baddeley said.
“It was more economical to sell goods in bulk and let merchants parcel them out to customers.
“Demijohns were storage vessels used for transporting liquids, wine and spirits.”
An additional unusual item in the exhibition is a beer bottle filler from the Empire Hotel.
The filler was used during World War II to top up quart bottles of beer for hotel patrons.
This was necessary because of the shortage of bottled beer and the closing of hotels at 6pm, which was in place at the time.
The exhibition is on display until March 2016.
St Clair Villa Museum and Archives is open to the public Fridays, from 10.30am to 4pm, Saturdays and Sundays from 1pm to 4pm or by appointment. Entry is free.
For more information call 4821 1156.