How a 19th-Century Bitters Brand Took America by Storm

If you were alive and even mildly sentient in the late 1860s, you would have been familiar with Drake’s Plantation Bitters. Starting from nowhere, these bitters suddenly seemed to be everywhere.

“The rapidity with which Plantation Bitters have become a household necessity throughout the civilized nations is without parallel in the history of the world,” noted a news article in the New Orleans Crescent in 1869. (It was actually not a news article. It was an advertisement masquerading as journalism.) “Over five million bottles were sold in 12 months, and the demand is daily increasing.” These bitters were favored by the “rich and poor, young and old, ladies, physicians and clergymen.”

Hundreds of bitter brands were being hawked, with most promoting not only exotic ingredients … but also an exhaustive list of maladies they could cure.

This was an era in which bitters were in a liminal state—part medicine, part flavoring agent for delicious cocktails. Hundreds of bitter brands were being hawked, with most promoting not only exotic ingredients—Plantation was made from the “choicest roots and herbs” along with the “celebrated Calisaya” bark from Peru—but also an exhaustive list of maladies they could cure.

In the case of Drake’s Plantation Bitters, claims for its benefits included a cure for “morning lassitude and depression of spirits,” along with “headache and languor;” it lent “strength, vigor and a cheerful and contented disposition,” and “puts dyspepsia to flight.” One alleged customer claimed to have gained 16 pounds in eight weeks, and now eats meals “with a good relish.”

But it wasn’t so much for health reasons that people swilled bitters each morning. It was for the buzz. Plantation Bitters boasted that it was made from the best rum imported from St. Croix. It was also bottled at a revivifying 100 proof, with a recommended dosage of three full wine glasses daily.

Drinking straight bitters was more wholesome and reputable than just knocking back a shot of whiskey each morning—it was, after all, for your health. It was also cheaper. Spirits were taxed more heavily because they were a product of choice; bitters were not, as they were medicine and thus an article of necessity. A 100-proof medicine, but medicine nonetheless. Even some temperance societies nodded approvingly at the taking of one’s morning bitters.

Plantation Bitters took root in the 1850s, when a Col. Patrick H. Drake launched a product called Catawba Bitters. In 1860 he reinvented and rebranded his product, tweaking the ingredients, changing to bottles shaped like log cabins, and renaming it Drake’s Plantation Bitters.

Drake turned his bitters into a sensation with two strategies: Ubiquity. And mystery.

How did it go from zero to five million bottles seemingly overnight? Drake turned his bitters into a sensation with two strategies: Ubiquity. And mystery. The ubiquity came in advertising. Drake ran large ads in dozens of papers, in which the name Plantation Bitters was repeated 20 or more times, interspersed with testimonials as to the superiority of his product. (“The value of such an antidote cannot be expressed in words,” read one). In 1862, an entire column on the front page of The New York Times touted the glories of Plantation Bitters; the rest of the page was given over to a detailed account of Gen. George B. McClellan and Gen. Joseph Hooker in the Battle of Richmond.

Drake also was an aggressive user of outdoor advertising. He painted massive ads on the sides of barns, houses, and rock outcroppings. An 1865 article in Harper’s Magazine about the perniciousness of such advertising showed “Drake’s Plantation Bitters” painted in exceedingly large letters on the Palisades across the Hudson River from New York City, visible just behind a woman applying her cosmetics. He also splashed his company name on the side of the White Mountains in New Hampshire, an act that led to the state banning advertising that defaced any natural setting of scenic beauty—the first such law in the nation.

The mystery arose in the content of Drake’s ads. The first ads blanketing the countryside featured only baffling text: “S.T. 1860 X.” Where people gathered they debated what this unusual cypher meant. Only after Drake got the nation conversing about this inscrutable code did he finally append the name “Plantation Bitters” to the ads, partially clarifying the enigma. (What did it actually mean? He insisted that the words and letters were just nonsense designed to incite curiosity, but that didn’t stop the theorizing. Among the more popular notions was that it was code for “St. Croix,” the source of the rum.)

Drake’s Plantation Bitters went from everywhere to nowhere almost as fast as they arose—and before the Pure Food and Drug Act of 1906 largely put a stop to quackery and left only a few bitters standing as condiments for cocktails. But let us pause and recognize a brand that was well ahead of its time: in exploiting tax loopholes, in wielding advertising like a truncheon, in confusing readers with advertorials made to look like journalism, in creating a social media–like buzz by being vague and mysterious.

It was all enough to provoke sadness and despair. Conveniently, that was exactly what it cured.