Coca Cola history poured out at Clayton House

Clayton Conversations: "A Sweet 100-Plus Years: History of Coca-Cola Bottling Company of Fort Smith" took place Sunday (June 23) at the Clayton House. A standing room only crowd enjoyed Coke floats and learned about the 1895 start of the Fort Smith region's favorite company that delivers a "passport to refreshment."  

Long-time employee and now curator and archivist for the company's museum, Fred Kirkpatrick, shared the history, complete with artifacts and a slideshow of the Meek family's Coca-Cola Bottling Company of Fort Smith.

Kirkpatrick shared the beginnings of the company, the family, the museum, and even the cemetery on the company's property. Larry Meador, current operations manager for Coke, also joined in on the presentation.

Kirkpatrick retired as operations manager in 1998 after 60 years with the Coca Cola Bottling of Fort Smith. Although he is officially retired, he "keeps his own time" and is still active in preserving the history of the company and on certain days he can be contacted at the office he still maintains at the plant.

Coca-Cola Bottling Company is a distributor for Coca-Cola Enterprises, which had sales of $48 billion in sales last year and $9 billion income. It is one of the top ten largest employers in the world with more than 700,000 system employees. The company has fully evolved to soft drinks.

The fourth generation of the Meek family ownership runs the Fort Smith company now, and the company itself is one of approximately 50 privately-owned Coca-Cola bottlers still in existence.

The Meek family were entrepreneurs in the farming, candy, confection and real estate businesses in the 1800s. James and Robert Meek, brothers, became partners starting a wholesale and jobbing candy company at Sixth and A Streets around 1892, later starting the manufacture of candy.

The J.W. & Robert Meek Candy Company dissolved and ceased operation in 1927. In 1895, the brothers expanded their business with the purchase of the D.J. Young Bottling Co. from J.D. Elliott. This business also included the Fort Smith Bottling and Candy Company.  A three-story building was constructed in 1899 at South Second Street and Rogers Avenue to be the home of J.W. and Robt. Meek Manufacturing Confectioners and the Fort Smith Steam Bottling Works. It was directly across from Judge Parker's courtroom, which had only been closed for a few years.

In 1903, J.W. and Robert Meek acquired the right to bottle Coca-Cola as a sub-bottler from M.W. Fleming of Little Rock. In 1907, they purchased the exclusive right to bottle Coca-Cola from M.W. Fleming for $1,500. Before 1915, deliveries of Coke were made by horsedrawn vehicles. The first trucks were purchased around 1915.

The Coca-Cola Company is located now at 3600 Phoenix Ave. in Fort Smith. They moved from their downtown location in 1980.