FROM: Squeak of the Week Published Fridays

Real Zeal Was Found in O-Zell

Disney Legend Herb Ryman grew up in a strict religious environment; his mother, especially, railed against demon rum, preferring the pleasures of (soda) pop, including one called O-Zell, which had a Ryman connection and a Disney twist!

- John Stanley Donaldson, June 24, 2011

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Herbert Ryman was raised by strict, Methodist morality; his great-grandfather being, after all, an early minister in the movement, and founder of the Western Christian Advocate. His mother, Cora, whom I was to know, was a woman so cold, butter would not have melted in her mouth.

So, before the boy from Illinois could say, "See ya later, Decatur," and head off to jolly Hollywood, he need abstain from anything alcohol; being of church discipline.

As officer in the temperance movement, Cora arranged for speakers with the Illinois Anti-Saloon League to lecture church groups on the value of abstinence.

Such might be told, to drive the point home, that blood alcohol content could cause a body to spontaneously combust; or inhaling unstoppered vapors be a sure way to defective offspring.

"Horrors!" be thy view from the pew.

Hop used in malt brewing was of mulberry; hemp was of mulberry.

Hashish was of hemp!

The price of a drink ranged "from a dime to damnation!"

Enter Ernest A. Scrogin, a superintendent of the league - and also organizer of the O-Zell fruit-juice company.

There was note to promote, this non-alcoholic alternative.

Even altering the Eucharist, to consume in communion.

The crimson calyx of the roselle plant, Hibiscus sabdariffa, can be juiced by boiling to a cranberry-like concoction. A table butter, syrup, and jelly could be made - but with carbonation, there was somewhat of a soft-drink contender.

"O-Zell - The Oriental Fruit Drink - Delightfully Different"

Not exactly Coca-Cola, but given the prospective thirst that was to grip the nation with the passage of Prohibition, investor shares of this sour O-Zell were sold - sweet deal - as part of that anti-saloon pitch. It was ciphered that if closed bars of Chicago were set side-by-side, they would line a twenty-mile street.

With lack of lager, "Oh Well," could be thee slogan, "Drink O-Zell."

The value of abstinence came to be cash. Given over five thousand other bottlers also hit on the wry, dry idea, with every conceivable concoction, made for bubbly battle.

As it happens, partner in this, O-Zell fizz-biz, was one Elias Disney.

Twenty years before they were to actually meet, Herbert Ryman and Walt Disney were entwined by this roselle vine.

John Stanley Donaldson, once the protege of Disney Legend Herb Ryman, is the author of Mr. Ryman's biography, Warp and Weft: Life Canvas of Herbert Ryman, which you can purchase directly from the author's site.

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