If ever the name of a product became part of the language it's Moxie, which originated as a patent medicine, morphed into a carbonated soft drink, and was absorbed into the vernacular as a synonym for spunk.

A onetime favorite of celebrities as disparate as President Calvin Coolidge and author E. B. White, Moxie was created in 1878 by Dr. Augustin Thompson, an employee of the Ayer Drug Co. in Lowell, Mass. It was first marketed as a patent medicine under the name “Moxie Nerve Food.”

Moxie was presented with an exotic background story, featuring a secret ingredient supposedly discovered by a “Lt. Moxie,” variously reported as “exploring near the Strait of Magellan” or “on duty in the tropics.” (Other explanations suggest that the name is a Native American word meaning either “wintergreen” — which is one of its ingredients, along with gentian root extracts — or “black water” or else is related to moxa, an East Asian plant used in healing.

Like many patent medicines of the day, the concentrated liquid was introduced as a cure for “paralysis, softening of the brain, mental imbecility and loss of manhood,” to be taken four times a day. Thompson's immodest claim was that Moxie would “shake this country more than telephones and telegraphs.” And, indeed, by the end of its first year, its inventor claimed that 5 million bottles had been sold.

With the growing popularity of carbonated soft drinks, however, its makers decided to switch gears, add carbonation, bottle it and sell it as a soda. Through the 1920s it became one of the nation's most popular soft drinks, even outselling Coca Cola at one point. There were endorsements by such celebrities as George M. Cohan and Ed Wynn, and later Ted Williams, and there were also Moxiemobiles — cars fitted with a life-size artificial white horse in the back seat, often with a uniformed attendant inside to dispense the beverage for 5 cents a glass. The Moxiemobiles were were seen on the streets of Boston, Providence, R.I., and New York, and at parades and fairs and such.

Unfortunately, Moxie was hit hard by a sharp rise in the price of sugar after World War II, but it did manage to survive in its base Northeastern states, even being designated in 2005 as the official soft drink of the state of Maine. It lives on as a component of such mixed drinks as “Welfare Mom,” and “Mad Mailman.”

Advertising and promotion directed by Moxie's Frank Archer were the keys to the products success — not its somewhat bitter, turnip taste. The many promotional items produced in its heyday are much sought after by collectors, many featuring such slogans as “I Like It” and “What This Country Needs is Plenty of Moxie,” as well as the figure of a young man in an Uncle Sam “I Want You” pose.

Other promotional items include: store signs made of cardboard and tin; trade cards; a fan with the slogan “Drink Moxie” die-cut on each celluloid segment; several cardboard fans; a 1910 serving tray depicting a young woman drinking from a glass and a tip tray depicting a woman in Victorian clothing, holding a glass of Moxie, with the slogan “I just love MOXIE, don't you?”; a lithographed tin lapel hanger showing a man wearing a Moxie fez; a white china Moxie ashtray; a gold-colored tin ashtray; fabric coasters and postcards; and the sheet music for the song “Just Make it Moxie for Mine.” Particularly rare are very early “Nerve Food” bottles and anything else from that pre-soda period. Also of interest to collectors are the products of the countless imitators that tried to cash in on Moxie's popularity by using such similar names as Noxie, Proxie, Hoxie, Toxie, Pixie, and Modox.

Linda Rosenkrantz has edited Auction magazine and authored 18 books, including "Cool Names for Babies" and "The Baby Name Bible" (St. Martin's Press; www.babynamebible.com). Visit her website at She cannot answer letters personally. To find out more about Linda Rosenkrantz and read features by other Creators Syndicate writers and cartoonists, visit the Creators Syndicate website at www.creators.com.

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