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The podcast "Cola Connections" explores the history and significance of the Cola Nut, a key ingredient in Coca-Cola. The hosts emphasize the African origins of the nut and its important contributions to American and European markets. The nut was used for spiritual, cultural, and medicinal purposes in Africa, and its trade spread through inter-African networks and the influence of Islam. European traders discovered and valued the nut, incorporating it into their own cultures. The transatlantic trade system played a role in bringing the nut to the Americas. The hosts stress the need to recognize and credit African contributions in history. Hi, I'm Caitlin. Hi, I'm Jack. Hi, I'm Chris. Welcome to our podcast, Cola Connections. Many consider Coke to be the quintessential American drink. Little do most people realize that this famous soft drink empire was built on the backbone of African resources and labor. So next time you open a can of Coke, send a cheers across the Atlantic to our African neighbors. This is Cola Connections, where we uncover the fascinating journey of the Cola Nut, from African forests to the heart of America's most iconic beverage, Coca-Cola. Join us as we explore the rich cultural history and the global impact of this teeny nut that revolutionized the world of soft drinks. Stay tuned as we crack open the story full of tradition, globalization, and more. So why are we talking about this? Well, the Cola Nut was extremely important and influential in the early 18th and 19th century Western world for its cultural, medicinal, and economic uses. However, oftentimes in history, African contributions are downplayed or overshadowed by Eurocentric teachings. We believe it's extremely important to credit African resources like the Cola Nut for their contribution to American and European markets and culture. We also believe that we need to recognize the African identity of crucial crops like the Cola Nut to understand best African contributions to the developed world, specifically American and European enterprises. Acknowledging the impact of African plants in the transatlantic trade system helps us better understand the importance of African communities in the history of the developing world. So the story starts, at least for the Western world, in the 17th century West African coast, where the Cola Nut was initially used for spiritual, governing, and currency purposes. In the 18th and 19th centuries, the Atlantic world was a time of mass globalization, during which resources and cultures were interchanged amongst the leading civilizations. Among these resources was a surplus of African plants in which Western markets found immense value. This intricate trading system is the backdrop to the story of the Cola Nut, a once sacred nut to the Igbo people of West Africa that became a global commodity for its practical and medicinal purposes. We also need to ensure that our audience understands the Cola Nut is one of the many African plants that make up a diverse trade network. Its importance translated into the transatlantic system, which for various reasons brought the nut to the Americas. The Cola Nut, native to the tropical rainforests of Africa, holds a special place in the hearts and minds of many African communities. It was sought out by everyone, regardless of gender, religion, or location. People would chew on the nut while working, socializing with others, and during their leisure times as well, if it was available. Over the years, it has been incorporated in many societal practices and became a respected part of their culture. Its uses went from religious purposes, to an item of cultural significance, to even medicinal practices. The Cola Nut played an important role in religion and was seen as a very spiritual item. In certain places, the Cola Nut was sworn upon in a similar fashion as when we swear upon a Bible. After this, they would swallow the nut to really show their honesty. Many different communities in Africa had their own uses for the nut in their religion, but one in particular held the nut in a particularly high regard. The Igbo were a group of people located in modern-day southeast Nigeria. They believed that the nut was the king of all fruits on earth, and that the fruit was the first treat and fruit on earth. They also believed that the nut was given as a gift by the Prophet Muhammad, and that they were used as alms or gifts in high festivals. To these communities, the nut was seen as so much more than just a nut, but an important part of their belief system. But the nut did not only have importance in religion, it was also held very highly in cultural matters as well. In some places, the nut was even used as a form of currency. However, in most places, the nut was seen as a form of truth and something to be used in many different facets. As previously stated, the nut was used as something to swear upon to confirm your truth. This did not only extend to religious ceremonies, but to everyday society as well. The nut was incorporated into rites of passage to confirm people, but that was not the only seen use of this nut. They were also used to confirm or seal legitimate treaties and contracts between villages or kingdoms. The nut had such importance and significance just through the ideas surrounding it, and we haven't even covered the actual properties of the nut itself. Beyond its symbolic value, the kola nut also has many practical medicinal purposes. The nut was thought to get rid of all kinds of illnesses by people who used it. It was commonly used to relieve thirst and use of water to make it taste better. The nut was also rich in caffeine as well, so when people would do this, it wouldn't just make the water taste better, but also give them the benefits of drinking caffeine. This means that they had more energy than before, as well as making them more alert if needed. It was also recorded as a means to strengthen their stomachs as well, because it was believed to get rid of hunger pans and also to potentially combat liver diseases. The kola nut had many uses, whether practical or symbolic, in African societies. Its influence spanned across the entire continent and was soon discovered by Europeans who began to take notice of the nut. In present-day Nigeria, the nut is said to be relished by the Prophet Muhammad, and as Caitlin has stated, the nut was used by various religions and cultures. But ample evidence suggests that the kola nut's use spread from inter-African trade networks long before the Europeans arrived to trade. The spread of Islam constituted the spread of the kola nut. Moorish occupation in Spain, along with the Ottoman Empire's entrance into the Mediterranean regions of Europe, catalyzed the spread of the nut's use as a medicine into areas of southern Europe, because the kola nut became an essential part of Islamic medicinal pharmacology, which utilized thousands of herbs to treat numerous illnesses and conditions. Historical evidence shows us that by the 12th century, the kola nut had made its way into Islamic pharmacology, and by the 16th century, it had become an essential plant in Islamic pharmacology. The flow of the kola nut and its adoption by civilizations, cultures, and peoples to whom the nut is not native, depicts how African peoples and their cultures were involved in world trade long before the Judeo-Christian European powers we recognize today entered the African continent and domineered world trade. The discoveries of the New World in the Americas coincided with European arrival in Africa. These discoveries, due to technological developments in maps, sailing, navigation, and preserving food over long-distance travel, shifted European powers focus towards global trade and faraway lands, which to them held the potential for great wealth. Subsequently, the African continent became a focus for European powers like the Portuguese, Dutch, Spanish, and British, who were all keen to engage in global economy. All along the Atlantic coast, European traders, typically sanctioned by their home government, set up trading posts and collaborated with local rulers, kings, and chiefs to trade. European and African interactions increased dramatically as demand rose for enslaved persons, as labor for newly established territories. The sale of enslaved persons comprised a large part of these interactions, and would increase dramatically over time. Regardless, it is essential to mention that other plants, goods, resources, and animals were traded between Europeans and Africans. Yes, either directly or indirectly. As Europeans stationed in Africa began to interact and observe the local culture, they acclimated to the region's culture and cuisine and became accustomed to the plants and animals available in the region. Of course, one of these plants was the kola nut. While we do not know precisely where the Europeans first discovered the kola nut, we have numerous primary sources to look at spanning the centuries when the transatlantic system existed. Yes, and one of the earliest accounts comes from 1623, when European Richard Jones described kola nuts in his diary, stating they were similar to chestnuts, but that the locals had held this nut in high esteem. Another account, coming from Dutchman Wilhelm Mueller, while stationed in the Gold Coast in 1662, mentioned that Africans used the kola nut when drinking water to make it taste better. Other accounts detailed the plant's stimulating effects and ability to forestall hunger pangs. One of these accounts comes from Wilhelm Bosman, a Dutch trader who worked on the Gold Coast for 14 years at the beginning of the 17th century, who mentioned that, and this is quotes, not only the Negroes, but some of the Europeans are infatuated to this fruit for the kola nut's value as a diuretic and to relish palm wine, relish is just make the palm wine better because it became sour after a day or so. Another source, coming from Jean Barba, another trader in Guinea, depicted that there's also a fruit called kola, and by others, cocteurs, which quenches the thirst and makes water delicious to those who make use of it. As Europeans continued interacting with various African cultures, the kola nut became essential in multiple ways. While Europeans compared the kola nut to the chestnut in appearance, they understood that the kola nut's importance and uses far outweighed that of the chestnut. Although we have yet to learn how kola made its way to America, it is unlikely that enslaved persons themselves brought kola onto the ships. Over the 16th century, ancient kola nut trade networks expanded to burgeoning coastal markets, perhaps in part because the nuts were located aboard slave ships to curb hunger and thirst and to freshen the taste of stagnant water and food. We can assume that European enslavers and traders, upon learning of the benefits and uses of the kola nut, decided to transport them in bulk quantity to energize the ship's crew as well as enslaved persons on board. One report from 1634 mentions that newly landed African slaves in Cartagena were given kola nuts as stimulant and medicine. What's more interesting, we can track the transfer of the kola nut on slave ships because of the continued use of African language names for kola, such as bisi, gora, and obion. In South American cultures, descended from enslaved persons brought across the Atlantic during this period points towards the importance of African plants in establishing the many cultures of the New World. Yes, these different names for the same kola nut exemplify how many different cultures and peoples used it for their purposes. What's more, the kola nut became a renowned drug when the nut made its way to Europe and America in large numbers, thanks to burgeoning global trade primarily made up by the flow of enslaved persons. In fact, John Smith Pemberton, the creator of the original Coca-Cola formula, whose namesake in part derives from the kola nut, complimented a German company, Merck, with making a superior kola-derived energy formula. While much of the formula for Coca-Cola is secret, we can assume Pemberton used Merck's kola derivative in the original formula. Primary sources can help us flesh this idea out further. In the late 1800s, an American doctor wrote about the therapeutic uses of fresh, undried kola nuts, calling them, in quotes, a very valuable drug that many physicians and doctors used to sustain themselves from extra and long-continued work, and especially if their duties called for loss of sleep. The same doctor also claimed that the nut cured various medical cases, such as whooping cough, asthma, melancholia, alcohol or morphine addiction, uterine enteria, surgical shock, Breit's disease, cardiac and or renal dropsies, rheumatoid conditions, and in cases of shock with collapse and delirium tremens. Now, it should be noted that while many claims for the kola nut are exaggerated at this time, current research has shown that the kola nut extract contains the same stimulants as caffeine, as well as theobromine and glucose. Therefore, it can counteract fatigue, alleviate thirst and hunger, and possibly enhance intellectual activity, as well as acting as a psychoactive substance on the brain, and it can suppress coughs. This extensive list of medical conditions that kola can or cannot treat, a plant, mind you, intrinsic to the African continent and numerous of its people groups, was used by professionals, often upper-class individuals, to cure disease and promote health in various ways. In this way, it becomes very hard to separate many aspects of the cultures of the New World and Europe to the African cultures whose people under enslavement quite literally built and established much of the New World we know today. In doing so, we can begin to understand the historical trends that still defines our current globalized economy. Western nations have capitalized and adopted plants and foods of cultural importance originating in cultures, peoples, and areas that have lacked the agency and representation to take credit for these contributions in our global world. Acknowledging the sad truth allows us to see the full effects of the colonial mercantilist framework, which continues in many ways to define or, at the very least, exists in cross-cultural and cross-continent interactions today. Many examples of African peoples, their contributions, culture, and natural resources, including flora and fauna, exist today in the Americas. Recognizing these contributions and continuities through centuries of change in colonial framework helps us understand the importance of recognizing African peoples and cultures played in constructing the New World in global economy. The kola nut was gaining popularity throughout the globalized world through trade as its medicinal and caffeinated properties were of immense value to many nations. The kola nut was almost seen as a panacea in European and American countries. It was said to cure hangovers, suppress appetite, and reduce fatigue and depression. Across the Atlantic, in Victoria-era Britain, the kola nut was prepared with kola extract, sugar, and vanilla to create a medicinal kola chocolate. This sweet chocolate treat was prescribed to travelers to relieve hunger and exhaustion from long journeys. Later, the Brits created a kola of champagne advertised as a tonic and nerve stimulant that was commonly used by the upper class. However, it wasn't until the kola nut fell into the hands of American soda companies that the demands for the nut really ramped up. Caffeinated soda became very popular in the United States as a substitute for alcohol that could be enjoyed by people of all ages. Early brands like Dope Cola, Coca-Cola, and Afri-Cola started to import kola nuts as their key ingredients to add caffeine to their recipes. Coca-Cola joined the bandwagon and used this key ingredient to make its famously popular soda. And while we commonly view soft drinks as a sweet treat in today's world, early sodas have more practical purposes and were often marketed as remedies for various ailments. By the early 1900s, Coca-Cola was the most popular fountain drink in America, all thanks to its original recipe featuring the kola nut, which is credited with creating Coca-Cola's distinct flavor. Similarly, the second part of the famous name kola got its namesake from our kola nut, leaving the lasting legacy of this prized African resource for years to come. The kola nut had become a global phenomenon. As time passed, the nut was eventually removed from the ingredient list in favor of artificial chemicals meant to mimic its original taste and caffeine content. However, the kola nut's properties remain an important factor in the taste, feel, and composition of the kola nut drink to this day, as they try to replicate the nut's properties. The global popularity and commodification of this one sacred nut has effectively diminished its traditional values for the West African peoples. One article called Kola Nut, Revisiting the Igbo Sociocultural Values and Identity, has noted its loss in popularity for modern members of the Igbo society, which once identified the kola nut as a key part of their culture's creation story. By tracing the narrative of the kola nut across centuries and continents, we uncover a profound understanding of a specific plant embedded within traditional practices. Today, the kola nut extract is a key ingredient and product manufactured by the pharmaceutical, dietary, and food and beverage industries. However, the story also sheds light on a broader issue, the imbalance in international commercial ventures. Often, the developed world capitalizes on the local resources and traditional knowledge, reaping substantial financial rewards, while local communities often receive little, if any, compensation in return. Is there a solution to this inequity, one that is fair, equitable, and based on transparent terms agreed on by all parties involved? Although past colonial frameworks offer little hope, there is potential for change. While it may be too late for past and present advocates and believers of the kola nut to benefit financially from their expertise, establishing legal frameworks is essential to safeguarding future local interests. These frameworks must recognize and integrate local cultural values and sensitivities to ensure a fair distribution of benefits and protection of traditional knowledge. In conclusion, examining the journey of the kola nut unveils a deeper narrative within global history, one that underscores profound African contributions to the creation of the new world's cultures, economies, and cuisines. As we acknowledge these contributions, we also recognize the broader trend of African contributions, often being overlooked or ignored. This exploration into the kola nut highlights the resilience and ingenuity of African peoples in challenges prevailing narratives that marginalize their pivotal roles. It reminds us of our world's interconnectedness and the importance of honoring diverse cultural legacies. Moving forward, we must continue learning, celebrating, and amplifying African voices and histories to foster a more inclusive understanding of our world's past, present, and future. Thanks for listening to our podcast. This is Kola Connections.