Louisville Unearthed: Flavored chewing gum was invented here

Colgan’s Taffy Tolu is credited with being the first flavored gum.

A Louisville druggist named John Colgan was making cough syrup and at one point apparently bought an entire train car full of chicle, a milky substance tapped from the sapodilla tree.

He had a lot of it. Like, a lot. So, he decided to make chewing gum with it and sell it in his store, which was located at the corner of 10th and Walnut streets (the latter is now Muhammad Ali Boulevard).

Chewing gum already existed, but it was typically made of wax and didn’t have much flavor. Colgan mixed the chicle with balsam tolu extract, which he used for making cough syrup for his store, added powdered sugar, and the result was a chewy substance that tasted great. That’s how flavored chewing gum was born, in 1873, here in Louisville.

With help from his son William, Colgan began to market the product as Colgan's Taffy Tolu. It was a hit, and it wasn’t long before Colgan gave up the drug business, sold his store and opened a factory to make the product. Eventually, he would provide flavored gum all across the United States, in Canada and even in Australia. The factory, the Colgan Chewing Gum Company, employed as many as 50 people and thrived.

John Colgan in an undated photo.

The gum was sold in tins, some of which contained cards depicting baseball players of the day, a trend that had shifted from tobacco products to chewing gum. He also would experiment further, adding longer-lasting flavor and other new twists to the product. The business did so well that by 1911, Colgan sold out and retired. He would die in 1916 at age 75.

Interestingly, during the Civil War, Colgan was a political prisoner for about four months. He ultimately was released in an exchange for other prisoners. He returned to Louisville after his imprisonment and opened his store.

What’s also interesting is that there are collectors of antique gum, and a few years ago a stash of 17 pieces of original Colgan’s Taffy Tolu were found locked away in a barn in Chicago. Surely, no one chewed any of it, but it’s probably fair to wonder if that long-lasting flavor made it 100 years.

Every Friday, Louisville Unearthed will bring you an unusual fact, historical nugget, place, person, etc., that you may not know about our city.