For the American Civil War general, see John C. Pemberton

Dr. John Stith Pemberton (July 8, 1831 - August 16, 1888) was an American druggist who invented Coca-Cola.

He was the son of James Clifford Pemberton (b. 1803 NC) and Martha L. Worsham Gent (b. about 1791 VA). The Pembertons married July 20, 1828, in Crawford County, and John was born July 8, 1831. Martha was the daughter of Archer Worsham (b. VA) and Nancy Clark Smith, who lived in Baldwin Co. The Pemberton family moved to Rome, and John attended medical school in Macon, receiving his degree at the age of 19. Sometime later he received a graduate degree in pharmacy. He married Wesleyan student Ann Eliza Clifford Lewis and moved to Columbus in 1853. The couple had a son, Charley Pemberton, born in 1854.

John's medical schooling was somewhat unconventional. He received no formal medical degree, as he was never schooled in the widely accepted heroic medicine, popularized by Benjamin Rush, which attempted to cure through the letting of blood. Rather, he attended a school in the tradition of Samuel Thompson, a controversial herbalist who cured through steam baths and the ingestion of lobelia. Thompson, like Pemberton, made his living selling patent medicines of dubious value (but, no more dubious than the prevailing medicine of the time).

John worked a druggist in Columbus, Georgia, and built a laboratory where he made and sold medicines, photographic chemicals, and cosmetic products including a popular perfume he called Sweet Southern Bouquet. He moved his family to Atlanta in 1870. Pemberton served on the first pharmacy licensing board in the state, established a modern chemical laboratory that was the first state-run facility to test soil and crop chemicals, and was a trustee of Emory University School of Medicine. He fought for the Confederacy, rising to the rank of lieutenant colonel in the 3rd Georgia Cavalry regiment. His severe wounds from the war led him, as many other civil war veterans wounded in battle, to morphine addiction.

John began work on a coca and cola (kola) nut-based nerve tonic called Pemberton's French Wine Coca. (a cocawine) when he was a druggist and chemist in Columbus. In 1885 he was selling the product through Atlanta druggists when the city passed a prohibition law. So he adjusted the formula, renamed the product Coca-Cola (as suggested by partner Frank Robinson), and marketed it as both a "delicious, exhilarating, refreshing and invigorating" soda-fountain beverage and a "temperance drink." He also made many health claims for his product, and marketed it as a cure for a myriad of diseases.

John was plagued by his morphine addiction and imbibed his Wine Cola and soda in an effort to control the addiction (both beverages contained coca leaf, which in turn contains cocaine - believed at the time to be helpful in combatting dependence on opiates). Indeed, Coca-Cola was originally advertised - in part - as a cure for morphine addiction.

Pemberton's behavior grew increasingly erratic as he neared the end of his life. He sold the rights to manufacture Coca-Cola twice. First, to two investors, from whom Asa Candler acquired his stake in the business. Then, to three more investors who had no knowledge of the previous sale and were left without a dime when Candler acquired exclusive rights to the formula in 1888.

His son Charley Pemberton returned to Atlanta that same year and claimed his father had promised him a stake in the business. At first, John insisited that Charles be included in the enterprise that also included Candler and Robinson. However, a principal investor grew tired of the alcoholic young man's antics. In an effort to make peace, Pemberton declared that Charles owned the rights to the name, but not the formula. Charles then began to manufacture his own version of the popular beverage.

This complex situation was resolved when Candler acquired the formula from John and two investors to whom John had sold partial rights in order to fund his addiction, Margaret Dozier and Woolfolk Walker. However, later handwriting analysis revealed that John's signature on the bill of sale was most likely a forgery, and the Pemberton family long after suspected foul play.

John died August 16, 1888, only a few months after Candler incorporated the first Coca Cola Corporation. He is buried in Linwood Cemetery in Columbus, Georgia.