54 Years Ago in TIME

A cold summer in Europe and competition at home have been blamed for a bad run at COCA-COLA. In 1950, though, it was the king of soft drinks and a ubiquitous ambassador for the U.S. across the globe.

In Brazil, some misguided people vow that it increases sexual prowess; others are under the delusion that it makes a man impotent ... Graceful gondolas carry it along the narrow canals of Venice, and sturdy, resigned burros tote it into the dusty Mexican hills. Bright red signs proclaim its worth beneath the blank, unastonished eyes of the great Sphinx ... The late William Allen White once described Coke as the "sublimated essence of all America stands for." To find something as thoroughly native American hawked in half a hundred languages on all the world's crossroads from Arequipa to Zwolle is still strangely anomalous, somewhat like reading Dick Tracy in French or seeing a Japanese actor made up to look like Abraham Lincoln. But it is reassuring. It is also simpler, sharper evidence than the Marshall Plan or a Voice of America broadcast that the U.S. has gone out into the world to stay.

— TIME, May 15, 1950