Stoneware Ginger Beer Bottle

This stoneware bottle once held ginger beer made in one of Bremner’s ‘lemonade factories’. 

With Brora becoming a resort destination around the turn of the century, with its beach, golf course, salmon rivers, and countryside attractions, the business capitalised on an expanding tourist market, with a thirst for carbonated drinks. 

The Aerated Water Manufactory was housed in a yard at the harbour in Brora. It was first established by James Wilson in 1905, who also operated a similar factory at Wick. Wilson sold his business to another Wick man, Robert Bremner, whose son Donald operated the Brora branch. 

They supplied drinks to the local hotels for their guests as well as to local shops. Business boomed until the outbreak of war in 1914.  

After the sad death of 43-year-old Donald Bremner to Spanish flu in 1919, one of 100 million victims of the pandemic globally, the factory ceased production in 1922.