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Icon: James Robert Cade
Physician, Gatorade Inventor. Cade died Nov. 27 at age 80.
» One of my fellows, (Harry J.) Jim Free (assistant in medicine) came back from a weekend at home and said, ‘Why do we not call it Gatorade?’
» They said if I wanted to do it, to go ahead and do it, but there is no way the university was going to get involved. The first year, the royalty paid on it amounted to $29,000, I think. The second year, it came to about $69,000. The third year, it was over $100,000. They eventually ... filed a lawsuit asking for all of the Gatorade royalties plus whatever had been paid up till then. We ended up offering them 20% of the royalty as their share. That is the arrangement that still exists.
» I used to play in the university symphony (orchestra). I played the violin for six years and the viola for about 10 years.
» I have grown roses since I got out of the Navy.
» I have 50-odd (Studebaker cars) that I have restored now.
» I read all the Agatha Christie books. I read books on history, particularly Egyptian and European during Roman times. I consider history to end in 1453 though, with the fall of Constantinople. Everything since then I consider to be current events.
» I have voted in all the elections since I have been old enough to do so. I am a conservative. Most of the time I have voted Republican.
» (Quaker, which purchased the rights to Gatorade) mostly they gave me a hard time. One thing was that they want to reduce the royalty. The other was, over the years, we did more research, and we made a drink we called TQ II, for “thirst quencher,” roman numeral two, for second generation. We tested it in the lab, and it was significantly better than Gatorade on someone working very hard or exercising very hard. It keeps up the blood volume better. They professed no interest in it until Pepsi Cola called. Pepsi Cola wanted to buy the rights to make TQ II. We were talking to Pepsi about it. Quaker decided they owned it anyway, and they sued us to keep us from selling it to Pepsi. Acrimonious discussions went on for a couple of years. Finally, suits were filed. The people on my side decided it was going to cost too much to go to court with them, so they recommended that we sell it to Quaker. They paid us $2 million for the rights to it. They do not want to make it because they are afraid of the New Coke syndrome. They have stuck it on a shelf, and they are going to let it die there.
» Growing up at San Antonio, I took Spanish in school and had occasion to use it frequently, so I could speak Spanish fluently. I do not use Spanish here at all, so it has gotten away from me. I can still speak German.
» They had to promise that it would be used for supporting research, which they have not done. They used it to put a new Gator Boosters room next to the president’s suite in Tigert Hall. They put new fume hoods in the chemistry building where they teach undergraduate chemistry. They have used it for travel. They have used it to trim shrubbery.
» I am an optimist, but I am disturbed by the world in which we live. I think that the future will be as good or better than today. However, I do not think man is getting any better.
 Gator Cade: Cade formulated Gatorade in 1965 while chief of renal medicine at the University of Florida’s medical school. [Photo: University of Florida] |
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