Cotton Candy Day: The Dentist Who Always Had Patients

Airy, translucent, and achingly sweet-the thought of cotton candy usually brings with it childhood memories of fairs, carnivals, or the circus. Would you believe that Cotton Candy as we know it today is the product of not one, but two dentists?

Hard to believe, but when “fairy floss” was first made for the public at the World’s Fair in 1904, it was the brainchild of Tennessee dentist William Morrison and confectioner John C. Wharton. Years later, another dentist would try his hand at confection production (though not with the same success as Morrison), and the Louisiana native was the one who called the fluffy clouds of sugar “Cotton Candy.” 

Spun sugar isn’t a new invention, and for hundreds of years, the incredibly wealthy have enjoyed the delicate snack. For centuries, the candy was the fruit of artisans who labored over boiling vats of sugar to painstakingly create the delicate threads by hand. It wasn’t until Morrison, dentist and inventor, collaborated with confectioner and fellow inventor John C. Wharton, that this treat became available to the average citizen. 

In 1904 at the World’s Fair in St. Louis, the men unveiled their machine. While it was noisy and had a tendency to overheat and burn the sugar, the “fairy floss” that came out of it was a huge hit. The cotton candy “cone” wasn’t invented yet, but Morrison and Wharton filled little boxes with their sweet stuff-and sold over 68,000 boxes. What makes this even more remarkable was that the men were selling the candy for half the price of admission, a steep ask in 1904. 

The history of sugar itself is a long one. Known in India and China, very wealthy Greeks and Romans used it as a medicine, which they called “Indian Salt.” Our word candy comes from the Sanskrit khanda, which was used to describe a type of sugar. 

For centuries, sugar was a commodity out of the reach of the average citizen. As colonialism expanded, Europeans gained a taste for other “exotic” goods, like tea, chocolate, and coffee. These increased the demand for sugar, and the slave trade accelerated to meet it. It is estimated that between 1748 and 1788 over 335,000 slaves were imported to Jamaica alone for sugar production. 

As sugar spread across the globe, it was touted for its medicinal properties;  it was believed that sugar “when taken moderately cleans the blood, strengthens body and mind, especially chest, lungs and throat.” Today’s sugar consumption would not be considered “moderate,” but the confection industry has improved medicine in an unlikely way. Several years ago, researchers at Vanderbilt University started experimenting with using cotton candy machines to help build synthetic organs. One of the struggles researchers have creating organs is replicating the fine web of capillary strands, which are 1/10th the size of human hair. A cotton candy machine, repurposed with the right materials, can produce strands of the right shape and size (just try not to think of that next time you have cotton candy!). 

Today, cotton candy is cheap and readily available. You can find it at stadiums, fairs, and carnivals, and even in bags at grocery stores. Home cotton candy machines are often inexpensive and easy to use, and allow families to make the treat at home. It is used as a decoration on other sweets, like cakes and cupcakes, and used in place of sugar in coffees and cocktails. Since we just celebrated National Bartender Appreciation Day, here is a simple cocktail to enjoy, with cotton candy taking the place of the traditional sugar cube:

2 dashes of angostura bitters

Baseball sized lump of cotton candy

2 ounces of bourbon (I used Brush Creek Straight Bourbon) 

Luxardo cherry 

Orange twist

Dash bitters into a rocks glass with a splash of water, and drop in the cotton candy. Add bourbon and stir twice; add ice and top with cherry and a twist.