New in the collection: Wilmington molasses and syrup labels

Bully Syrup packaging

“Old timers may remember the distinctive aroma hanging over the Cape Fear River at the former American Molasses Co. plant under what is now the Cape Fear Memorial Bridge. The operation, one of several the New York-based company ran around the country, shows up in city directories from 1922 to 1978.

“Despite the local facility, most of the product refined in the site at 15 Queen St. came from the Caribbean, likely Barbados, according to an oral history on file at UNC Wilmington’s library recorded in 2004 with Joyce Andrews, daughter of the plant’s superintendent.

— From “Area family keeps sugarcane farming and processing alive” by Paul Stephen in the Wilmington Star-News (Dec. 15, 2013)

DOT link dump: A plane, a train, an automobile

— Will World War II bomber pulled from South Carolina lake wind up north of the border?

— Was engineer’s race “to put her in Spencer on time” wrongly blamed for wreck of the Old 97?

— Now this is an irresistible headline:  “Is it true a Cadillac fell off the Cape Fear Memorial Bridge into the river?”?