James Robert Cade (September 26, 1927 – November 27, 2007) was an American physician, university professor, research scientist and inventor. Cade, a native of

Texas Texas ( , ; or ) is the most populous U.S. state, state in the South Central United States, South Central region of the United States. It borders Louisiana to the east, Arkansas to the northeast, Oklahoma to the north, New Mexico to the we ...

, earned his bachelor and medical degrees at the University of Texas, and became a professor of medicine and nephrology at the

University of Florida The University of Florida (Florida or UF) is a public university, public land-grant university, land-grant research university in Gainesville, Florida, United States. It is a senior member of the State University System of Florida and a preem ...

. Although Cade engaged in many areas of medical research, he is most widely remembered as the leader of the research team that created the sports drink Gatorade.Arline Phillips-Han,
Dr. Robert Cade . . . saga of the world's best-selling sports drink and the creative physician scientist behind it
" ''Health Science Center News'', University of Florida (February 24, 2003). Retrieved December 10, 2014. Gatorade would have significant medical applications for treating dehydration in patients, and has generated over $150 million in royalties for the university. In his later years, Cade became a prominent philanthropist, donating significant sums to charities affiliated with the Lutheran Church, creating scholarships and donating freely to the University of Florida and other colleges and universities, and endowing his own charitable foundations.

Early life and education

Robert Cade was born in San Antonio, Texas, on September 26, 1927.Douglas Martin,
J. Robert Cade, the Inventor of Gatorade, Dies at 80
" ''The New York Times'' (November 28, 2007). Retrieved December 10, 2014. He was a fourth-generation Texan.Samuel Proctor
Dr. James Robert Cade Interview
Samuel Proctor Oral History Project, George A. Smathers Libraries, University of Florida, Gainesville, Florida, page 4 (1996). Retrieved December 10, 2014. Cade took an early interest in athletics and ran the mile in four minutes, twenty seconds at Brackenridge High School, a very respectable time for a high school athlete in the early 1940s. He graduated from Brackenridge High School in May 1945 and joined the U.S. Navy. He served for three years and was stationed at Naval Medical Research Unit Four in Dublin, Georgia (1 year), the destroyer USS ''Gherardi'' ( years) and the cruiser USS ''Rochester''. He completed his service in September 1948 with the rank of pharmacist's mate third class. After being discharged from the navy, he enrolled in the University of Texas.Associated Press,
Inventor of Gatorade dies at 80
" ''USA Today'' (November 27, 2007). Retrieved December 10, 2014. He completed four years of undergraduate coursework in two calendar years, and graduated with his bachelor's degree in 1950. He was also a member of the Delta Upsilon fraternity while at the University of Texas. In 1953, he married Mary Strasburger, a nurse from Dallas, Texas, whom he had met while he was in medical school.The Cade Museum for Innovation and Invention, The History
A Man, A Team, An Idea + A Drink: Dr. J. Robert Cade
Retrieved December 10, 2014 After graduating with his doctor of medicine degree from the University of Texas Southwestern Medical School in Dallas in 1954, Cade completed his internship at the Saint Louis City Hospital in Saint Louis, Missouri and did his residency at Parkland Memorial Hospital in Dallas. He also served fellowships at his alma mater, Southwestern Medical School, and

Cornell University Cornell University is a Private university, private Ivy League research university based in Ithaca, New York, United States. The university was co-founded by American philanthropist Ezra Cornell and historian and educator Andrew Dickson W ...

Medical College in New York City. In 1961, Cade joined the faculty of the University of Florida College of Medicine in Gainesville, Florida, as an assistant professor of internal medicine in its renal division.

Invention of Gatorade

In 1965, Cade was approached by Dewayne Douglas, an assistant coach for the Florida Gators football team, about the extreme dehydration faced by Gator football players practicing in the high temperatures and humidity of the Deep South in late summer and early fall.Michael McLeod,
Gator-made
" ''Orlando Sentinel'' (August 14, 2005). Retrieved February 17, 2010. Douglas questioned Cade why his football players did not urinate during practice and games. Cade learned from anecdotal evidence that football players were losing water through perspiration and failing to replace fluid during practice and games. Cade's research team discovered that football players were losing up to 18 pounds (8.2 kilograms) during the three hours of a

college football College football is gridiron football that is played by teams of amateur Student athlete, student-athletes at universities and colleges. It was through collegiate competition that gridiron football American football in the United States, firs ...

game, and that ninety to ninety-five percent of that loss was water. A player's plasma volume could decrease as much as seven percent and blood volume by five percent, and sodium and chloride were excreted in the sweat. During 1965 and 1966, Cade, together with his team of research doctors Dana Shires, James Free, and Alejandro M. de Quesada, conducted a series of trial-and-error experiments with his

glucose Glucose is a sugar with the Chemical formula#Molecular formula, molecular formula , which is often abbreviated as Glc. It is overall the most abundant monosaccharide, a subcategory of carbohydrates. It is mainly made by plants and most algae d ...

-and-

electrolyte An electrolyte is a substance that conducts electricity through the movement of ions, but not through the movement of electrons. This includes most soluble Salt (chemistry), salts, acids, and Base (chemistry), bases, dissolved in a polar solven ...

s rehydration drink on members of the Gators football team of coach Ray Graves, first with members of the freshman squad, and after initially promising results, with starting members of the varsity team. "It didn't taste like Gatorade," Cade said in a 1988 interview with '' Florida Trend'' magazine. In fact, according to Cade, when Gators lineman Larry Gagner first tried it, he spat it out and strongly suggested that the original experimental formula tasted more like bodily waste. Dana Shires remembered that "it sort of tasted like toilet bowl cleaner."Robert Cade: Scientist who invented Gatorade, the world's first and biggest-selling sports drink
" ''The Times'' (November 29, 2007). Retrieved December 14, 2014. To make it more palatable, at the suggestion of Cade's wife, the researchers added lemon juice and cyclamateRichard Burnett,
Gatorade Inventor: My Success Based On Sweat And Luck
" ''Orlando Sentinel'' (April 16, 1994). Retrieved February 16, 2010. Other sweeteners were substituted in 1970, when the federal

Food and Drug Administration The United States Food and Drug Administration (FDA or US FDA) is a List of United States federal agencies, federal agency of the United States Department of Health and Human Services, Department of Health and Human Services. The FDA is respo ...

(FDA) banned cyclamate as a potential carcinogen. to the original formula of water, salt, sodium citrate, fructose and monopotassium phosphate. Cade appeared in "The Legend of Gatorade" television commercials narrated by long-time college football announcer Keith Jackson in 2005, during which Cade declared, "Naturally, we called our stuff ''Gator''ade." However, the rehydration drink was first known as "Cade's Ade" and "Cade's Cola" to the Florida Gators football team, and only later became known as "Gatorade." The drink received its first real test in the Gators' 1965 game against the LSU Tigers football team; the Tigers faded in the heat of the second half and the Gators did not. Coach Graves was convinced, and asked Cade to produce enough of his potion for all Gator games. Gatorade achieved national prominence as a result of the Gators' first Orange Bowl title over the Georgia Tech Yellow Jackets in January 1967. The Gators reinforced their reputation as a "second-half team" and came from behind to defeat the Yellow Jackets 27–10. Afterward, Georgia Tech head coach Bobby Dodd told reporters: "We didn't have Gatorade; that made the difference." Cade

patent A patent is a type of intellectual property that gives its owner the legal right to exclude others from making, using, or selling an invention for a limited period of time in exchange for publishing an sufficiency of disclosure, enabling discl ...

ed the formula and offered all the rights to the drink to the University of Florida in exchange for the university's backing of the production and marketing of the drink, but the university turned down his proposal.Massachusetts Institute of Technology, Inventor of the Week Archive
Inventor of the Week: Robert Cade
Retrieved December 10, 2014. He initially obtained bank financing and began to produce "Gatorade" through his own business, but later entered into a contract with Stokely-Van Camp, Inc. to produce and sell the drink. When sales royalties reached $200,000, the university took notice.Dave Curtis,

" ''Orlando Sentinel'' (April 14, 2007). Retrieved July 12, 2022. The Florida Board of Regents, prompted by the U.S. Department of Health, Education and Welfare, which had provided Cade with a small grant for his research, asked for the patent rights.Julian M. Pleasants, Gator Tales: An Oral History of the University of Florida, University of Florida, Gainesville, Florida, pp. 129–130 (2006). Cade refused. The Board of Regents, acting on behalf of the university, then brought suit against Cade for a share of the profits, arguing that the university's facilities, employees and students were instrumental in the development of the product.Proctor & Langley, ''Gator History'', p. 55. After thirty-one months of legal wrangling, Cade and the university negotiated a settlement of their dispute in 1972, and the Board of Regents and the university settled for a twenty percent share of the royalties. Cade, and his investors in the Gatorade Trust, retained eighty percent. In the aftermath of the settlement, Cade and the university resolved their differences amicably, and expanded their professional relationships—of the first $70,500 in Gatorade royalties received by the university, the university reinvested $30,000 in kidney research by Cade's renal department and another $12,000 in Cade's other research projects. Cade, for his part, created multiple scholarships and contributed generously to the university from his own royalties over the following years.

Legacy

Up to 2007, the University of Florida has received over $150 million from its share of the Gatorade royalties. As of 2015, this total has increased to $281 million. Cade and his associates' share of the royalties is undisclosed, the majority of their rights having been sold to Stokely-Van Camp. After the settlement, Cade continued to work for the university, and the college of medicine named him professor

emeritus ''Emeritus/Emerita'' () is an honorary title granted to someone who retires from a position of distinction, most commonly an academic faculty position, but is allowed to continue using the previous title, as in "professor emeritus". In some c ...

of nephrology upon his retirement in 2004. In April 2007, several months before his death, the University Athletic Association inducted Cade into the University of Florida Athletic Hall of Fame as an "honorary letter winner." Gatorade, now owned by PepsiCo, is today sold in some eighty countries and over fifty various flavors. In contrast to the forty-three dollars that Cade and his team spent to make the first experimental batch of Gatorade in 1965, Gatorade prompted the evolution of a multibillion-dollar sports drink industry in the years that followed; as of 2007, over seven billion bottles of Gatorade were being sold annually in the United States.Neil Amdur,
Raise a Glass to the Father of Energy Drinks
" ''The New York Times'' (December 2, 2007). Retrieved December 10, 2014. While he was surprised by its commercial success as a sports drink, Cade took greater pride in Gatorade's use in hospitals, in post-operative recovery and to treat diarrhea-related dehydration in infants and young children. Cade's other research included

hypertension Hypertension, also known as high blood pressure, is a Chronic condition, long-term Disease, medical condition in which the blood pressure in the artery, arteries is persistently elevated. High blood pressure usually does not cause symptoms i ...

, exercise physiology, autism,

schizophrenia Schizophrenia () is a mental disorder characterized variously by hallucinations (typically, Auditory hallucination#Schizophrenia, hearing voices), delusions, thought disorder, disorganized thinking and behavior, and Reduced affect display, f ...

and kidney disease. His research into carbo-loading substantiated the early claims of Swedish researchers, and he also invented a hydraulic football helmet that substantially reduced the risk of concussion to football players. Cade was an active, lifelong member of the

Lutheran Lutheranism is a major branch of Protestantism that emerged under the work of Martin Luther, the 16th-century German friar and Protestant Reformers, reformer whose efforts to reform the theology and practices of the Catholic Church launched ...

church, and he was recognized by the church with its Wittenberg Award in 1991. He gave generously to many Lutheran colleges and organizations. In their later years, Cade and his wife established the Gloria Dei Foundation, an organization that makes grants to aid the "poor and underserved." Cade was a talented violinist who sometimes played with local symphony orchestras. Cade acquired collections of more than thirty violins and more than sixty vintage Studebaker automobiles. He and his wife continued to live in the same Gainesville house that they owned before the financial success of Gatorade. On November 27, 2007, Cade died of kidney failure, at the age of 80, in Gainesville. He was survived by his wife Mary, their six children, twenty grandchildren and eight great-grandchildren. The Cade Museum Foundation, established in 2004 and chaired by Cade's daughter, Phoebe Cade Miles,The Cade Museum for Innovation and Invention
Cade Museum Board
. Retrieved December 10, 2014. announced in 2010 that it had begun raising funds to construct a new building for the Cade Museum in Gainesville, with a groundbreaking planned for 2015. The museum opened in May 2018. On September 26, 2013, Florida Governor Rick Scott posthumously honored Cade as a " Great Floridian" during a ceremony at the Cade Museum.Shannon Chernoff,
Gatorade Inventor Honored With Great Floridian Award
" WUFT (September 27, 2013). Retrieved December 10, 2014. The award honors those people who made "major contributions to the progress and welfare" of Florida.

References

Bibliography

*Golenbock, Peter, ''Go Gators! An Oral History of Florida's Pursuit of Gridiron Glory'', Legends Publishing, LLC, St. Petersburg, Florida (2002). . *Hairston, Jack, ''Tales from the Gator Swamp: A Collection of the Greatest Gator Stories Ever Told'', Sports Publishing, LLC, Champaign, Illinois (2002). . *Pleasants, Julian M., ''Gator Tales: An Oral History of the University of Florida'', University of Florida, Gainesville, Florida (2006). . *Proctor, Samuel
Dr. James Robert Cade Interview
Samuel Proctor Oral History Project, George A. Smathers Libraries, University of Florida, Gainesville, Florida (1996). *Proctor, Samuel, & Wright Langley, ''Gator History: A Pictorial History of the University of Florida'', South Star Publishing Company, Gainesville, Florida (1986). . *Rovell, Darren,
First In Thirst: How Gatorade Turned The Science of Sweat Into A Cultural Phenomenon
', Amacom Books, New York, New York (2006). .

External links