Black Cow

Root beer and vanilla ice cream — Frank Wisner's August 1893 invention in Cripple Creek, Colorado, A&W Root Beer spreading the float format nationally from 1919.

The Black Cow — more broadly known as a root beer float — is an American soda fountain classic whose specific origin is attributed to Frank J. Wisner, who operated the Cripple Creek Cow Mountain Gold Mining Company in Cripple Creek, Colorado and ran a resort for the company's investors. According to accounts first published in the early 20th century, Wisner created the combination on August 19, 1893 by placing a scoop of vanilla ice cream from the Breckenridge Creamery in a glass of Myers Avenue Red root beer, reportedly inspired by the snowy peaks of Cow Mountain visible from his resort, which he thought resembled vanilla ice cream floating in brown liquid. He called it the Black Cow, naming it after the dark cattle common to the region. The drink spread rapidly through Colorado and beyond, becoming a standard soda fountain offering within years of its creation and eventually one of the most universally recognized American food-and-drink combinations. The A&W Root Beer chain, founded by Roy W. Allen in Lodi, California in 1919, helped nationalize root beer float culture through the growing drive-in restaurant format of the 20th century. Root beer itself — made from a blend of sassafras, wintergreen, vanilla, anise, and other botanical flavorings — is a distinctly American soft drink whose origins trace to colonial-era small-batch fermented beverages before commercial bottling standardized the format.