Sigmund Freud, who was Viennese, used cocaine to treat for morphine addictions. In 1884 he researched it and rote the paper, Uber Coca. He theorized that cocaine was a stimulant like caffeine, not one like most narcotics, and opium. One of the most tragic examples involved a close friend of Freud's, Ernst Von Fleischl–Marxow, who was addicted to morphine. When Freud treated his condition with cocaine, Fleischl–Marxow quickly became heavily involved with the drug and began to use it excessively. Within a year he was taking so much cocaine that he suffered toxic psychosis and later died. One scientist at the time pronounced that cocaine was "the third scourge of humanity." (After alcohol and opium.)
             Seemingly, Sigmund Freud single-handedly popularized the use of cocaine.
             In the 1880's, a Corsican chemist named Angelo Mariani used this coca extract in a wine called Vin Mariani. It became an immensely popular medicine for fatigue, nervousness, and a variety of other ills. Mariani sent free samples to celebrities and solicited their endorsements. Among the public figures that sang the praises of Vin Mariani were Pope Leo XIII, the inventor Thomas Edison, Jules Verne, and the U.S. president Ulysses S. Grant. The Scottish author Robert Louis Stevenson was inspired by cocaine while writing his famous novel The Strange Case of Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde. And Sir Arthur Conan Doyle, the creator of the fictional detective Sherlock Holmes, portrayed Holmes as an occasional heavy user of cocaine. Although aware that the drug was bad for him, the detective injected it because cocaine as "transcendentally stimulating and clarifying to the mind."
             Vin Mariani had competition from the American, John Styth Pemberton and his "Brain Cola." Its popularity spread because of its use in soda fountains. Called Coca–Cola, it also faced competition from tonics with names such as Koca Nola, Celery Cola, Wis...