Birthplace of Barq's

Edward Barq was a trained chemist from New Orleans who worked Louisiana sugar plantations in winter and spent summers in Biloxi bottling artesian water and mixing flavors. His root beer was first bottled by the Biloxi Artesian Bottling Works and reached national distribution in 1906. The growth came in the 1930s, when Barq chose twelve-ounce bottles over the usual six and eight, and franchises spread to Mobile and New Orleans; by one count, sixty-two bottling plants stood in twenty-two states by 1937. The family sold the company in 1976, and Coca-Cola bought it in 1995.

Where it stands

Worth the stop nearby

• Ohr-O'Keefe Museum of Art — 0.4 mi
  Frank Gehry's pavilions on the Biloxi waterfront, built around the pottery of George Ohr, the self-styled Mad Potter, and the rebuilt Pleasant Reed House.
• Maritime & Seafood Industry Museum — 1.2 mi
  A Point Cadet museum on Biloxi's oyster, shrimp and schooner past, from the packing houses and the shrimpers' unions to the Vietnamese families who rebuilt the industry.
• Biloxi Lighthouse — 1.4 mi
  A cast-iron tower lit in 1848 on the Biloxi beachfront, kept by women for most of its first century and still in service after Camille and Katrina.
• Biloxi Beach Wade-In Marker — 1.4 mi
  The beachfront parking lot beside the Biloxi Lighthouse where state markers recall the 1959 and 1960 wade-ins that opened Mississippi's public beaches to Black residents.

More markers nearby

• Debuys-Hermann-Keller House — 0.2 mi
• Vance-Gillis House — 0.2 mi
• Church of the Redeemer — 0.3 mi
• Tivoli Hotel — 0.4 mi