According to the company, the original inventor was a pharmacist named John Pemberton who never put the formula on paper, choosing to pass it down solely by word of mouth. That would all change decades later, when a group of investors would hold back the funds to buy the company and literally guarantee the loan with the secret formula itself. Interestingly enough, that original document remained in an Atlanta bank until Coca-Cola moved it in recent years to a purpose-built vault within the company.