Hillsboro's Rose Hopkins drives replica Civil War coffee wagon in 2023 Lebanon Christmas parade

Rose Hopkins of Hillsboro participated in Lebanon’s 34th annual horse-drawn carriage parade and Christmas Festival Saturday, Dec. 2.

Hopkins, who works at the Hillsboro Rural King, owns and raises North American Spotted Haflinger (NASH) horses. She and her horses led a replica of a Civil War coffee wagon in the 2023 Lebanon Christmas parade.

The original coffee wagon used by the United States Christian Commission was built and donated to them by Jacob Dutton. Dutton was a pharmacist in Philadelphia and an amateur inventor.

Dutton invented the coffee boiler, which he patented in 1863 as a cook stove. The original could brew 126 gallons of coffee every hour. It was mainly used in hospital scenarios for men who were too badly wounded to be able to make their own coffee. Besides coffee, it could make hot chocolate, clear broth, hot water for tea and other needs.

The coffee wagon led by Hopkins in this year’s parade is an antique replica built in 1961 by the Chase and Sanborn Coffee Company for the centennial of the Civil War. It is owned by the Armed Services YMCA in Virginia Beach, Va.

This coffee wagon is 7/8 scale and can brew 108 gallons an hour. It is operated by the Re-enactors Missions for Jesus Christ out of Concord, Va. The RMJC ministry has spent the last five years restoring this wagon so that it can be on display, teach history and make coffee. Chaplain Alan Farley brought this coffee wagon to Lebanon, Ohio from Virginia.

Hopkins and her husband, Dean, helped support this venture in the Lebanon Christmas Parade by supplying the horses to pull the wagon and by Rose serving as the driver. Fresh-brewed cups of coffee were available from the wagon during the event.