ELIZABETHTOWN, KENTUCKY.-The News-Enterprise Online reported that from 1920 to 1999, the Schmidt family owned the Elizabethtown Coca-Cola Bottling Co., which bottled Coke in Elizabethtown. In 1999, they sold the rights and renamed the business Cardinal Cos. This year, the Schmidts sold the company to Cott Beverages Inc. b¿Now Bill Schmidt wants to see his dream of a multimillion-dollar Coca-Cola memorabilia museum become reality.

"As of right now, we don’t have any active plans," Schmidt said earlier this week.

Schmidt said in a statement Monday he and his wife will erect an 80,000-square-foot building to house the collection, once valued at around $10 million, that will include a 7,500-square-foot museum. Schmidt said the new museum will be about the size of a museum they maintained at the bottling plant from 1976 to 1999. The Elizabethtown Tourism and Convention Bureau currently houses a 2,000-square-foot, interim Coke museum.

"This museum would give us lots of advantages that we’ve never had," Schmidt said.

The Schmidts have been trying for several years to head up a fund-raising effort to build a major Coke museum in Elizabethtown, where plans include commissioning renowned architect Frank Gehry to design the building, which was estimated to cost $25 million and expected to draw tourists from around the country and world.

"We want the building to be distinguishable," he said.