USA
A Fortune Built on Sand: Health Grains
In early 20th-century New York, a mailman introduced a new patent medicine called Health Grains for indigestion – but the ingredients were far from beneficial. Mrs Bertha Bertsche, a 38-year-old widow, could often be found supervising the pans on the kitchen range at her home in Glebe Avenue, Westchester Square, New York. Inside the pans, […]
Read MoreRocks that Shock: the Hillman Electric Resort
In 1880s Georgia, a Baptist minister accidentally discovered rocks that appeared to emit a therapeutic power of electricity. As their fame spread, the location became a popular resort for people in search of healing.
Read More‘Eat! Eat! Eat!’ Those notorious tapeworm diet pills
Peoria, Illinois, 1912: the horror begins. A society lady, encouraged by a friend’s success with an easy new weight-loss treatment, pays $25 for ‘two rather large and suspicious-looking pills.’ Her husband sends the pills to be analysed by the Washington public health service, and before long a ‘government secret official’ appears, informing him that the […]
Read MoreWhy smoke and spit your life away?
ADvent Calendar Day 22 Advertised with this beautiful Art Nouveau poster designed by William H Bradley, Narcoti-cure claimed to put smokers and tobacco-chewers off their habit for life. ‘Why smoke and spit your life away?’ advertisements asked. ‘Why suffer from dyspepsia, heartburn and drains on your vital force?’ The product would cure nicotine addiction […]
Read MoreI was a tub of fat!
ADvent Calendar Day 18 Korein claimed to contain Fucus vesiculosis (bladderwrack), which enjoyed a vogue as a weight loss supplement in the late nineteenth and early twentieth centuries. When the Connecticut Agricultural Experiment Association analysed Korein in 1915, however, they reported that it was 40% sassafras oil and 60% petrolatum, presented in red gelatine capsules. […]
Read MoreMerchant’s Gargling Oil
ADvent Calendar Day 14 If people evolved from apes, why are apes still selling Gargling Oil? Ask this fellow, taking a break from evading sasquatch hunters to advise punters that Merchant’s liniment is good for both man and beast. It was mainly an external remedy for bruises, wounds, skin diseases, burns etc, but people could […]
Read MoreThe sparkle of perfect health
ADvent Calendar Day 12 The Favorite Prescription was just one part of a range marketed by Dr Ray Vaughn Pierce in newspapers, almanacs, pamphlets and on the side of barns across the late 19th-century US. After his death in 1914, his profitable business continued in the hands of his son, Dr Valentine Mott Pierce, and […]
Read MoreHow to grow tall
ADvent Calendar Day 11 Rochester, NY, might ring a bell for attentive followers of this calendar, as it made an appearance on Day 8 as the location of the New York Institute of Science. That it was home to another dodgy organisation is no coincidence. Thomas Adkin, the Institute’s President, was also a director of […]
Read MoreThe intangible power that controls human destiny
ADvent Calendar Day 8 The marvellous book on offer from the New York Institute of Science in the first decade of the twentieth century was called The Philosophy of Influence, and promised ‘The secret of power, the science of health. Life’s mysteries unveiled.’ One would have to wait a little longer to unveil them, however, […]
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