1890s advertising

Victorian asthma cigarettes: who was Dr Batty?

Some 19thC doctors saw smoking as an efficient way to deliver medication to the lungs – but the popular ‘Dr Batty’ advertisement isn’t real.

Dr Wheeler and the Bacillus of Death

British newspapers reported in 1895 that someone had discovered the ‘Death Microbe’.

An inventor’s survival: Ramey’s Medicator

Ramey’s Medicator was meant to cure ‘death-dealing disease’. What most customers didn’t know was that its inventor had been through a life-threatening medical experience of his own.

An advertising poster in the Art Nouveau style, showing a knight on horseback sticking a lance into a humanoid figure composed of tobacco leaves. The desing includes the words 'Narcoti-cure, cures the tobacco habit in from 4 to 10 days. The Narcoti Chemical Co., Springfield, Mass. Price $5.00. Book of particulars free.'

Narcoti-Cure: ‘Why smoke and spit your life away?’

Last updated: 20 April 2024 This beautiful 1895 poster, created by leading Art Nouveau designer William H Bradley (1868-1962), formed part of a widespread advertising campaign for Narcoti-Cure, a product that was only available for about a year. Narcoti-Cure claimed to put smokers, tobacco-chewers and snuff-takers off their filthy habit for life. ‘Why smoke and […]

Dr MacKenzie’s Harmless Arsenic Complexion Wafers

Arsenic was reputed to give a youthful, wrinkle-free complexion, so 1890s entrepreneurs started advertising arsenic pills and soaps.

Godfrey’s Inhaler

This mainstream medical product enabled the inhalation of vapour for the treatment of asthma, hay fever, coughs, colds and other respiratory problems. The vapour was created by combining hydrochloric acid and ammonium chloride, which were provided in attractive little glass bottles – one clear and one emerald green. There are some pictures of the product, […]

Claxton’s Patent Ear Cap

ADvent Calendar Day 4 ‘It has often been observed by experienced elders, that since it became the fashion for babies to discard caps, protruding ears are but too common. They are very ugly, and the ear-cap just invented is a safe preventive, without the heat that made the cap objectionable.’ (Northampton Mercury, 17 April 1891) […]

Hall's Coca Wine - 1897 ad from Country Life

The devil in disguise: Hall’s Coca Wine

John Michael Smith is one of those fleeting figures who cross history’s pages when they get into trouble and then disappear, leaving only a hint of a life where destitution is more prominent than criminality. At the age of 11 he lived in Lodge Lane, Derby, with his mother and siblings. His dad died in […]

10 Victorian products for Movember

As more than a million people across the world spend this month growing moustaches to raise awareness of – and funds for – Movember‘s men’s health projects, here are a few 19th-century products to help them along the way. 1. Latreille’s Excelsior Lotion Advertised in the 1870s by John Latreille, originally of Walworth, this product used […]

Bailey’s Rubber Complexion Brush

A harmless alternative to the arsenical preparations then in vogue for improving the complexion, Bailey’s rubber brush was intended to improve the circulation, clear the pores and allow the blood to free itself of impurities. Charles J Bailey of Newton, Massachusetts, invented the product in 1887, immediately patenting it in England, France, Canada, Belgium […]