The Patent-Medicine Evil
By L. A. S.
“Clergymen” and “Temperance Workers” Indorse Duffy’s Malt Whisky
MANY of our readers have no doubt noticed among the proprietary-medicine advertisements in the papers one showing the portraits of three “clergymen,” with the accompanying statement: “Clergymen indorse Duffy’s Pure Malt Whisky. Distinguished divines and temperance workers, who have spent their lives in uplifting their fallen brethren and placing their feet upon the solid rock, use and recommend Duffy’s Pure Malt Whisky. These great preachers have been cured of dyspepsia, and of stomach, throat, and bronchial trouble by this wonderful medicine, whose virtues they extol. Honored and respected preachers of the gospel and advocates of temperance without regard to creed or prejudice make frank and outspoken statements of what Duffy’s Malt Whisky has done for them,” etc. With reference to this advertisement Mr. Adams says in Collier’s: “Of these three ‘distinguished divines and temperance workers,’ the Rev. Dunham runs a Get-Married-Quick Matrimonial Bureau, while the ‘Rev.’ Houghton derives his income from his salary as deputy internal revenue collector, his business being to collect Uncle Sam’s liquor tax. The printed portrait of Houghton is entirely imaginary. The Rev. McLeod lives in Greenleaf, Mich., a township north of Port Huron and off the railway line. Mr. McLeod was called to trial by his presbytery for indorsing Duffy’s Whisky, and was allowed to ‘resign’ from the fellowship.” Duffy’s Whisky advertises as “the only whisky recognized by the government as a medicine,” though decisions by the Supreme Court of New York and the Internal Revenue Department of the federal government class it as being on a par with ordinary whisky and gin. It differs from ordinary whisky only in being sweetened. Regarding this much-advertised preparation Mr. Adams says:— “When this series of articles was first projected, Collier’s received a warning from ‘Warner’s Safe Cure,’ advising that a thorough investigation would be wise before ‘making any attack’ upon that preparation. I have no intention of ‘attacking’ this company or any one else, and they would have escaped notice altogether, because of their present unimportance, but for their letter. The suggested investigation was not so thorough as to go deeply into the nature of the remedy, which is an alcoholic liquid, but it developed this interesting fact: Warner’s Safe Cure, together with all the Warner remedies, is leased, managed, and controlled by the New York and Kentucky Distilling Company, manufacturers of standard whiskies which do not pretend to remedy anything but thirst. Duffy’s Malt Whisky is another subsidiary company of the New York and Kentucky concern. This statement is respectfully submitted to temperance users of the Malt Whisky and the Warner remedies.” Of the percentages of alcohol in some of the most commonly advertised nostrums of this class Mr. Adams states:— “Hostetter’s Bitters contain, according to an official State analysis, forty-four per cent of alcohol; Lydia Pinkham appeals to suffering womanhood with twenty per cent of alcohol; Hood’s Sarsaparilla cures ‘that tired feeling’ with eighteen per cent; Burdock’s Blood Bitters with twenty-five per cent; Ayer’s Sarsaparilla with twenty-six per cent; and Paine’s Celery Compound with twenty-one per cent. The fact is that any of these remedies could be interchanged with Peruna or with one another, so far as general effect goes, though the iodide of potassium in the sarsaparilla class might have some effect (as likely to be harmful as helpful) which would be lacking in the simpler mixtures.” It should be noted that the proportion of alcohol in these “medicines” is much greater than that in wine or beer. We come now to the consideration of a different class of patent nostrums, the so-called microbe killers. The advertisements of these preparations are based upon the claim that all diseases are the work of microbes, just as Peruna advertisements are based on the claim that all human ills result from catarrh. As frauds these preparations are no whit behind those of the alcoholic type. By far the most prominent of them at the present time is “liquozone,” which is advertised to cure almost every known disease, including cancer and consumption. The usual convincing testimonials are to be had in abundance, together with much “scientific” evidence of the curative virtue of this compound. Mr. Adams finds it interesting and enlightening to trace the genealogy of liquozone back to its first parentage. He says:— “Twenty years ago the microbe was making a great stir in the land. The public mind, ever prone to exaggerate the importance and extent of any new scientific discovery, ascribed all known diseases to microbes. The infinitesimal creature with the mysterious and unpleasant attributes became the leading topic of the time. Shrewdly appreciating this golden opportunity, a quack genius named Radam invented a drug to slay the new enemy of mankind, and gave it his name. Radam’s Microbe Killer filled the public prints with blazonry of its lethal virtues. As it consisted of a mixture of muriatic and sulphuric acids with red wine, any microbe which took it was like to fare hard; but the ingenious Mr. Radam’s method of administering it to its intended prey, via the human stomach, failed to commend itself to science, though enormously successful in a financial sense through flamboyant advertising. “In time some predaceous bacillus, having eluded the ‘killer,’ carried off its inventor. His nostrum soon languished. To-day it is little heard of, but from the ashes of its glories has risen a mightier successor, liquozone. Where twenty years ago the microbe reveled in publicity, to-day we talk of germs and bacteria; consequently liquozone exploits itself as a germicide and bacteriocide. It dispenses with the red wine of the Radam concoction, and relies upon a weak solution of sulphuric and sulphurous acids, with an occasional trace of hydrochloric or hydrobromic acid. Mostly it is water.” After giving a list of the diseases which liquozone “cures,” Mr. Adams continues:— “These diseases it conquers by destroying, in the human body, the germs which cause (or are alleged to cause) them. Such is liquozone’s claim. “Yet the Liquozone Company is not12a patent-medicine concern. We have their own word for it. “We wish to state at the start that we are not patent-medicine men, and their methods will not be employed by us. . . . Liquozone is too important a product for quackery.” “The head and center of this non-patent-medicine-cure-all is Douglas Smith. Mr. Smith is by profession a promoter. He is credited with a keen vision for profits. Several years ago he ran upon a worthy ex-piano dealer, a Canadian by the name of Powley (we shall meet him again, trailing clouds of glory in a splendid metamorphosis), who was selling with some success a mixture known as Powley’s Liquefied Ozone. This was guaranteed to kill any disease germ known to science. Mr. Smith examined into the possibilities of the product, bought out Powley, moved the business to Chicago, and organized it as the Liquid Ozone Company. Liquid air was then much in the public prints. Mr. Smith, with the intuition of genius, and something more than genius’s contempt for limitations, proceeded to catch the public eye with this frank assertion: ‘Liquozone is liquid oxygen—that is all.’” “It is enough. That is, it would be enough if it were but true. Liquid oxygen doesn’t exist above a temperature of 229 degrees below zero. One spoonful of it would freeze a man’s tongue, teeth, and throat to equal solidity, before he ever had time to swallow. If he could, by any miracle manage to get it down, the undertaker would have to put him on the stove to thaw him out sufficiently for a respectable burial. Unquestionably, liquozone, if it were liquid oxygen, would kill germs, but that wouldn’t do the owner of the germs much good because he’d be dead before they had time to realize that the temperature was falling. That it would cost a good many dollars an ounce to make is, perhaps, beside the question. The object of the company was not to make money, but to succor the sick and suffering. They say so themselves in their advertising. For some reason, however, the business did not prosper as its new owner had expected. A wider appeal to the sick and suffering was needed. Claude C. Hopkins, formerly advertising manager for Dr. Shoop’s Restorative (also a cure-all) and perhaps the ablest exponent of his specialty in the country, was brought into the concern, and a record-breaking campaign was planned. This cost no little money, but the event proved it a good investment.”