The Marvel of the Age and the Wonder of the World - nice to know that Ephraim S. Wells of Jersey City, New Jersey was not shy about extolling his Leaurelle (Laurel?) Oil, in this ad (ca 1890-1900). I was not able to ascertain what was in it, exactly; but it seems to have been the Oil of Olay of its day, marketed to ladies who wanted to look youthful and wrinkle-free. It is a shame that Wells made it sound like such a Herculean task to correct wrinkles and lines. Not very flattering to the customers to think that they require some sort of incredible miracle to look lovely!
Ephraim S. Wells was not only known for his beauty preparations - he was actually better known for the pesticides that he produced. Rough On Rats (which was essentially arsenic) was the most widely known of these. I recognized the name E.S. Wells from the posts I wrote about the tragic death of my great-grandfather's first cousin, Sarah Hicks, in December 1887. You can read about her here:A Brooklyn Juliet, Part 1
A Brooklyn Juliet, Part 2
Wells was prosecuted by the American Medical Association in the early 1900s, with reference to the Wells Hair Balsam. It was marketed as being "a vivifying tonic," neither a dye nor "harmful to the hair or scalp" in any way. However, it contained perfumed sulphur mixed with what the AMA called "a watery solution of lead acetate (sugar of lead) and glycerin." The AMA noted in its 1912 Nostrums and Quackery (p. 574) that the Hair Balsam was not a balsam, but was in fact a dye, and a poisonous one at that.
You can read more about Rough On Rats here:
Rough On Rats advertising and sheet music
The Premature Death Notice: Matthew Low, Part 1
A Dog and Cat Life: Matthew Low, Part 2 [not really about Rough On Rats per se, but the aftermath of his having taken it]
Image of Leaurelle Oil ad from IHM (Images from the History of Medicine at National Museum of Medicine). Advertisement from New York, 1890.
Image of ads for various E.S. Wells products from The Pharmaceutical Age, July 1, 1893, p. n27. Larger version is here. In this ad, the Hair Balsam is called a Color Restorer, which seems to imply pretty strongly that it was a dye. I assume that the hyperbole got stronger in the later ads, which would have been the ones that the AMA saw in the 1910s.
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5 comments:
~Cheers to a new year and new chance to do it right~
Isn't is amazing how the products back then never went through any quality assurance testing. So crazy, really. Even the ads, although creative in their own right, were so off kilter in some odd way. They seemed to threatened the customers into buying the products, and when they finally did, man did they regret it.
Dorothy L - Yes, indeed! And all the best to you, too :)
Dr. Lauren - Yes, I was thinking that too. Actually they did try to crack down a bit on Rough on Rats in Brooklyn, in the late 1880s, due to the number of suicides (it was very very easy to obtain), among them Sarah Hicks, whose story received a lot of press (partly due to the attempted cover-up by her father and BIL).
Good grief! How horrifying. I'd not buy a beauty product from him if you paid me!
Richard - Well, exactly. And yet - there were so many products like these. That issue of The Pharmaceutical Age is full of the most astonishing things!
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