Piso's—For Coughs due to Colds

Piso’s—For Coughs due to Colds

This medication was first manufactured by Hazeltine & Co in 1864 apparently started out labeled as a remedy for consumption although it was really only ever a cough remedy and the jury is still out on that.  One source says “Piso's was essentially a pretty good cough and cold syrup” and another source says “. Piso's Cure was poisonous and caused many deaths, especially in children. One of the main ingredients was chloroform, which can cause death or permanent damage to your liver and kidneys”.

Our bottle has an intact label that indicates chloroform at 5/8 minim per maximum dose.  The maximum recommended dose for adults is 1 teaspoonful every 2 or 3 hours as required.  This sent me looking for the definition of a minim.

1. Abbr. M. or min. A unit of fluid measure, as:

a. In the United States, ¹/₆₀ of a fluid dram (0.0616 milliliters).

b. In Great Britain, ¹/₂₀ of a scruple (0.0592 milliliters).

I think that works out to .064 teaspoons of chloroform in a 24-hour day for an adult.  That doesn’t sound like a lot and apparently this medication also contained Cannabis Indica (marijuana), Morphine, Opium and alcohol.

Our label gives no other ingredients besides the Chloroform and that was commonly used as a preservative for oral liquid pharmaceutical preparations. As a preservative, it is included in most products at a final concentration of 0.25 per cent v/v.

[There’s another measurement—fluid drams, scruples, minims, teaspoons, v/v. I’m beginning to be grateful for teaspoons.]

Our bottle gives directions, in two different places, to shake the bottle.  They obviously don’t want any ingredients to settle out.

Our bottle’s label says it is prepared by “The Piso Company” with the new package adopted in 1915.  This is well after the passing, in the United States, of The Pure Food and Drug Act of June 30, 1906 that provided federal inspection of meat products and forbade the manufacture, sale, or transportation of adulterated food products and poisonous patent medicines.[1]” It probably means that a lot of ingredients were changed. Even the name had been changed although the embossed name Piso’s on the sides of the bottle remained.  Apparently, this feature makes the bottles quite collectable because they can be identified even without the label.

There is a wonderful article written by Jack Sullivan that can be downloaded in PDF form called Piso’s Trio:  One Step Ahead of the Law.

http://www.fohbc.com/PDF_Files/PisoTrior_JSullivan.pdf

Leonard Ear Oil

Leonard Ear Oil is the first patent medicine in the collection that I found that was condemned as useless by a medical authority.

 In 1925, DR. ARTHUR J. CRAMP (Director of the Bureau of Investigation, American Medical Association) condemned Leonard Ear Oil and eardrum as useless quackery and commented, “The fact that manufacturers of such useless products succeed in a financial way is an interesting commentary on the low level of human intelligence that exists in certain classes of our population.” 

The insert in the box with the oil states, “while not claim is made that every case will be helped, it has been successful in bringing relief to many troubled with conditions of this kind”.  Conditions of this kind refer to “chronic catarrhal conditions…that interferes with the drainage and ventilation of the nasal passages, mucous accumulating and blocking the Eustachian tube”.

Directions for use involve putting a small amount of the oil (ear oil?) in the nostrils and rubbing it on the neck behind the ears.  I guess this makes sense because the ingredients are camphor, oil of eucalyptus, spirits of ammonia, (mixed with highest grade of mineral oil), all of which will certainly clear your sinuses.  The insert also suggests treating earache with heat and wax build-up with hydrogen peroxide not Leonard’s Ear Oil but says that the Ear oil could be tried for rheumatic or other pains by rubbing it into the affected part!

Leonard’s Invisible Ear Drum looks completely bogus. I am including the part of the insert that describes it.  Judge for yourself.

The A. O. Leonard Co. seems to have been somewhat successful for at least a couple of decades.  The box states that it had successful sales since 1907 and it was still advertising in 1929.  The company seems to have originated in New York but did have a Canadian distributor in Toronto—Maltby Brothers, Limited.  The company is no longer indexed on the Internet.

Frese's Hamburg Tea

I don't have an insertion for this because the box is still sealed and I was reluctant to open it. The product is supposed to be a 'True Herbal Medicine' for disorders of the Digestive System.  Regulates the bowels for constipation, headache, Indigestion, Dyspepsia, Biliousness, Blood and Skin Ailments. There are directions for use on the bottom of the box:

"Take one tablespoon full of Tea, pour on two or three cups full of boiling water, cover the vessel, and put it in a warm place to draw for about two or three hours, then pour it through a sieve or a piece of screen and give to a full grown person a cup full each in the morning and evening, children less in proportion.  Should this dose not prove sufficient to produce an opening of the bowels two or more time, augment the dose, according to circumstances and repeat every two hours until it has the desired effect.

NB—No tin or metal vessel should be used."

The Frese family is listed in the genealogy of San Francisco as druggists and herbalists and Frese’s Hamburg Tea was manufactured in San Francisco first by Redington & Co and then by Coffin Redington. Co. 

In 1877, the company won a suit in U.S Circuit Court against a defendant over the use of the name, Frese’s Hamburg Tea.  The box prominently displays the words TRADE MARK and “Not genuine without Facsimile Signature [Emil frese superimposed over Redington tea].

There is a heritage building in San Francisco built by this company and subsequently converted into residential lofts.

The “tea” was offered for sale in Germany and as a result of that we have from The Handbook of Secret Medicines by Wittstein, 1871, an analysis of the contents. Hamburg Tea contains 8 parts Senna, 3 parts Manna and 1 part Coriander.

Senna: 

The sennas, is a large genus of around 250 species of flowering plants. This diverse genus is native throughout the tropics, with a small number of species reaching into temperate regions. Sennas act as purgatives and are similar to Aloe and Rhubarb.

Manna:

Manna is often used to refer to the secretions of various plants, especially of certain shrubs, particularly the sugars obtained by evaporating the sap of the Manna Ash.  The Manna Ash, native to southern Europe and southwest Asia, produces a blue-green sap with has medicinal value as a mild laxative, demulcent, and a weak expectorant.

Coriander:

Coriander is an annual herb also known as Chinese parsley or cilantro. Coriander has been used as a folk medicine for the relief of anxiety and insomnia in Iran. Coriander seeds are used in traditional Indian medicine as a diuretic.  In holistic and traditional medicine, it is used as a carminative [combats flatulence] and as a digestive aid.

I didn’t find anything in the tea to directly affect blood or skin but perhaps once your digestive troubles are cleared up, the other symptoms disappear.