This late 19th Century medicine is part of a large collection of bottles of liniments, nostrums, syrups, balms and tooth drops peddled by unscrupulous druggists, adventurers, but mostly quacks. Unregulated, many of the medications had addictive and potent narcotis (cocaine, morphine, opium or heroin). Claims were exagerated, cure was promised from toothache to tuberculosis, to everything. Jadway’s Elixir for Infants contained morphine and was notorius for causing addiction, overdose and some infant death at the end of the 19th Century. Along with the infamous Mrs. Winslow’s Soothing Syrup, Jadway’s was fined for exagerating claims and misrepresenting the truth in advertising. In 1906 Congress put an end to the free-for-all unregulated patent-medicine market. It paved the way for the future agency known as the Food and Drug Administration (FDA). Why we care about these bottles? Because today prescription-opiates, eventhough are regulated, still caused an epidemic. We never learn. Description by Andrew Spielman
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