19th century America witnessed many rambunctious manifestations of the entrepreneurial spirit. One of the most flamboyant was the "patent medicine" industry. Patent medicines are NOT medicines that have been patented. They are instead proprietary (i.e., "secret formula") and unproved remedies advertised and sold directly to the public. The growth of the patent medicine industry was rooted in the medical shortcomings of the early 19th century. There were few doctors and those expensive. Prospects were not cheerful even for those who could afford professional medical care. Knowledge of human physiology and of the causes and progress of disease was extremely limited (it was not until 1861 that the theory of germs was first published by Louis Pasteur). Routine health care in the 19th century was generally provided by the mother of the family, relying on home remedies, recipes for which could often be found in cookbooks. Even the most skillful mother realized, however, that she could not combat the terrible diseases that became endemic during the course of the 19th century - typhoid, typhus, yellow fever, cholera. The fear that these diseases rightfully engendered led directly to the success of the patent medicine industry. Where before, housewives and grandmothers had supplied their friends and relations with homemade remedies, now the spirit of profit took hold. Entrepreneurs with business savvy began to bottle and sell "old family recipes." And, if the recipe were a commercial success, bottling factories would appear, then networks of traveling salesmen, and then distribution systems for wholesaling the product. The profiteering spirit overcame the scientific and philanthropic. Medicine making became big business.
And it became big business in an age when business was almost totally unregulated. During the 19th century, any drug could be sold on the open market. Any claim could be made.
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Updated 18 May, 2005
