Sawbones: A Marital Tour of Misguided Medicine - Sawbones: The Chattanooga Medicine Company

Episode Date: July 19, 2019

This week on Sawbones, live from the historic Ryman Auditorium, hear the patent medicine company so insidious they made Dolly Parton sing about laxatives on one of the biggest stages in country music. Music: "Medicines" by The Taxpayers

Saubones is a show about medical history, and nothing the hosts say should be taken as medical advice or opinion. It's for fun. Can't you just have fun for an hour and not try to diagnose your mystery boil? We think you've earned it. Just sit back, relax, and enjoy a moment of distraction from that weird growth. You're worth it. that weird growth. You're worth it. Alright, time is about to books. One, two, one, or Miss Guy to Medicine. for the mouth. Hello everybody and welcome to Saul Bones, Mayoral Dura, Miss Guy de Medicine.

That's your co-host Sidney McAroy. I was trying to do a thing where it's her binocular t-shirt isn't it? Dang it! And I'm Justin McRoy whatever. It's fine. I know where I stand. It's fine. It's fine. I know where I stand.

Hello Nashville, Tennessee. Thank you for saying my name. I know where I stand. It's fine. It's fine. I know where I stand. Hello, Nashville, Tennessee. Thank you for saying my name just in case I forgot it. I appreciate that. We go on, we have played shows all over this beautiful country of ours. And we're returning to Nashville. We played here in 2017, and we're in a car driving over to the Adventure Science Center.

Is that the formerly the Cumberland Science Museum? And when I was a small boy. We've also been to Science Museums all over the space. We got to Science Museums all over the... Science Museums our aquarium, because we have a one year old and a four year old. And as we're pulling, as we're pulling up to the venue,

the adventure science museum, we both look at and say, oh wait a minute, we've been here before. We had literally, we've been to so many science museums and aquariums, but I gotta say folks, it's a great one. It really is, it's a, I have been as finest in this great land of ours.

Uh, so whenever we go on the road and do a live show, we like to talk about topics that relate to where we are and then the area we're in. And I want to talk to you, this theater is so beautiful. I'm distracted by... Yeah. It's intimidating. It's a... It's a very church-like...

Mm-hmm. Mother church, yeah. Yeah. I feel like I'm in... It's a home of American music. I-hmm. Mother church, yeah. Yeah. I feel like a music. It's a home of American music. I mean, it's a birthplace of American music. I know. I feel like I need to go to a birthplace of church music,

to a birthplace of a church of a church. To confession or something. It's a little intimidating. Why don't you confess what the episode's about? Good one. It's kind of, yeah. I'm just going to segue. I want to talk about the Chattanooga Medicine Company.

Now, I have a reason. I know I'm just going to segue. I want to talk about the Chattanooga Medicine Company. Now, I have a reason. I know I'm in Nashville. I was worried as I put this episode together, I was like, there's not some weird rivalry that I don't know about, right? OK, that was mixed. Thank you. OK.

The reason I want to talk about the history of the Chattanooga Medicine Company, because it was one of many medicine companies that kind of sprung up through the late 1800s that sold what we would probably call fake medicine. Now patent medicines, medicines that may or may not have worked, but were marketed well. But the tie-in, the reason that I think it's appropriate, is that the Chattanooga Medicine Company did what a lot of companies at the time started to realize was a good thing to do and put on medicine shows.

And this extended well into the mid-1960s, even, and one of the shows that they sponsored was the Porter Wagner show So you could watch the show and watch Porter Wagner or Dolly Parton sing Sing songs about laxatives and so I Thought this was the perfect tie-in. Perfect. Right? Yes. Agreed. So when did it start? Well, the...

I don't know. No, I'm going to tell you. Oh, it was rhetorical. OK. It dates back to February 21st, 1879. That's my mom's birthday, not 1879. Don't... You actually didn't say that fast enough.

Don't tell our sad dad. In the same syllable to keep you out of trouble. She's going to be mad. Zeboin Carter Patton was the founder of the company. And basically, he had been, he's from Illinois originally. And he came, well, he came down south. Hold on, it's he came down south. Hold on, it's all bones, folks.

He came down south during the Civil War as part of the Union Army. The good guys. The good guys. Sorry. I know there's mixed reactions here. I'm not sure what's happening. Well, I know, but the thing is, like, he came down south and it's because of the Civil War and then he stayed and I think I have a friend who's from Atlanta and whenever I started to tell a story like this, he goes, huh, carpet baggers.

So I think that... It's 2019. Why do you even have a bag full of carpets? It's 2019. Go to a store. It's nice, no scent. What is it we said? Yes, I said it. What?

It was you or Taylor said, oh, that's the whole ball of wax. And we saw for a second, like, why is there a ball of wax? Where's the ball from? I don't there a ball of wax? What's ball from? I don't have any balls of wax. So anyway. So Mr. Patton comes down south. Besides he wants to stay. He likes Chattanooga.

He wants to stay there. He wants to set up a company. And he gets four of his buddies. And they all become very prominent business men in the Chatt Nuke community for like decades to come. But the first thing they start is this Chad Nuke Medicine company. And at first it's a very humble operation.

It's like, it's this little two story building and they just have a couple of employees. And their initial goal is we need to get a couple of medicines that we can start selling right away that will be really big that we can start selling right away that will be really big and we can market really well. They don't wanna have a long list of products, just like let's start with ones we can really push. And so the first thing they go for is a laxative because those are very popular.

Laxatives, they're a history or a popular because you know they're working. It's one of the very few things where it's like, oh yeah, that one works. None of our medicines work, but laxatives, they work. The proof is, as I say, in the pudding. You can't hurt me, Nash. You're just done now. I'm done. You're done.

You're like, I'm not gonna prove you're in the pudding. I'm gonna join my Cabernet, so I'm going to go over here and reflect on the great thing I said out loud. Okie. Is it really Okie or did you just say it? How would I know? I would have no way. This is the 28th glass of wine I've ever drank. I have no idea if it Zoki or not. So they start with what they call Thedford's Black Draft.

A good name indeed. Black Draft was named for a dream. That great Kurt Russell movie we all love. Oh, sorry, I thought I was dead folks, but I'm full of them tonight. You keep going. That's actually all. Go ahead, Sid, sorry. No, that's the whole point of the show. You should keep doing it.

Oh, all Cal keep doing them. Dang, pressure's on me still. All right. So it was named for a drink that sailors would commonly have when they were on ship for long periods of time. Because a sailor's diet largely consisted of a lot of salted meats, which is not so great for keeping things regular.

And so there was some sort of drink that had a black powder sprinkled in it. And they'd, sailors would call it black draft draft and you would drink it every night before bed to make sure that, you know, the next morning things would... You sit on the side of the boat and do your thing. That can't be your... No, no, no. It was, we don't know where they went on a ship, the poop deck.

No. I will not allow that. So anyway, so they take this, this laxative, which was, it was used, Senna, which is a laxative. So I mean, I'm certain that it worked, making people poop. It probably did just that for most of the people who used it. So they started marketing, Ferds Black Draft and it was very popular and that took off pretty quickly.

The second medicine that they introduced was called, in 1880, was called Wine of Cardoey. And they later added, I love this. I need this. Sometimes I'll find something and I'll think, I want this merch to exist so I can own it. It's Dr. McElries, not McElroy. But so close. Dr. McElries, wine of Cardoey, which was a product for, you know, female problems.

Just any of them. Which a lot of, I mean they said it was anything related to menstrual relief. Just all parts of that that might bother you if you are a menstruating person, whatever it is. Just take this, it's fine. The story behind it, because when you listen to the stories behind these old patent medicines, there's always like, well, sit down kids. Let me tell you the tale of wine of Cardiouille. There was a Mrs. Francis Smith, this is the story, who observed that there was someone in her in her town who was suffering from great menstrual pains.

And she observed a member of the Cherokee Nation give this young woman some leaves and all of her menstrual pains were gone. And she thought, hmm, well that's really interesting. And her husband, I guess we'll call him Mr. Mrs. Smith. Anyway, Mr. Mrs. Smith. Anyway, Mr. Smith went and said, can we get some of those leaves maybe?

Apparently he didn't want to sell them, because that's where you think he's like, oh, he's going to sell these. But he doesn't, he just saves them and gives them to their granddaughter. This is a cool cat. Mrs. McOry, who then keeps them in a trunk for some period of time. And then at some point, her husband, it's always the husband. It's got to be the husband, right? And then her husband's like, you know, we should plant those seeds and see what happens.

So then he plants the seeds and he grows it and lo and behold, it's a medicine that is great for everything related to menstrual problems. And then I guess he gets to be called doctor because of that. It's never clear why Mr. McAury becomes Dr. McAury at this moment in the story, but then he does. And he sells the recipe, so recipe, formula, whatever, in 1882 to the Chattanooga Medicine Company. And so now they have Dr. Macquarie's wine of Cardoey.

And in order to make sure that they had a good reputation, the company wanted to make sure we're gonna start selling this new medicine and we want everybody to feel like, ooh, the Chattanooga Medicine Company, their products work, they had a guarantee, we're going to send you all of this product. And if you are not fully satisfied with your results, we'll refund all of your money.

So they sent out like 7,000 bottles of wine of Cardiouille in their first shipment. I mean, tons of this stuff to people all over who are suffering from anything related to menstruation. Literally any time of the month, not just before periods, during periods, after periods, when you think about periods, if you can have children, can't have children, any of it, it was good for.

So, I mean, anything, pain in the back, in the hips, in your butt, in your stomach, in your legs, they marketed it for all of that, it will work for any of it, and it was a huge success. People loved wine of Cardiouille so much so that they had all of these testimonies, and that was often how you would sell these patent medicines back in the day, because even as we move into the early 1900s, you start to see laws being passed that say, hey, you can't sell a medicine and lie about what it does.

And what's in it? And what's in it? That's bad. You need to tell the truth. But you can print whatever testimonials you want. That was no problem. That was like a legal loophole. So instead of saying, here's what our medicine does, they would say, we could tell you what wine of carduay can do for you.

But why don't we let all of our satisfied customers? Medicine's for medicines that ask you let my God for the mouth. And so I found tons of ads for wine of Cardiouille that were marketed mainly aiming at women again with any kind of menstrual related issues. But they would say, this is my favorite. Woman's modesty and ignorance of danger often cause her to endure pains and suffer torture. If you're not a woman, I would encourage you may be tempted to react in any way.

I would encourage you, please, stay perfectly. So introducing Dr. Macarois wine of car, don't microwave. Wine of car, I did not make this. It's a harmless bitter wine without intoxicating qualities, which is cool since it's 19% alcohol. I would have thought otherwise. It can relieve pain, correct derangements, quietness. You've paying correct arrangements? Quiet. You're just drinking this stuff. And someone's like, hey, Mrs. Peterson, you're drunk. She said, no, that's impossible.

No, I'm not. I'm not drunk. It's, look at it. I'm just curing it dating. It had a carbon monoxide leak. It's a carbon monoxide leak. It's a carbon monoxide leak. It's a carbon monoxide leak.

It's a carbon monoxide leak. It's a carbon monoxide leak. It's a carbon monoxide leak. It's a carbon monoxide leak. It's a carbon monoxide leak. It's a carbon monoxide leak. It's a carbon monoxide leak. It's a carbon monoxide leak.

It's a carbon monoxide leak. It's a carbon monoxide leak. It's a carbon monoxide leak. It's a carbon monoxide leak. It's a carbon monoxide leak. It's a carbon monoxide leak. It's a carbon monoxide leak. It's a carbon monoxide leak. It's a carbon monoxide leak. It's a carbon monoxide leak. that was really just alcohol with some herbs in it that you could call a medicine so you could legally purchase it and drink wine, you know. But there were herbs, there were other things,

there was blessed this oil and golden seal and some other ingredients, but I think the alcohol was the, that was probably the prominent effect. And it was extremely popular. They sold calendars and all menacs and song books. Oh. About the great period, why? Well, they were just like songs of the day. And then like on one page you'd have,

here's a very popular like gospel tune. on the other page like here's an ad about my period. There was one like I have examples. There was the music for popular song Rock Me to Sleep Mother. That's nice. That's pleasant. And next to that was a big testimonial from Mrs. C. Imlad, who said, I take pleasure in telling you and afflicted women that I owe my life, my health, and my happiness to wine of Cardoey. And she said, after my marriage, my health broke. Fair. She went to many physicians. No one could fix it. But then she got wine of Cardoey.

And she fell so much better. She owes it all to wine. Thanks, wine. That's hard to read. There are others that are very, they had very explicit descriptions of their symptoms. There was one Mrs. Grace Brown, who said, I could hardly walk from one room to the other without my womb coming down. That's a problem.

That's a problem. But then she started taking wine of Cardioui. And she doesn't say that her womb doesn't fall down after that. I think she just doesn't care. I feel great. I'm like, what's your problem? And then, what are my favorite Miss Martha Dingas of... Martha already had the the dex act against her. She she put her testimony was published and they had all these ladies ladies birthday all men acts which I was thinking like what a birthday all men act like birthdays

of and they do they have like famous birthdays they have all the holidays which I guess it's good to have a Google people. With all the holidays. And then they have a lot of like astrology. They have like a lot of zodiac signs and like what where like the moon will be like nativity charts. Different days of the month, that kind of thing. And then they would have like weather reports, like an almond-ac, like weather reports. And then they would also have a bunch of ads for whatever patent medicines had sponsored the almond-ac,

whoever was selling it. And so in the Ladies' Birthday Almanac in 1909, Miss Martha Dinkas says, I feel at my duty to inform you what Cartouille has done for me. I was a noted invalid for 20 years. A noted invalid. One of the very popular ones. But then four months ago, she commenced to take wine of Cardoey and now she's great. It's that easy. That's that easy. Thanks, wine. Did it again? Now, the problem that a lot of these patent medicine companies started to run up against

as we move into, this is 1916 when this occurs. And this is about the time when you start to see the FDA is formed and the pure food and drug act is passed. And the government kind of says, listen, we know what you're doing. We love it. We're wild about it. We're the government. We're gonna do a lot of wax stuff in the next ever. So, we're not against it, but we gotta look good. So, for appearances, we're gonna pass some laws that say,

you really gotta stop this. We know your line, we know this doesn't work, and we also know you're using the testimonials. So at that point, the Chattanooga Medicine Company, along with a lot of other patent medicine companies, gets in trouble and ends up in court with the American Medical Association. The AMA takes them to court, which the AMA was doing with a lot of different patent medicine sales companies

at that point, taking them on and saying, like, listen, we're doctors. We know this is not real. You can't sell fun medicine anymore. Only boring medicine, the fixest stuff. That really is what happened. We know this medicine is just alcohol. Stop it.

Oh. This is cocaine alcohol. Stop it. Oh. This is cocaine and pixie sticks mixed up in beer. It said it treats arthritis. You've done a very bad job. Take this medicine off the market. I have to imagine there was some like back room conversation where they were like, we know, we know. But like, we can't buy beer.

So beer's illegal. Just let it, just, we're not yet, but almost. But anyway, they were taking a court and they said, look, this is a fraud. What they're saying is deceitful. They're lying. They're misleading the public. And it was this huge trial.

And then in the midst of this, at one point, the court is briefly adjourned for, I don't know, whatever court's adjourned for briefly, before it recommences. And the company owner at the time, who was the nephew of Patten, the original Zebelin Patten, John Patten, he has taken over the company and while they're in, while they are adjourned briefly, he starts having this horrible stomach pain, is rushed to the hospital and ends up in surgery and then dies. And so this throws the whole thing into a tizzy and nobody knows what's going to happen

with this court case. The owner of the company has just died and the AMA is still mad and they did still lie and they're still selling this stuff. And what ends up happening is the whole thing, they declare the Chattanooga Medicine Company the winners of the suit at the end of it, but their damages that they get are one cent. So it was kind of like this draw at the end of the day, like they have been lying, they've been misleading people, yeah, well we don't think that, but at the same time we know what they're doing is wrong. So you get a penny, but also that guy did die.

So maybe what they did wasn't so bad if you think about it. So they keep selling their medicine. Yay! Chuck went up for the good guys. So nothing stops them at that point, even though the AMA is still issuing statements like we still think it's bad to sell medicine that's mostly alcohol. Everybody else is like, we don't, we're fine with it. Can't try and twice, that's double jeopardy. I know the law. I know my rights. We don't we're fine with it. Can't chime twice since double jeopardy. I know the law. I know my rights. We don't. That's why I'm drinking wine of Cardoede to this day.

So they continue to sell these products. They start to roll out more products to increase, you know, their profits to address more problems. In 1935, there's a doctor, an actual doctor, does develop a medicine. Dr. Irvine Grote makes a medicine that was called menthecal, and it was something that you were supposed to put on like sore muscles, kind of like an icy hot kind of thing. Except it's totally unpopular, nobody wants to buy menthecal, so they rename it s salt-ess and it becomes hugely popular, which I don't understand.

But for whatever reason, salt-ess becomes hugely popular and so they start marketing a lot of different like creams and bombs that you can rub on your sore muscles and they make a ton of money that way. They continue to expand and during World War II they actually make K-Rations for people, K-Rations. And so, the government hails them, like, ah, they're patriots. And so, like, now they're on the good side, and everybody's like, hey, it's fine. Keep selling your laxatives and your wine of cardouille, no problem.

And that's when, in 1960, they start thinking big. So the Chad Nukemetizen Company says, you know, it's great to hawk these products in our magazines, in our Almanac, in our calendars. They're still selling all this stuff, but now there's television. And we could probably reach a lot more people and sell a lot more stuff if we could sell our products

on television. So they actually start the Chattanooga Medicine Company network, the CMC network, to sell their products on TV, and that is when they start what was initially called the Black Draft Sultis Porter Wagoner Show. Just trips off the tongue. The direct TV cuts it off right after a black draft. If you look for it today, just search for black draft because the whole title isn't on there.

You can find, it's actually, it's really interesting. So of course, as I start reading about this, I'm like, well, I got to find this. It's hard to find the original season of the, like, these started airing in 1961, and to find episodes on YouTube from 1961, it's hard. We didn't preserve anything back then. I mean, there's episodes of Dr. Hoo that have been lost to time because we didn't archive them. There's not a joke there.

It's just true. You'll never see all of Dr. Hoek. Because there's a lot from the whatever. You don't care. Whatever. Just do your medicine thing. You've been a real bummer right now. I'm just saying, if you want to see all William Hartnell's

Dr. Hoek episodes, they're not archived. They're lost to time in memorial, preserving media is important. So I went in search. I said, I gotta find, because I kept reading these accounts of Porter Wagoner and Dolly Parton, selling Black Draft Laxative,

and I thought I have to be able to find this, and I found a clip to be able to find this and I found I found a clip of Dolly Martin selling Black Draft Laxative and Paul would you mind playing us some Dolly Parton please? You gotta listen this is so good Smile from the inside out, smile from the inside out, black drought makes you It ain't that beautiful. Know what that's about? A laxative. Really, black drought is a laxative. But anyhow, oh, it's saying it's so beautiful.

They tried to make it sound pretty. I think it sold a lot of products and kept us on the air. Also, there was something else we sold. I sold from the Jadaattanooga Medicine Company, the sponsor of the show, and I tell you I was so embarrassed, I thought that I would die. I would dread it all week long, having to do the show, because I had to stand up, hold this box of card you are, which is for that woman's time of the month. Water retention, swelling, bloat, you know, that stuff. Well, it was a good product.

Oh, I just would rather die than to done that, but we had to do it. You got to make your living. I'm not so shy anymore. And thanks to the Chattanooga Medicine Company and Porter, I wrote this particular song because I think it's about time somebody wrote it. Thank you, Paul. Thank you.

Thank you, Paul. She really makes that laxative sound beautiful. It's a beautiful laxative. I mean, it does. The cool thing at the end of the Chad Nuke Medicine Company story is the cool thing is that later it would become known as Chatham Inc. which is still around today. There's still making medicines in Chad Nuke today. So there's still a medicine company. They're not selling black draft as far as I know. They're not selling wine of carduroy.

I know, they're not selling wine of Khartuay. I know. But they're selling stuff like, you know, Asper cream and Selcin Blue and Gold Bond, Icy Hot, Unisom, Allegra. Lots of stuff you probably use. So like real medicines now. So it's like a happy end to the story. Is it? That's a funny way of looking at it.

So for you, a happy story is one in which a bunch of con men dig up some weird leaves out of a lady's trunk and then plan them and make some with booze and sell them to ladies for like a thousand years. And then they sell pirate laxatives to people that, and they sell those for a long, long time, and then a guy beefs it, mid-trial, and everyone's so sad that they give them a penny and let them keep doing crimes for like a thousand years.

And then later, they make make later they get to make a bajillion dollars selling old people creams and you feel like very happy story, very good narrative, another solbos well done. Just so I sort of understand what constitutes a happy ending for you. I mean, you know what we do here, it's all relative, that is a happy ending for some of our own. That's how it goes. Well thank you so much for listening to our show. We hope you've enjoyed yourself such an honor to be here.

Thank you to Paul. Thank you to the great staff here at the Ryman. We've got a book. It's called Sobons, the Book, or the Sobons book, actually. Yeah, the Sobons. It's on Amazon. You can buy it there. Thank you, the taxpayers for these

or our song medicines, is the intro and outro of our program. There will now be a brief intermission. We encourage you to go buy a bunch of things in the lobby, but that is going to do it for us. So as always, my name is Justin McRoyne. I'm Sydney McRoyne. It's the next time. Don't, Joe LaHole, in your head. Alright!

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