Laws of Etiquette by a Society Lady: Selling Patent Medicine in the Nineteenth-Century
“Do not think a very small waist is the perfection of a good form…” — Selling health, selling hygiene
Eight booklets promote the patent medicines “Kohler-Antidote for Headache and Neuralgia” and “Kohler One Night Corn Cure.” Both of these fine products were manufactured by Kohler Manufacturing Co. of Baltimore, Maryland.
The colorful booklets, all similarly printed and bound in the same format, are in the form of popular advice or humor books. Each booklet touts two of Kohler’s patent medicines, four giving more prominence to “Kohler-Antidote” and four to the company’s “Corn Cure.”
Here we see booklets offering advice on etiquette and beauty and hygiene; humor and poetry; and fate or fortune telling books.
If you’re going to sell patent medicine in late 19th-century America make it colorful –make it colorful.
“Do not think a very small waist is the perfection of a good form…” This admonishment was a favorite in 19th-century America, possibly 18th-century, too.
The eight titles are: Laws of Etiquette by A Society Lady, What Your Dream Meant, Wit and Humor, Laugh and Grow Fat, Pointers on Beauty and How to Keep Healthy,Forget-Me-Not Rhymes for the Memory Book, What the Gypsy Prophesies for You, A Game of Wedlock or Peeping into the Future, and Love’s Fate.
A fine collection of colorful booklets offering popular entertainment while at the same time modestly advertising popular, patent medicine cures for everyday ailments made by Kohler Manufacturing Co.