Lydia Pinkham's Fabulous Compound by John Dinan It didn't come as a surprise when Radcliffe College's Schlesinger Library became the repository of the papers of Lydia Pinkham, of Vegetable Compound fame. It didn't matter that her fabled "medicine" contained no vegetables and wasn't a compound; Lydia Pinkham is deemed by Radcliffe as a woman who has done much for womanhood by developing and marketing her fabulous concoction. When asked why Radcliffe wanted Lydia's papers, the curator's eyes opened wide in surprise: "Why, for all she's done for women, of course." During the turn-of-the-century years, patent medicines proliferated over the American landscape. Almost every community had a regional brewer of some elixir or other that could cure anything and everything from flat feet to a leaning chimney. While these "medicines" were worthless as remedies for any ills, real or imagined, it has been suggested that the alcohol base (often as great as 21 percent) provided a certain psychological sedation and the geniality of a cocktail at a time when female drinking was frowned upon. After the panic of 1873, Lydia, faced with severe economic hardship, put together a mixture she called "the greatest medicine since the dawn of mankind." Selling for $1, her Vegetable Compound was touted as a mighty elixir for all Victorian "woman problems": "Some of the conditions which disappoint the hope of children are displacement of the womb, constriction of the ovaries, local catarrhal conditions, obstructed menstruation, and abnormal growth of tumors." Lydia suggested that women take the compound daily and "let the doctors alone;" in fact, much of her pitch was based on a distrust of the medical profession. What was in this compound? The formula, locked behind double-steel doors in the Lynn, Mass., plant, revealed a hodgepodge of roots--life root, Senecio gracilis; pleurisy root, Aselepias tuberosa; false unicorn root, Helonia dioca; and so forth--and the magic touch of ethyl alcohol, "used solely as a solvent and preservative." This formula was adjusted over the years to comply with various acts and laws as they were promulgated, including the Pure Food and Drug Act of 1906, and the regulations of the Bureau of Chemistry, circa 1914, keeping the compound one step ahead of the law. Meanwhile, the powerful American Medical Association took a what-the-heck attitude: "Another day, another ingredient, but still essentially the same old female weakness nostrum. Grandma used it, her daughter tolerated it, but her granddaughter should know better..." (AMA Journal, Dec. 17, 1938). Given all of this, what is the value of the Lydia Pinkham papers? The answer lies in the personal correspondence solicited by Lydia. The Pinkham factory employed all female help, including the staff hired to answer questions in the fashion of a Dear Abby column, and thus provided a history of sorts of women's preoccupations of the day. The Pinkham papers are ensconced in the Schlesinger Library, but ample copies of booklets, trade cards, etc. published by Pinkham can be had at paper shows for only a few dollars. Two of these publications contain user dialogue: Facts and Fancies and Lydia E. Pinkham's Private Textbook Upon Ailments Peculiar to Women. One testimonial read thus: "Eight years ago I got into an awful condition with what the doctor said was falling of the womb. I would have spells of bearing-down pains until he would have to give me morphine, and when I could not stand that they would put hot cloths to me. The doctor said I would never have any children without an operation. A neighbor, who knew what your medicine would do, allowed me to give Lydia E. Pinkham's Vegetable Compound a trial. I did so and I have never had a return of my old trouble. The next September I gave birth to as healthy a boy as you can find, and now I have two more children." The fabled Vegetable Compound delivers once again! It was the principle product of the Pinkham line of nostrums, which included a blood purifier, liver pills and a sanative wash. According to Lydia E. Pinkham's Private Textbook Upon Ailments Peculiar to Women, the maladies that could be treated effectively by Pinkham products ranged from anemia to rheumatism and included kidney diseases, colds, impure blood, mental derangement, hysteria and nervous disease, sterility, tumors and dyspepsia, to name but a few. Lydia was an influential woman in Lynn, Mass., involving herself in the spiritualist world and civil rights activities. Most of the purveyors of patent medicines found themselves wealthy and influential people. In at least one case, a town was named after one of these people: Ayer, Mass., home of Fort Devens, was cut out of Lowell, Mass., and named after "Dr." Frederick J.C. Ayer of Blood-Enriching Sarsaparilla fame. Lydia sold her patent medicine well into the 20th century and, with the respectful archiving of her papers by Radcliffe, her immortality is assured. The bottom-line question of whether or not the compound did any good can be answered "Probably yes." The power of suggestion coupled with the medicinal effects of an afternoon cocktail probably did much to create a generalized euphoria. And who knows? All those roots may have had some curative effects after all. Just look at the proliferation of "natural remedies" available today, and how major drug companies investigate barks, herbs and who knows what else!