As the drug cures are the most vicious form of quackery, so the private disease
treatments
are the foulest.
Adams-Great-American-Fraud
"T do not advertise in any news- paper," he says proudly.
Somebody does it for him, then, for I find his advertisements in the Sunday papers: "Opium, morphin, cocain habits absolutely cured.
" The Coats firm is purely a mail order concern.
You send them your money for morphin cure and they send you their remedy, containing the very drug that you are striving to discard, in the quan- tity which you have been taking.
The Coats "cure" contains 2.
5 grains of morphin per dose, a terrific quantity--and it bears no poison label.
Poison Sent Out Unlabeled.
Something of the nature of the agile grasshopper inheres in the Opa Specialty Co. , which sells Opacura. " It answers my first letter from
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Chicago, my second from San Antonio, and my third from South Haven, Michigan. Possibly it operates on the sound economic principle that it is cheaper to move than to pay rent. "Opacura," the reader is informed, "is very palatable and easily taken, and positively contains no belladonna, calomel, enabis indicis [cannabis indica? ] or atropin in any form. " Nor ice cream, nor dish-water, ncr dry Martini cocktail ! But it does contain morphin, in. most formidable proportion. The Opa Company informs me modestly, replying to my desire for information as to the presence of morphin in the "cure:" "There is a little to give support while the Tonic acts upon the system. " A little! Nearly two grains per dose. "It will not injure the patient in any manner/" declares "^he scoundrel who writes me, and he distributes this deadly poison unlabeled. Mor- phina-Cura, which is advertised as "A Reliable Cure for Opium" is itself morphin. It must be credited with the merciful precaution of labeling its poison wdth skull and bones.
How much there is in a good name ! "Drug Crave Crusade" is almost worth the money. Their advertisement, signed D. C. C. Co. , appears in the Bmart Set, which offers an eager hospitality to this class of villainy. "Our remedy forms no other habit whatever," writes the Dr. Baker, who runs the foul business. Certainly not. It simply keeps up the same h^bit. The patient is encouraged to take all he can stand of the stuff. "Enough to give comfortable support" is what I am encouraged to take. Thus Ihe poor victim who supposes himself to be conquering the morphin habit is really continuing his habit, and paying the Drug Crave Crusade a big price for the privilege. Their "cure" runs to about a grain of mor- phin per dose.
"The sedative which is in the remedy is to take the place of morphin," is the Drug Crave Crusade's reply to my query. "We are enclosing here- with an extract from the New York Health journal, which we feel sure will settle any doubt in your mind as to the remedy containing any opiates. " It does. It would settle any. doubt in my mind, were there any. as to the nature of the Drug Crave Crusade. Any enterprise en- dorsed by that ghost of a journalistic prostitute, the New York Health Journal, is, by that very token, damned for a swindle.
"Denarco" is the nostrum of the Comstock Remedy Co. of Lafayette, Indiana. Having filled out one of their blanks Avith the description of a case taking 12 grains of morphin a day, I receive, via form-letter, the encouraging though somwhat astonishing information that "your answers show there is nothing serious the matter with you. " Nothing serious the matter with a man Avho takes in twenty-four hours enough morphia to kill a dozen normal men! There is something the matter with the Comstock Remedy Co. . and this is it, that they are a band of murderous medical pirates. Their "Denarco," described as "reliable and absolutely harmless," contains . 19 grain of morphin per dose, which I am invited to take day and night, if I need it. Of course, the prominent bankers and the Postmaster of Lafayette are used as backing in the advertising matter of the company.
The Amazing Contrell.
It is always a pleasure to meet a straight-out whole-souled liar. As such R. G. Contrell, M. D. , the genial medical vampire who acts as "director" of the Harris Institute of 400 West Twenty-third Street, New York City, is entitled to respectful consideration. "We never advocate a reduction or tapering-off treatment, but eliminate the drug from the start," he asseverates in the Institute's booklet, further stating that in undergoing a course of the treatment, "there is no more danger than in takingaglassofwater. . . . Theresultsarepositivelyandabsolutely
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^iinranteed. " The only safe guarantee to make for the Harris treatment would be that the dupe wli^ takes it will fulfil the Scriptural description: "The last state of this man was worse than the first. " Perpend Contrell, 1M. D. , on the innocence of his "dope:" "Owin^ to the general effect cf Ihe medicine many people imagine that our medicine contains opium when notliing is far \sic] from the truth. " Contrell, M. D. , is "far from the truth. " His non-reduction and non-tapering-off treatment contains 1. 7 grains of mcrphin to the double teaspoonful dose, to be taken four times a dny.
AVithin easy reach of the Harris man-trap by a Twenty-third Street crosstown car, the Professor M. W. Waterman Institute does business. Professor AYaterman, so his circular inform^s all and sundry, was formerly l^oputy Coroner of New York City. Very likely; and he is now pre- sumably furnishing subjects for his successors. "jNIy treatment is the only absolute specific and cure for drug habits. It is the only one that contains fhe vital principle. " Many cures, he sadly observes, are "sim- ply morphin in solution. They dupe their patients into paying exorbi- tant prices for the identical drvig they are seeking to be rid of. " This is, indeed, spoken from the lofty heights of wise philanthropy. But down he comes from those heights'^ on being asked whether his own "cure" isu"t morphin in solution, "l^ou will note," he writes me, "that the only narcotic contained in the remedy is bi-maconic acid. This is a bi- product [sic] of opium, but is not as injurious as morphia ncr is it as strong. " Impressive term, bi-maconic acid! But, strangely enough, it is unknown to the regular chemists. I suspect that Professor Waterman span it out of his own inside, like a spider. He is most certainly of the spider genus, and the human Hies that get in his web are fed on morphin, as the "vital principle" of his "cure. " My sample contains . 65 grain morphia per teaspoonful dose, which I am advised to repeat as often as 1 feel like it.
Quacks Who Pretend to be Physicians.
There is a grim pleasure in illuminating the devious ways in which those quacks who pretend to ^legitimate standing work their little games. They are hard to catch, and of the two whose description follows, one would never have been embodied in this article but for the efforts of cer- tain physicians of Cleveland, where he practices. To be accurate. Glen- ville, a suburb of Cleveland, is the stamping-ground of J. Edward Allport, YI. D. The Glenville paper is full of paragraphs about his private hospi- tal. He is an ingenious fellow, a dispenser of platitudes to Sunday-school classes, and a churchgoer, as part of his advertising, for he follows the precept laid down by Sam Weller's friend the "depity saw-bones," and has himself called out of the service on urgent business, so that people shall wonder at the demands of his practice. Allport's specialty is drug addictions. No case is too bad for him to tackle by mail. He fell easily into a trap set for him and undertook to cure a bad case of morphin "habit without seeing the patient. His dosage, prescribed by letter, carries -about 1. 1 grains of morphin six times a day. With the morphin vial he sends me a bottle of pink whisky, to mix with the morphin when it gets low, a pretty villainous combination. Dr. J. Edward Allport does not advertise openly, but he is no less scoundrelly, and is even more dangerous,
than Richie, the twin "Saints," and Waterman.
More easily caught was Dr. J. C. Hoffman of Chicago, Dr. Hoffmaft
yearns to be considered "ethical. " "My social and professional standing protect me from the insult of being classed with advertising quacks," he writes in a fine burst of dignity. Therefore, he hires a stool-pigeon to do his advertising for him. Readers of the Sunday papers will remember her ingenious little advertisement, ''Myself cured, I will g\a. dj infqrni
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any one addicted to cocain, morphin, opium, or laudanum of a never- failing, harmless home cure. Mrs. Mary O. Baldwin, Box 1,212, Chicago. " Upon receiving an inquiry Mrs. Baldwin, in a manuscript letter, refers the "come-on" to Dr. Hoffman. She says she dees this out of gratitude for her own cure. I surmise that she does it because she is paid to do it. Then Dr. Hoffman takes hold. His "follow-up" system of form-letters is typical. He is sure he can cure you by mail. "The remedy so perfectly controls the system that the patient feels better than under the deadening influence of the former drug. " Yes, indeed ! The gentleman of protective social and professional standing keeps his patients feeling happy, by a steady if not judicious dosage of morphin. The treatment he sent me contained about two grains of morphin to the maximum dose, to be repeated three to four times a day= The Hoffman-Baldwin partnership may be one of gratitude, but it is, I suspect, a gratitude based on the hope of profits to come. A pretty grisly pair of ghouls are Dr. Hoffman and his accomplice, Mrs. Baldwin.
DR. J. EDWARD ALLPORT.
A supposedly "ethical" practitioner of Cleveland, who "cures" morphin fiends
by mail, with morphin.
When this article was announced Dr. B. M. Woolley of Atlanta, Georgia, wrote me advancing arguments to show why he should not be included among the quack drug cure practitioners, and asserting that his one unethical feature is the fact that he advertises. What he advertises to do is to cure the morphin habit. His "cure" consists in 1. 9 grains of mor- phin per teaspoonful dose, to be repeated four times a day. If Dr. Woolley has any further arguments to adduce, tending to disprove my theory that the world would be a better place if he were safely in jail, I hope he will send them to me.
A Safe Rule to Follow.
Necessarily I have omitted many of the minor vampires of the drug addiction school. I can, perhaps, cover them all in one warning; the man who advertises a sure cure for any drug habit is a swindler. Ten to one he is also a substituter and will push his victim further into the depths, for the few dollars to be got out of it. Reputable sanitariums there are in plenty for this purpose; most physicians know of them. The addict who can not be cured in them can not be cured anywhere, and might better buy his poison at the regular rate than at a fancy price
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froir the vicious quack of tlic advertisini>- scht nl. When the" Pure Food law ^oes into effect, the business must, perforce, cease, for, honestly labeled, the "dope" bottles carrying the cure would be bought by few.
The Sunday newspapers and small weeklies teem with advertisements of "drink cures," which are supposed to exercise the alcoholic craving when secretly given in tea or coffee. Few of these concoctions can be described as immediately dangerous, though none of them is really safe. All are swindles. They do not cure the drink habit. Once in a while some drunkard will succeed in breaking his fetters synchronously with the taking of the "remedy," and the wonderful "cure" is heralded to the world. But the percentage of these cases is so small as to be practically negligible. Orrine is such a cure, conspicuously exploited. Another is Dr. Haines' Golden Specific. Parker Willis conducts a little bunco trade in this line at Indianapolis, and the Milo Drug Co. of St. Louis helps to make good that community's claim to the proud title of the City of Quacks. Toledo boasts H. C. Keith, who not only has a quack treatment for drink, but further exhibits himself as a swindle by guaranteeing to cure all drug addictions. One might at first suppose that the Kansas Anti- Liquor Society's project for furnishing a drink cure prescription free was a worthy charity. In reality it is only a petty fake-, since the "pre- scription" is one that no drug store could put-up, so the patient must buy it from the "Society"--at a heavy advance upon the cost of the drugs. Of course it will fail to effect any good results in a vast majority of cases. In the foot-note to the prescription the patient is assured that it is harmless to "the most delicate and sensitive constitution," which may possibly be true; but before I took repeated doses containing, even in minute quantities, such poisons as aloin, strj^chnin, hydrastin and cocain, I should want to know what my doctor thought about it.
Quacks with Stool-Pigeons.
The reader has very likely seen in the public prints an alleged picture of Mrs. Margaret Anderson of Hillburn, New York, who "cured her hus- band of drinking," and wants to tell you how to cure yours, free. "She has nothing whatever to sell," says the advertisement. True. But the Physicians' Co-operative Association, a quack organization of Chicago, for which Mrs. Anderson is stool-pigeon, has something to sell. That some- thing is Alcola. "The Conqueror of King Alcohol. " Mrs. Anderson's correspondents are recommended by her, in a skillful imitation of a hand- written letter, to buy Alcola and be saved. Alcola is the same kind of fake as the rest of the "given in secret" cures.
Of "institutions" for the regeneration of drunkards there are many. Some of them are entirely reputable, but these do not make blanket promises of cure. The famous "Keeley Cure," which formerly made the most extravagant claims, is now conducted on a much saunder basis, and actually produces results in a certain percentage of cases, though its for- mer claim of more than eighty per cent, cured and less than twenty per cent, lost would be much nearer the truth if reversed. As the Keeley institutes do not now, so far as I can judge, promise to cure all forms of drunkenness nor attempt to take pay for cases which they know to be incurable, I do not include them in the swindling category.
Hundreds of letters come to Collier's, inquiring about various advertised cures in all fields of human suffering, and a large proportion of these relate to treatments for private diseases of men. This is a subject which I take up reluctantly, and only because of its widespread peril.
As the drug cures are the most vicious form of quackery, so the private disease treatments are the foulest. All this class of practitioners are frauds and
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swindlers. Many of them are ex-criminals of other fields. The "Old Doctors," the "Phj'sicians Institutes," the "Medical Councils," and the "Quick Cures," are all equally to be shunned. Blackmail is the underlying principle of this business. These treatments can not cure; ten to one they only aggravate the disease and render it dangerous or even deadly. But once they have a man in their clutches, they need not help him in order to get his money. If he demurs at their charges, a threat to expose the nature of his ailment to his family or employers is enough. Some firms of this sort send a $25 treatment C. 0. D. by express, as soon as an inquiry is received, without any order. If the addressee refuses to accept it, they write him saying: "Another gentleman in your town has also written us. We will turn over your shipment to him, explaining the cir- cumstances. " The unhappy dupe, realizing that the knowledge of such a remedy having been sent him may prove ruinous, pays the price to preserve his wretched secret. Every advertisement of "private diseases," or "men's specialist," ought to be a danger signal, pointing not only to wasted money, shame and misery, but often to invalidism and a dreadful form of death, where in 90 per cent of cases reputable treatment would have brought the patient through. In some localities it is against the law to publish advertisements of this class. Pennsylvania has such a law, but it is a dead letter. St. Louis is attempting to enforce its illegal advertis- ing ordinance, and the St. Louis newspapers ? ire fighting to save for them- selves the dollars tainted with unspeakable filth.
Reprinted from Collier's Weekly, Nov. 4, 1905.
THE PATENT MEDICINE CONSPIRACY AGAINST THE FREEDOM OF THE PRESS.
"Here shall the Press the People's rights maintain, Unawed by influence and unbribed by gain. "
--Joseph Story : Motto of the Salem Register.
Would an\) person helieve that there is any one subject upon loMch the neirsjxipers of the United 8-tates, acting in concert, ty prearrangement, in ctedience to wires all draic-n hy one man, icill deny full and free discus- sion? If such a thing is possible, it is a serious matter, for ice rely upon the newspapers as at once the most forbidding preventive and the swiftest and surest corrective of evil. For the haunting possibility of neicspaper exposure, men tcho knoio not at all the fear of God pause, hesitate, and turn bach from contemplated rascality. For fear "it might get into the pavers," more men are abstaining from crime and carouse to-night than for fear of arrest. But these are trite things--only, what if the news- papers fail lis? Relying so wholly on the press to undo evil, hoic shall ire deal with that evil loith which the press itself has been seduced into captivity f
In the Lower House of the Massachusetts Legislature one day last March there was a debate which lasted one whole afternoon and engaged some twenty speakers, en a bill providing that every bottle of patent medicine sold in the state should bear a label stating the contents of the bottle. More was told concerning patent medicines that afternoon than often comes to light in a single day. The debate at times was dramatic-- member from Salem told of a young woman of his acquaintance now in an institution for inebriates as the end of an incident which began with patent medicine dosing for a harmless ill. There was humor, too, in the debate--Representative Walker held aloft a bottle of Peruna bought by him in a drug store that very day and passed it around for his fellow- members to taste and decide for themselves whether Dr. Harrington, the Secretary of the State Board of Health, was right when he told the Legis- lative Committee that it was merely a "cheap cocktail. "
The Papers did not Print One Word.
In short, the debate was interesting and important--the two qualities which invariably ensure to any event big headlines in the daily newspapers. But that debate was not celebrated by big headlines, nor any headlines at all. Yet Boston is a city, and Massachusetts is a state, where the pro- ceedings of the legislature figure very large in public interest, and where the newspapers respond to that interest by reporting the sessions with greater fullness and minuteness than in any other state. Had that debate
a
? ? 12i
been oil prison reform, on Sabbath observance, the early closing saloon law, on any other subject, there would have been, in the next day's papers, overflowing accounts of verbatim report, more columns of editorial com- ment, and the picturesque features of it would have ensured the attention of the cartoonist.
Now why? Why was this one subject tabooed? Why were the daily accounts of legislative proceedings in the next day's papers abridged to a fraction of their usual ponderous length, and all references to the afternoon debate on patent medicines omitted? Why was it in vain for the speakers in that patent-medicine debate to search for their speeches in the next day's newspapers? Why did the legislative reporters fail to find their work in print? Why were the staff cartoonists forbidden to exercise their talents on that most fallow and tempting opportunity--the members of the Great and General Court of Massachusetts gravely tippling Peruna and passing the bottle around to their encircled neighbors, that practical
knowledge should be the basis of legislative action?
I take it if any man should assert that there is one subject on which
the newspapers of the United States, acting in concert and as a unit, will deny full and free discussion, he would be smiled at as an intemperate fa- natic. The thing is too incredible. He would be regarded as a man with a delusion. And yet I invite you to search the files of the daily newspapers of Massachusetts for March 16, 1905, for an account of the patent-medicine debate that occurred the afternoon of March ]5 in the Massachusetts Legislature. In strict accuracy it must be said that there was one exception. Any one familiar with the newspapers of 'the United States will already have named it^--the Springfield Repuhlican. That paper, on two separate occasions, gave several columns to the record -of the proceedings of the legislature on the patent-medicine bill. Why the otherwise universal silence?
The patent-medicine business in the United States is one of huge finan- cial proportions. The census of 1900 placed the value of the annual product at $59,611,355. Allowing for the increase of half a decade of rapid growth, it must be to-day not less than seventy-five millions. That is the wholesale price. The retail price of all the patent medicines sold in the United States in one year may be very conservatively placed at one hundred million dollars. And of this one hundred millions which the people of the United States pay for patent medicines yearly, fully forty millions go to the newspapers. Have patience ! I have more to say than merely to point out the large revenue which newspapers receive from patent medicines, and let inference do the rest. Inference has no place in this story. There are facts a-plenty. But it is essential to point out the intimate financial relation between the newspapers and the patent medicines. I was told by the man who for many years handled the advertising of the Lydia E. Pinkham Company that their expenditure was$100,000amonth,$1,200,000ayear. Dr. PierceandthePerunaCom- pany both advertise more extensively than the Pinkham Company. Cer- tainly there are at least five patent-medicine concerns in the United States who each pay out to the newspapers more than one million dollars a year. When the Dr. Greene Nervura Company of Boston went into bank-
ruptcy, its debts to newspapers for advertising amounted to $535,000. To the Bostcn Herald alone it owed $5,000, and to so small a paper, com- paratively, as the Atlanta Constitution, it owed $1,500. One obscure quack
--
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doctor in New York, who did merely an office business, was raided by the authorities, and among the papers seized there were contracts showing that within a year he had paid to one paper for advertising $5,856,80; to another $20,000. Dr. Humphreys, one of ^he best known patent-med- icine makers, has said to his fellow-members of the Patent Medicine Asso- ciation: "The twenty thousand newspapers of the United States make more money from advertising the proprietary medicines than do the pro- prietors of the medicines themselves. . . . Of their receipts, one-third
This Contract is Void if Patent Sheets with Advertisements are Used.
Threegears' Advertising Contract
Vv
We herehy aire<yyitn CHjENEY MEDICINE 'COMPANY, for the sinn of 1^
^ _ _ . Z. . . . L^. . '. - ^0\X. M\'S>^"to ins&rt the aclvertisemerit of i "HALL'SCATARRhj/CURE,"eoihiainingniaUeraspercopyfwrnishcd(setin \ our regular reading matter type) to he piihlislied each issue of Paper andj ^ to appear in, regular reading ruatfer not to he preceded hy a. ny paid notice, f andonlocaloreditorialjjage. Saidadvertisementtoberunforthreeyears ujithtliepriv^ege of twelve changes a^nnually, ^/O
Faymjd^stoheyyddesem-i^annually. Advertis^J^nist^pipuhlishedin Daily
Puhlished^aii
We also agree to mail a copy of each issjre coniaining " Ad. " :o Cheney Medicine Co. , Toledo, Oh
Circulation, Daily. -^ C? r. -? ! lz? -. Circulation, W^eekhj- f^. y. J. . . . LL
It Is mutually agreed that this Contract is void, if any law is enacted by your State restricting or prohibiting the manufacture or sale of proprietary medicines.
Remarhs , -
Mdme of Paper. Per
CHENEY MEDICINEjC Per
Manager.
^^N^--yt^:^^:^Sru^y^. . . Couniy of- i. . . ,^^.
M. :^
THE "CONTRACT OF SILENCE. "
The two lines in heavy type are the "red clause. "
to one-half goes for advertising. " More than six years ago, Cheney, the president of the National Association of Patent Medicine Men, estimated the yearly amount paid to the newspapers by the larger patent medicine concerns at twenty million dollars--rmore than one thousand dollars to each daily, weekly and monthly periodical in the United States.
Silence is the Fixed Quantity.
Does this throw any light on the silence of the Massachusetts papers? Naturally such large sums paid by the patent-medicine men to the news-
papers sugges't the tliou<T^ht of favor. But silence is too important a part cf the patent-medicine man's business to be left to the capricious chance of favor. Silence is the most important thing in his business. The ingredients of his medicine--that is nothing. Does the price of golden- seal go up? Substitute whisky. Does the price of whisky go up? Buy the refuse wines of the California vineyards. Does the price of opium go too high, or the public fear of it make it an inexpedient thing to use? Take it out of the formula and substitute any worthless barnyard w^eed. But silence is the fixed quantity--silence as to the frauds he practices; silence as to the abominable stewings and brewings that enter into his nostrum; silence as to the deaths and sickness he causes ; silence as to the drug fiends he makes, the inebriate asylums he fills. Silence he must have. So he makes silence a part of the contract.
Read the significant silence of the Massachusetts newspapers in the light of the following contracts for advertising. They are the regular printed form used by Hood, Ayer and Munyon in making their advertising contracts with thousands of newspapers throughout the United States.
On page 74 is shown the contract made by the J. C. Ayer Company, makers of Ayer's Sarsaparilla. At the top is the name of the firm, "The J. C. Ayer Company, Lowell, Mass. ," and the date. Then follows a blank for the number of dollars, and then the formal contract: "We hereby agree, for the sum of Dollars per year, to insert in
published at , the advertisement of the J. C. Ayer Company. " Then follow the conditions as to space to be used each issue, the page the advertisement is to be on, and the position it is to occupy. Then these two remarkable conditions of the contract: "First-- It is agreed in case any law or laws are enacted, either state or national, harmful to the interests of the J. C. Ayer Company, that this contract may be canceled by them from date of such enactment, and the insertions
made paid for pro-rata with the contract price. "
This clause is remarkable enough. But of it more later. For the present
examine the second clause: "Second--It is agreed that the J. C. Ayer Co. may cancel this contract, pro-rata, in case advertisements are published in this paper in . which their products are offered, with a view to substitu- tion or other harmful motive; also in case any matter otherwise detri- mental to the J. C. Ayer Company's interest is permitted to appear in the reading columns or elsewhere in the paper. "
This agreement is signed in duplicate, one by the J. C. Ayer Company and the other one by the newspaper.
All Muzzle-Clauses Alike.
That is the contract of silence. (Notice the next one, in identically the same language, bearing the name of the C. I. Hood Company, the other great manufacturer of sarsaparilla; and then the third--again in identically the same words--for Dr. Munyon. ) That is the clause which with forty million dollars, muzzles the press of the country. I wonder if the Standard Oil Company could, for forty million dollars, bind the news- papers of the United States in a contract that "no matter detrimental to the Standard Oil Company's interests be permitted to appear in the read- ing columns or elsewhere in this paper. "
Is it a mere coincidence that in each of these contracts the silence clause is framed in the same words ? Is the inference fair that there is
the
,
-
? 12G
? 127
an agreement among the patent-medicine men and quack doctors, each to impose this contract on all the newspapers with which it deals, one reaching the newspapers which the other does not, and all combined reach- ing all the papers in the United States, and effecting a universal agreement among newspapers to print nothing detrimental to patent medicines? Youneednottakeitasaninference. Ishallshowitlaterasafact.
"In the reading columns or elsewhere in this paper. " The paper must not print itself, nor must it allow any outside party, who might wish to do so, to pay the regular advertising rates and print the truth about
SIMPLE METHOD OF ENFORCING THE "CONTRACT OP SILENCE. "
A letter such as this was sent last February to every paper in Massa- chusetts which had a contract with any patent-medicine concern. There were very few newspapers uncontaminated by the red clause, and they all gave "prompt attention to the bill. " The name of the paper to which this letter was addressed is erased in order to shield the publishers from consequences that might follow.
patent medicines in the advertising columns. More than a year ago, just after Mr. Bok had printed his first article exposing patent medicines, a business man in St. Louis, a man of great w^ealth, conceived that it would help his business greatly if he could have Mr. Bok's article printed as an
:--
? 12S
advertisement in every newspaper in the United States. He gave the order to a firm of advertising agents and the firm began in Texas, intending to cover the country to Maine. But that advertisement never got beyond a few obscure country papers in Texas. The contract of silence was effect- ive; and a few v/eeks later, at their annual meeting, the patent-medicine association "Resolved"--I quote the minutes--"That this Association com- mend the action of the great majority of the publishers of the United States who have consistently refused said false and malicious attacks in the shape of advertisements^ which in whole or in part libel proprietary medicines. "
I have said that the identity of the language of the silence clause in several patent-medicine advertising contracts suaafests mutual understand- ing among the nostrum makers, a preconceived plan; and I have several times mentioned the patent-medicine association. It seems incongruous, almost humorous, to speak of a national organization of quack doctors and patent-medicine makers; but there is one, brought together for mutual support, for co-operation, for--but just what this organization is for, I hopetoshow.
Poison Sent Out Unlabeled.
Something of the nature of the agile grasshopper inheres in the Opa Specialty Co. , which sells Opacura. " It answers my first letter from
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Chicago, my second from San Antonio, and my third from South Haven, Michigan. Possibly it operates on the sound economic principle that it is cheaper to move than to pay rent. "Opacura," the reader is informed, "is very palatable and easily taken, and positively contains no belladonna, calomel, enabis indicis [cannabis indica? ] or atropin in any form. " Nor ice cream, nor dish-water, ncr dry Martini cocktail ! But it does contain morphin, in. most formidable proportion. The Opa Company informs me modestly, replying to my desire for information as to the presence of morphin in the "cure:" "There is a little to give support while the Tonic acts upon the system. " A little! Nearly two grains per dose. "It will not injure the patient in any manner/" declares "^he scoundrel who writes me, and he distributes this deadly poison unlabeled. Mor- phina-Cura, which is advertised as "A Reliable Cure for Opium" is itself morphin. It must be credited with the merciful precaution of labeling its poison wdth skull and bones.
How much there is in a good name ! "Drug Crave Crusade" is almost worth the money. Their advertisement, signed D. C. C. Co. , appears in the Bmart Set, which offers an eager hospitality to this class of villainy. "Our remedy forms no other habit whatever," writes the Dr. Baker, who runs the foul business. Certainly not. It simply keeps up the same h^bit. The patient is encouraged to take all he can stand of the stuff. "Enough to give comfortable support" is what I am encouraged to take. Thus Ihe poor victim who supposes himself to be conquering the morphin habit is really continuing his habit, and paying the Drug Crave Crusade a big price for the privilege. Their "cure" runs to about a grain of mor- phin per dose.
"The sedative which is in the remedy is to take the place of morphin," is the Drug Crave Crusade's reply to my query. "We are enclosing here- with an extract from the New York Health journal, which we feel sure will settle any doubt in your mind as to the remedy containing any opiates. " It does. It would settle any. doubt in my mind, were there any. as to the nature of the Drug Crave Crusade. Any enterprise en- dorsed by that ghost of a journalistic prostitute, the New York Health Journal, is, by that very token, damned for a swindle.
"Denarco" is the nostrum of the Comstock Remedy Co. of Lafayette, Indiana. Having filled out one of their blanks Avith the description of a case taking 12 grains of morphin a day, I receive, via form-letter, the encouraging though somwhat astonishing information that "your answers show there is nothing serious the matter with you. " Nothing serious the matter with a man Avho takes in twenty-four hours enough morphia to kill a dozen normal men! There is something the matter with the Comstock Remedy Co. . and this is it, that they are a band of murderous medical pirates. Their "Denarco," described as "reliable and absolutely harmless," contains . 19 grain of morphin per dose, which I am invited to take day and night, if I need it. Of course, the prominent bankers and the Postmaster of Lafayette are used as backing in the advertising matter of the company.
The Amazing Contrell.
It is always a pleasure to meet a straight-out whole-souled liar. As such R. G. Contrell, M. D. , the genial medical vampire who acts as "director" of the Harris Institute of 400 West Twenty-third Street, New York City, is entitled to respectful consideration. "We never advocate a reduction or tapering-off treatment, but eliminate the drug from the start," he asseverates in the Institute's booklet, further stating that in undergoing a course of the treatment, "there is no more danger than in takingaglassofwater. . . . Theresultsarepositivelyandabsolutely
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^iinranteed. " The only safe guarantee to make for the Harris treatment would be that the dupe wli^ takes it will fulfil the Scriptural description: "The last state of this man was worse than the first. " Perpend Contrell, 1M. D. , on the innocence of his "dope:" "Owin^ to the general effect cf Ihe medicine many people imagine that our medicine contains opium when notliing is far \sic] from the truth. " Contrell, M. D. , is "far from the truth. " His non-reduction and non-tapering-off treatment contains 1. 7 grains of mcrphin to the double teaspoonful dose, to be taken four times a dny.
AVithin easy reach of the Harris man-trap by a Twenty-third Street crosstown car, the Professor M. W. Waterman Institute does business. Professor AYaterman, so his circular inform^s all and sundry, was formerly l^oputy Coroner of New York City. Very likely; and he is now pre- sumably furnishing subjects for his successors. "jNIy treatment is the only absolute specific and cure for drug habits. It is the only one that contains fhe vital principle. " Many cures, he sadly observes, are "sim- ply morphin in solution. They dupe their patients into paying exorbi- tant prices for the identical drvig they are seeking to be rid of. " This is, indeed, spoken from the lofty heights of wise philanthropy. But down he comes from those heights'^ on being asked whether his own "cure" isu"t morphin in solution, "l^ou will note," he writes me, "that the only narcotic contained in the remedy is bi-maconic acid. This is a bi- product [sic] of opium, but is not as injurious as morphia ncr is it as strong. " Impressive term, bi-maconic acid! But, strangely enough, it is unknown to the regular chemists. I suspect that Professor Waterman span it out of his own inside, like a spider. He is most certainly of the spider genus, and the human Hies that get in his web are fed on morphin, as the "vital principle" of his "cure. " My sample contains . 65 grain morphia per teaspoonful dose, which I am advised to repeat as often as 1 feel like it.
Quacks Who Pretend to be Physicians.
There is a grim pleasure in illuminating the devious ways in which those quacks who pretend to ^legitimate standing work their little games. They are hard to catch, and of the two whose description follows, one would never have been embodied in this article but for the efforts of cer- tain physicians of Cleveland, where he practices. To be accurate. Glen- ville, a suburb of Cleveland, is the stamping-ground of J. Edward Allport, YI. D. The Glenville paper is full of paragraphs about his private hospi- tal. He is an ingenious fellow, a dispenser of platitudes to Sunday-school classes, and a churchgoer, as part of his advertising, for he follows the precept laid down by Sam Weller's friend the "depity saw-bones," and has himself called out of the service on urgent business, so that people shall wonder at the demands of his practice. Allport's specialty is drug addictions. No case is too bad for him to tackle by mail. He fell easily into a trap set for him and undertook to cure a bad case of morphin "habit without seeing the patient. His dosage, prescribed by letter, carries -about 1. 1 grains of morphin six times a day. With the morphin vial he sends me a bottle of pink whisky, to mix with the morphin when it gets low, a pretty villainous combination. Dr. J. Edward Allport does not advertise openly, but he is no less scoundrelly, and is even more dangerous,
than Richie, the twin "Saints," and Waterman.
More easily caught was Dr. J. C. Hoffman of Chicago, Dr. Hoffmaft
yearns to be considered "ethical. " "My social and professional standing protect me from the insult of being classed with advertising quacks," he writes in a fine burst of dignity. Therefore, he hires a stool-pigeon to do his advertising for him. Readers of the Sunday papers will remember her ingenious little advertisement, ''Myself cured, I will g\a. dj infqrni
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any one addicted to cocain, morphin, opium, or laudanum of a never- failing, harmless home cure. Mrs. Mary O. Baldwin, Box 1,212, Chicago. " Upon receiving an inquiry Mrs. Baldwin, in a manuscript letter, refers the "come-on" to Dr. Hoffman. She says she dees this out of gratitude for her own cure. I surmise that she does it because she is paid to do it. Then Dr. Hoffman takes hold. His "follow-up" system of form-letters is typical. He is sure he can cure you by mail. "The remedy so perfectly controls the system that the patient feels better than under the deadening influence of the former drug. " Yes, indeed ! The gentleman of protective social and professional standing keeps his patients feeling happy, by a steady if not judicious dosage of morphin. The treatment he sent me contained about two grains of morphin to the maximum dose, to be repeated three to four times a day= The Hoffman-Baldwin partnership may be one of gratitude, but it is, I suspect, a gratitude based on the hope of profits to come. A pretty grisly pair of ghouls are Dr. Hoffman and his accomplice, Mrs. Baldwin.
DR. J. EDWARD ALLPORT.
A supposedly "ethical" practitioner of Cleveland, who "cures" morphin fiends
by mail, with morphin.
When this article was announced Dr. B. M. Woolley of Atlanta, Georgia, wrote me advancing arguments to show why he should not be included among the quack drug cure practitioners, and asserting that his one unethical feature is the fact that he advertises. What he advertises to do is to cure the morphin habit. His "cure" consists in 1. 9 grains of mor- phin per teaspoonful dose, to be repeated four times a day. If Dr. Woolley has any further arguments to adduce, tending to disprove my theory that the world would be a better place if he were safely in jail, I hope he will send them to me.
A Safe Rule to Follow.
Necessarily I have omitted many of the minor vampires of the drug addiction school. I can, perhaps, cover them all in one warning; the man who advertises a sure cure for any drug habit is a swindler. Ten to one he is also a substituter and will push his victim further into the depths, for the few dollars to be got out of it. Reputable sanitariums there are in plenty for this purpose; most physicians know of them. The addict who can not be cured in them can not be cured anywhere, and might better buy his poison at the regular rate than at a fancy price
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froir the vicious quack of tlic advertisini>- scht nl. When the" Pure Food law ^oes into effect, the business must, perforce, cease, for, honestly labeled, the "dope" bottles carrying the cure would be bought by few.
The Sunday newspapers and small weeklies teem with advertisements of "drink cures," which are supposed to exercise the alcoholic craving when secretly given in tea or coffee. Few of these concoctions can be described as immediately dangerous, though none of them is really safe. All are swindles. They do not cure the drink habit. Once in a while some drunkard will succeed in breaking his fetters synchronously with the taking of the "remedy," and the wonderful "cure" is heralded to the world. But the percentage of these cases is so small as to be practically negligible. Orrine is such a cure, conspicuously exploited. Another is Dr. Haines' Golden Specific. Parker Willis conducts a little bunco trade in this line at Indianapolis, and the Milo Drug Co. of St. Louis helps to make good that community's claim to the proud title of the City of Quacks. Toledo boasts H. C. Keith, who not only has a quack treatment for drink, but further exhibits himself as a swindle by guaranteeing to cure all drug addictions. One might at first suppose that the Kansas Anti- Liquor Society's project for furnishing a drink cure prescription free was a worthy charity. In reality it is only a petty fake-, since the "pre- scription" is one that no drug store could put-up, so the patient must buy it from the "Society"--at a heavy advance upon the cost of the drugs. Of course it will fail to effect any good results in a vast majority of cases. In the foot-note to the prescription the patient is assured that it is harmless to "the most delicate and sensitive constitution," which may possibly be true; but before I took repeated doses containing, even in minute quantities, such poisons as aloin, strj^chnin, hydrastin and cocain, I should want to know what my doctor thought about it.
Quacks with Stool-Pigeons.
The reader has very likely seen in the public prints an alleged picture of Mrs. Margaret Anderson of Hillburn, New York, who "cured her hus- band of drinking," and wants to tell you how to cure yours, free. "She has nothing whatever to sell," says the advertisement. True. But the Physicians' Co-operative Association, a quack organization of Chicago, for which Mrs. Anderson is stool-pigeon, has something to sell. That some- thing is Alcola. "The Conqueror of King Alcohol. " Mrs. Anderson's correspondents are recommended by her, in a skillful imitation of a hand- written letter, to buy Alcola and be saved. Alcola is the same kind of fake as the rest of the "given in secret" cures.
Of "institutions" for the regeneration of drunkards there are many. Some of them are entirely reputable, but these do not make blanket promises of cure. The famous "Keeley Cure," which formerly made the most extravagant claims, is now conducted on a much saunder basis, and actually produces results in a certain percentage of cases, though its for- mer claim of more than eighty per cent, cured and less than twenty per cent, lost would be much nearer the truth if reversed. As the Keeley institutes do not now, so far as I can judge, promise to cure all forms of drunkenness nor attempt to take pay for cases which they know to be incurable, I do not include them in the swindling category.
Hundreds of letters come to Collier's, inquiring about various advertised cures in all fields of human suffering, and a large proportion of these relate to treatments for private diseases of men. This is a subject which I take up reluctantly, and only because of its widespread peril.
As the drug cures are the most vicious form of quackery, so the private disease treatments are the foulest. All this class of practitioners are frauds and
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swindlers. Many of them are ex-criminals of other fields. The "Old Doctors," the "Phj'sicians Institutes," the "Medical Councils," and the "Quick Cures," are all equally to be shunned. Blackmail is the underlying principle of this business. These treatments can not cure; ten to one they only aggravate the disease and render it dangerous or even deadly. But once they have a man in their clutches, they need not help him in order to get his money. If he demurs at their charges, a threat to expose the nature of his ailment to his family or employers is enough. Some firms of this sort send a $25 treatment C. 0. D. by express, as soon as an inquiry is received, without any order. If the addressee refuses to accept it, they write him saying: "Another gentleman in your town has also written us. We will turn over your shipment to him, explaining the cir- cumstances. " The unhappy dupe, realizing that the knowledge of such a remedy having been sent him may prove ruinous, pays the price to preserve his wretched secret. Every advertisement of "private diseases," or "men's specialist," ought to be a danger signal, pointing not only to wasted money, shame and misery, but often to invalidism and a dreadful form of death, where in 90 per cent of cases reputable treatment would have brought the patient through. In some localities it is against the law to publish advertisements of this class. Pennsylvania has such a law, but it is a dead letter. St. Louis is attempting to enforce its illegal advertis- ing ordinance, and the St. Louis newspapers ? ire fighting to save for them- selves the dollars tainted with unspeakable filth.
Reprinted from Collier's Weekly, Nov. 4, 1905.
THE PATENT MEDICINE CONSPIRACY AGAINST THE FREEDOM OF THE PRESS.
"Here shall the Press the People's rights maintain, Unawed by influence and unbribed by gain. "
--Joseph Story : Motto of the Salem Register.
Would an\) person helieve that there is any one subject upon loMch the neirsjxipers of the United 8-tates, acting in concert, ty prearrangement, in ctedience to wires all draic-n hy one man, icill deny full and free discus- sion? If such a thing is possible, it is a serious matter, for ice rely upon the newspapers as at once the most forbidding preventive and the swiftest and surest corrective of evil. For the haunting possibility of neicspaper exposure, men tcho knoio not at all the fear of God pause, hesitate, and turn bach from contemplated rascality. For fear "it might get into the pavers," more men are abstaining from crime and carouse to-night than for fear of arrest. But these are trite things--only, what if the news- papers fail lis? Relying so wholly on the press to undo evil, hoic shall ire deal with that evil loith which the press itself has been seduced into captivity f
In the Lower House of the Massachusetts Legislature one day last March there was a debate which lasted one whole afternoon and engaged some twenty speakers, en a bill providing that every bottle of patent medicine sold in the state should bear a label stating the contents of the bottle. More was told concerning patent medicines that afternoon than often comes to light in a single day. The debate at times was dramatic-- member from Salem told of a young woman of his acquaintance now in an institution for inebriates as the end of an incident which began with patent medicine dosing for a harmless ill. There was humor, too, in the debate--Representative Walker held aloft a bottle of Peruna bought by him in a drug store that very day and passed it around for his fellow- members to taste and decide for themselves whether Dr. Harrington, the Secretary of the State Board of Health, was right when he told the Legis- lative Committee that it was merely a "cheap cocktail. "
The Papers did not Print One Word.
In short, the debate was interesting and important--the two qualities which invariably ensure to any event big headlines in the daily newspapers. But that debate was not celebrated by big headlines, nor any headlines at all. Yet Boston is a city, and Massachusetts is a state, where the pro- ceedings of the legislature figure very large in public interest, and where the newspapers respond to that interest by reporting the sessions with greater fullness and minuteness than in any other state. Had that debate
a
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been oil prison reform, on Sabbath observance, the early closing saloon law, on any other subject, there would have been, in the next day's papers, overflowing accounts of verbatim report, more columns of editorial com- ment, and the picturesque features of it would have ensured the attention of the cartoonist.
Now why? Why was this one subject tabooed? Why were the daily accounts of legislative proceedings in the next day's papers abridged to a fraction of their usual ponderous length, and all references to the afternoon debate on patent medicines omitted? Why was it in vain for the speakers in that patent-medicine debate to search for their speeches in the next day's newspapers? Why did the legislative reporters fail to find their work in print? Why were the staff cartoonists forbidden to exercise their talents on that most fallow and tempting opportunity--the members of the Great and General Court of Massachusetts gravely tippling Peruna and passing the bottle around to their encircled neighbors, that practical
knowledge should be the basis of legislative action?
I take it if any man should assert that there is one subject on which
the newspapers of the United States, acting in concert and as a unit, will deny full and free discussion, he would be smiled at as an intemperate fa- natic. The thing is too incredible. He would be regarded as a man with a delusion. And yet I invite you to search the files of the daily newspapers of Massachusetts for March 16, 1905, for an account of the patent-medicine debate that occurred the afternoon of March ]5 in the Massachusetts Legislature. In strict accuracy it must be said that there was one exception. Any one familiar with the newspapers of 'the United States will already have named it^--the Springfield Repuhlican. That paper, on two separate occasions, gave several columns to the record -of the proceedings of the legislature on the patent-medicine bill. Why the otherwise universal silence?
The patent-medicine business in the United States is one of huge finan- cial proportions. The census of 1900 placed the value of the annual product at $59,611,355. Allowing for the increase of half a decade of rapid growth, it must be to-day not less than seventy-five millions. That is the wholesale price. The retail price of all the patent medicines sold in the United States in one year may be very conservatively placed at one hundred million dollars. And of this one hundred millions which the people of the United States pay for patent medicines yearly, fully forty millions go to the newspapers. Have patience ! I have more to say than merely to point out the large revenue which newspapers receive from patent medicines, and let inference do the rest. Inference has no place in this story. There are facts a-plenty. But it is essential to point out the intimate financial relation between the newspapers and the patent medicines. I was told by the man who for many years handled the advertising of the Lydia E. Pinkham Company that their expenditure was$100,000amonth,$1,200,000ayear. Dr. PierceandthePerunaCom- pany both advertise more extensively than the Pinkham Company. Cer- tainly there are at least five patent-medicine concerns in the United States who each pay out to the newspapers more than one million dollars a year. When the Dr. Greene Nervura Company of Boston went into bank-
ruptcy, its debts to newspapers for advertising amounted to $535,000. To the Bostcn Herald alone it owed $5,000, and to so small a paper, com- paratively, as the Atlanta Constitution, it owed $1,500. One obscure quack
--
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doctor in New York, who did merely an office business, was raided by the authorities, and among the papers seized there were contracts showing that within a year he had paid to one paper for advertising $5,856,80; to another $20,000. Dr. Humphreys, one of ^he best known patent-med- icine makers, has said to his fellow-members of the Patent Medicine Asso- ciation: "The twenty thousand newspapers of the United States make more money from advertising the proprietary medicines than do the pro- prietors of the medicines themselves. . . . Of their receipts, one-third
This Contract is Void if Patent Sheets with Advertisements are Used.
Threegears' Advertising Contract
Vv
We herehy aire<yyitn CHjENEY MEDICINE 'COMPANY, for the sinn of 1^
^ _ _ . Z. . . . L^. . '. - ^0\X. M\'S>^"to ins&rt the aclvertisemerit of i "HALL'SCATARRhj/CURE,"eoihiainingniaUeraspercopyfwrnishcd(setin \ our regular reading matter type) to he piihlislied each issue of Paper andj ^ to appear in, regular reading ruatfer not to he preceded hy a. ny paid notice, f andonlocaloreditorialjjage. Saidadvertisementtoberunforthreeyears ujithtliepriv^ege of twelve changes a^nnually, ^/O
Faymjd^stoheyyddesem-i^annually. Advertis^J^nist^pipuhlishedin Daily
Puhlished^aii
We also agree to mail a copy of each issjre coniaining " Ad. " :o Cheney Medicine Co. , Toledo, Oh
Circulation, Daily. -^ C? r. -? ! lz? -. Circulation, W^eekhj- f^. y. J. . . . LL
It Is mutually agreed that this Contract is void, if any law is enacted by your State restricting or prohibiting the manufacture or sale of proprietary medicines.
Remarhs , -
Mdme of Paper. Per
CHENEY MEDICINEjC Per
Manager.
^^N^--yt^:^^:^Sru^y^. . . Couniy of- i. . . ,^^.
M. :^
THE "CONTRACT OF SILENCE. "
The two lines in heavy type are the "red clause. "
to one-half goes for advertising. " More than six years ago, Cheney, the president of the National Association of Patent Medicine Men, estimated the yearly amount paid to the newspapers by the larger patent medicine concerns at twenty million dollars--rmore than one thousand dollars to each daily, weekly and monthly periodical in the United States.
Silence is the Fixed Quantity.
Does this throw any light on the silence of the Massachusetts papers? Naturally such large sums paid by the patent-medicine men to the news-
papers sugges't the tliou<T^ht of favor. But silence is too important a part cf the patent-medicine man's business to be left to the capricious chance of favor. Silence is the most important thing in his business. The ingredients of his medicine--that is nothing. Does the price of golden- seal go up? Substitute whisky. Does the price of whisky go up? Buy the refuse wines of the California vineyards. Does the price of opium go too high, or the public fear of it make it an inexpedient thing to use? Take it out of the formula and substitute any worthless barnyard w^eed. But silence is the fixed quantity--silence as to the frauds he practices; silence as to the abominable stewings and brewings that enter into his nostrum; silence as to the deaths and sickness he causes ; silence as to the drug fiends he makes, the inebriate asylums he fills. Silence he must have. So he makes silence a part of the contract.
Read the significant silence of the Massachusetts newspapers in the light of the following contracts for advertising. They are the regular printed form used by Hood, Ayer and Munyon in making their advertising contracts with thousands of newspapers throughout the United States.
On page 74 is shown the contract made by the J. C. Ayer Company, makers of Ayer's Sarsaparilla. At the top is the name of the firm, "The J. C. Ayer Company, Lowell, Mass. ," and the date. Then follows a blank for the number of dollars, and then the formal contract: "We hereby agree, for the sum of Dollars per year, to insert in
published at , the advertisement of the J. C. Ayer Company. " Then follow the conditions as to space to be used each issue, the page the advertisement is to be on, and the position it is to occupy. Then these two remarkable conditions of the contract: "First-- It is agreed in case any law or laws are enacted, either state or national, harmful to the interests of the J. C. Ayer Company, that this contract may be canceled by them from date of such enactment, and the insertions
made paid for pro-rata with the contract price. "
This clause is remarkable enough. But of it more later. For the present
examine the second clause: "Second--It is agreed that the J. C. Ayer Co. may cancel this contract, pro-rata, in case advertisements are published in this paper in . which their products are offered, with a view to substitu- tion or other harmful motive; also in case any matter otherwise detri- mental to the J. C. Ayer Company's interest is permitted to appear in the reading columns or elsewhere in the paper. "
This agreement is signed in duplicate, one by the J. C. Ayer Company and the other one by the newspaper.
All Muzzle-Clauses Alike.
That is the contract of silence. (Notice the next one, in identically the same language, bearing the name of the C. I. Hood Company, the other great manufacturer of sarsaparilla; and then the third--again in identically the same words--for Dr. Munyon. ) That is the clause which with forty million dollars, muzzles the press of the country. I wonder if the Standard Oil Company could, for forty million dollars, bind the news- papers of the United States in a contract that "no matter detrimental to the Standard Oil Company's interests be permitted to appear in the read- ing columns or elsewhere in this paper. "
Is it a mere coincidence that in each of these contracts the silence clause is framed in the same words ? Is the inference fair that there is
the
,
-
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an agreement among the patent-medicine men and quack doctors, each to impose this contract on all the newspapers with which it deals, one reaching the newspapers which the other does not, and all combined reach- ing all the papers in the United States, and effecting a universal agreement among newspapers to print nothing detrimental to patent medicines? Youneednottakeitasaninference. Ishallshowitlaterasafact.
"In the reading columns or elsewhere in this paper. " The paper must not print itself, nor must it allow any outside party, who might wish to do so, to pay the regular advertising rates and print the truth about
SIMPLE METHOD OF ENFORCING THE "CONTRACT OP SILENCE. "
A letter such as this was sent last February to every paper in Massa- chusetts which had a contract with any patent-medicine concern. There were very few newspapers uncontaminated by the red clause, and they all gave "prompt attention to the bill. " The name of the paper to which this letter was addressed is erased in order to shield the publishers from consequences that might follow.
patent medicines in the advertising columns. More than a year ago, just after Mr. Bok had printed his first article exposing patent medicines, a business man in St. Louis, a man of great w^ealth, conceived that it would help his business greatly if he could have Mr. Bok's article printed as an
:--
? 12S
advertisement in every newspaper in the United States. He gave the order to a firm of advertising agents and the firm began in Texas, intending to cover the country to Maine. But that advertisement never got beyond a few obscure country papers in Texas. The contract of silence was effect- ive; and a few v/eeks later, at their annual meeting, the patent-medicine association "Resolved"--I quote the minutes--"That this Association com- mend the action of the great majority of the publishers of the United States who have consistently refused said false and malicious attacks in the shape of advertisements^ which in whole or in part libel proprietary medicines. "
I have said that the identity of the language of the silence clause in several patent-medicine advertising contracts suaafests mutual understand- ing among the nostrum makers, a preconceived plan; and I have several times mentioned the patent-medicine association. It seems incongruous, almost humorous, to speak of a national organization of quack doctors and patent-medicine makers; but there is one, brought together for mutual support, for co-operation, for--but just what this organization is for, I hopetoshow.
