"Your Glands Wear Out!"

Here’s a neat page at the website of the FDA’s Center for Drug Evaluation and Research — their Gallery of Nostrums, containing labels from and ads for old patent medicines.

Yes, there’s snake oil. Several kinds. And many other scary things. “Epilepsy Remedy”… “Eckman’s Alterative” (sheesh, that one sounds like Jack Vance or Gene Wolfe invented it) … “Mixer’s Cancer and Scrofula Syrup.”

(shudder)