More patent medicine
Cardui | Dr. Grace Feder Thompson's letter appealing for patients | Dr. Pierce's medicines | Dr. E. C. Abbey's The Sexual System and Its Derangements (1882) | Dr. Young's rectal dilators | Lydia Pinkham's medicine | Orange Blossom medicine | ad for Dr. Schenk's Mandrake Pills, appearing on a trade card for journalist Nellie Bly.
CONTRIBUTE to Humor, Words and expressions about menstruation and Would you stop menstruating if you could?
Some MUM site links:
homepage | MUM address & What does MUM mean? | e-mail the museum | privacy on this site | who runs this museum?? |
Amazing women! | the art of menstruation | artists (non-menstrual) | asbestos | belts | bidets | founder bio | Bly, Nellie | MUM board | books: menstruation and menopause (and reviews) | cats | company booklets for girls (mostly) directory | contraception and religion | costumes | menstrual cups | cup usage | dispensers | douches, pain, sprays | essay directory | extraction | facts-of-life booklets for girls | famous women in menstrual hygiene ads | FAQ | founder/director biography | gynecological topics by Dr. Soucasaux | humor | huts | links | masturbation | media coverage of MUM | menarche booklets for girls and parents | miscellaneous | museum future | Norwegian menstruation exhibit | odor | olor | pad directory | patent medicine | poetry directory | products, current | puberty booklets for girls and parents | religion | Religión y menstruación | your remedies for menstrual discomfort | menstrual products safety | science | Seguridad de productos para la menstruación | shame | slapping, menstrual | sponges | synchrony | tampon directory | early tampons | teen ads directory | tour of the former museum (video) | underpants & panties directory | videos, films directory | Words and expressions about menstruation | Would you stop menstruating if you could? | What did women do about menstruation in the past? | washable pads
Leer la versión en español de los siguientes temas: Anticoncepción y religión, Breve reseña - Olor - Religión y menstruación - Seguridad de productos para la menstruación.

Micajah's Medicated Wafers
Small boxes of old American patent medicine for women's diseases,
headache, stomach illness, menstruation, and birth control

Murray & Nickell Blue Cohosh Root | Murray & Nickell Cotton Root Bark | Allaire Woodward & Co. Oak Bark-White | Wampole's Vaginal Cones with Picric Acid | Humphreys "31" | Orange Blossom Suppositories | Dr. Pierce's Vaginal Tablets | Micajah's Medicated Wafers | Santrex Formula 52T | Sedets
SarahAnne Hazlewood generously donated the medicine to this museum, part of her huge gift of medical instruments,
books and advertising material about women's health.
Harry Finley created the images.

 

 

The pH - the degree of acidity or alkalinity - of a healthy vagina is around 3.8-4.4, fairly acid. Numbers greater than that - which happens with menstruation - allow harmful organisms to thrive, such as Candida albicans and Trichomonas (both forms of vaginitis). Neutral is 7 and above that, alkaline. And as a reader pointed out, the main use for these suppositories might have been to kill sperm, which sufficiently strong acid - under pH 3.5 - can do. See the odor page for another effect of low vaginal acidity.

 

 Cellophane covers the box - or covered, since it's beaten up.

What typical consumer knew what the posterior vault of the vagina was? Do you?

<··· NEXT ···>
Dr. Pierre's Boro-Pheno-Form and introduction | Murray & Nickell Blue Cohosh Root |
Murray & Nickell Cotton Root Bark | Allaire Woodward & Co. Oak Bark-White |
Wampole's Vaginal Cones with Picric Acid | Humphreys "31" | Orange Blossom Suppositories |
Dr. Pierce's Vaginal Tablets | Micajah's Medicated Wafers | Santrex Formula 52T | Sedets

© 2005 Harry Finley. It is illegal to reproduce or distribute any of the work on this Web site in any manner
or medium without written permission of the author. Please report suspected violations to hfinley@mum.org