Medicine Maketh Man

Hey y’all, I am back with a new post this week! With summer starting and people moving around the country, I thought it would be a good idea to write about some Americans in the past who have done the same. Specifically, I will be talking about a group of Americans called “Medicine Men” and their medicine shows. This is to not be confused with the elders of Native American history these are simple hustlers who sold grand products based off of whim and bad ideas.

Medicine men and medicine shows developed from the European mountebank show. The mountebank and their shows were often referred to as swindlers or charlatans. So, you probably have a good idea where this is going. These travelers were not the best people, because they often cared about swindling locals for a quick buck. While the mountebank style show was big in Europe, by the turn of the 19th century, they would come to America and change. The changes that took place focused on products that were considered “cure-alls” or “wonder potions”. The name changed to medicine shows, most likely because mountebank sounded too European or simply because it focused more on their products.

These medicine shows would roll up into American towns, specifically those in the West. For example, these men and women would take their wagons to small farming towns or towns with a railroad nearby. They would set themselves up in a public area making a big appearance. Medicine men/women would establish test trials or hire local gunslingers to promote their products. Unfortunately, it was all false advertising. For example, these swindlers would hire a bald man putting on an ointment then miraculously growing hair by having a spare whig. Depending on the salesperson, the ointments had various names.

The most common ointment was called snake oil. This was just a common name for a medicine show’s cure all miracle elixir. Typically, it had a variety of ingredients unfit for consumption. Often, the snake oil was labeled as something that could promote hair growth, remove wrinkles, shine your shoes, and get rid of stains. Sometimes, on occasion, it was said that it could cure any ailment the user had from headaches, stomach bugs, to knee pain. Aside from these so called cures, why would anyone think it would be a good idea to drink something that could remove stains.

Despite selling supposed “cure alls”, medicine shows acted like a miniature fair for whatever town it was in. Some events that were featured in this fair were small cattle roundups, trickshots by local gunslingers, various dancers, and ventriloquists. In a way, I think the attention that was brought by these fairs were also used as publicity stunts to attract people to their goods. Whether or not the product was good, these wild west con men knew how to sell their terrible products. Let us now fast forward in time to the modern and post-modern day.

Throughout the 1930s and 1940s, the medicine show became an iconic radio, television, and film theme. There were shows or films such as The Medicine Man, Betty Boop, M. D. and The Inspector General. With music, the phenomenon reached punk rock band called Big Audio Dynamite in the 80s and 90s. One of my favorite songs by them is promptly called Medicine Show. In recent years, video games have thrown in references to the medicine men and medicine shows. In the first Red Dead Redemption, a wild west third-person shooter, the main character has to do various missions for a medicine show operator.

While this was not a typical wet hot American summer, there will be other posts that feature unique topics. Next week, we are taking a trip through Pennsylvania history to talk about a famous steel factory.