vintage toronto world ad of the day

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Vintage Ad #1,050: Six Torontonians Can't Be Wrong About Dr. Chase's Nerve Food

(full size version)

Six respectable-looking Edwardian Torontonians can't be wrong, can they? Even if this miracle revitalizer contains ingredients like arsenic and strychnine?

Alvin Wood Chase (1817-1885) was an Ann Arbor-based patent medicine salesman who received his medical training in fits and spurts while supplying local doctors and drug dispensers. He wrote a series of home remedy handbooks that recommended treatments like using water that toads were boiled in to heal sprains and a variety of poultices to battle cancer.

By the late 1940s, Dr. Chase's miracle product was manufactured in Oakville (where the local historical society has posted a 1949 A.W. Chase almanac). Ads continued to be produced, such as one posted on Kitchen Retro targeting 1950s housewives. Further websurfing indicates that you can still rely on the good doctor to lift brain fog and prevent loss of flesh.

Source: The Toronto World, May 13, 1904 - JB

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