Obviously, this state of affairs was extremely confusing to all
of the customers. Judson traveled widely through the Canadian
maritime provinces and prevailed upon many merchants to disavow
orders previously given to the new A.J. White firm at 10
Courtlandt Street. On April 28, 1859, White and Moore, for their
part, appointed one James Blakely of Napanee, Canada West, to
represent them in the territory between Kingston and Hamilton
"including all the back settlements," where he should engage in
the collection of all notes and receipts for the Indian Root
Pills and distribute new supplies to the merchants. On all
collections he was to receive 25 percent; new medicines were to
be given out without charge except for freight. In his letter
accepting the appointment, Blakely advised that:
I think the pills should be entered here so as to avoid part of the enormous duty. 30% is too much to pay. I think there might be an understanding so that it might be done with safety. Goods coming to me should come by Oswego and from thence by Steamer to Millport. By this route they would save the delay they would be subject to coming by Kingston and avoid the scrutiny they would give them there at the customhouse.
| FIGURE 9.—"To
Purchasers of Dr. Morse's Indian Root Pills"—a warning by James Blakely, Canadian agent for A.J. White, against the "counterfeit" pills manufactured by the Comstock firm. |
The great bulk of the notes and accounts which were assigned to
Blakely for collection were undoubtedly accounts originally
established with the old A.J. White & Co. and therefore in
dispute with the Comstocks. But in any case, Blakely went
vigorously up and down his territory, frequently crossing the
paths of agents of the Comstocks, pushing the pills and
attempting to collect outstanding bills owed to A.J. White &
Co. by persuasion and threats. On July 2, 1860, he wrote
that:
My sales have been pretty good. Comstock Pills are put in almost every place, generally on commission at a low figure, but I get them put aside in most cases and make actual sales so they will be likely to get them back.
Meanwhile, back in New York City, the fight between the erstwhile
partners went on, mostly in the legal arena. On April 14, 1859,
the sheriff, at the instigation of the Comstocks, raided White's
premises at 10 Courtlandt Street and seized the books, accounts,
and correspondence carried away by White and Moore on January 1.
Simultaneously, the Comstocks succeeded in having White and Moore
arrested on a charge of larceny "for stealing on last New Year's
Day a large number of notes and receipts," and in September White
was arrested on a charge of forgery. Since the alleged offense
took place in Pennsylvania, he was extradited back to that state.
Neither the circumstances nor the disposition of this case is
known, but since White claimed the right to collect notes issued
by the old A.J. White & Co., it is probable that the charge
arose merely out of his endorsement of some disputed note. On
this occasion the Comstocks printed and distributed circulars
which were headed: "Andrew J. White, the pill man indicted for
forgery," and thereunder they printed the requisition of the
governor of New York in response to the request for extradition
from Pennsylvania, in such a way as to suggest that their side of
the dispute had official sanction.
The Comstocks must also have discovered White's and Blakely's
arrangement for avoiding "scrutiny" of their goods shipped into
Canada, for on July 29 there was an acknowledgment by the
Collector of Customs of the Port of Queenston of certain
information supplied by George Wells Comstock, William Henry
Comstock, and Baldwin L. Judson on goods being "smuggled into
this province."
While the principal case between the Comstocks and White and
Moore was scheduled for trial in December 1860, no documents
which report its outcome were discovered. However, it is a fair
surmise that the rival parties finally realized that they were
spending a great deal of energy and money to little avail,
injuring each other's business in the process and tarnishing the
reputation of the Indian Root Pills regardless of ownership. In
any case, a final settlement of this protracted controversy was
announced on March 26, 1861, when White and Moore relinquished
all claims and demands arising out of the sale of Dr. Morse's
Indian Root Pills prior to January 1, 1859.
Since no copy of this agreement was found, we do not know what
inducement was offered to Moore and White. However, hundreds of
announcements of the settlement, directed "To the debtors of the
late firm of A.J. WHITE & CO." were printed, advising
that
The controversy and the difficulties between the members of the old firm of A.J. White & Co. of No. 50 Leonard Street, New York, being ended, we hereby notify all parties to whom MORSE'S INDIAN ROOT PILLS were sent or delivered prior to January 1, 1859, and all parties holding for collection or otherwise, any of said claims or demands for said Pills, that we the undersigned have forever relinquished, and have now no claim, right, title or interest in said debts or claims, and authorize the use of the names of said firm whenever necessary in recovering, collecting and settling such debts and claims.
The announcement was signed by Andrew J. White and Andrew B.
Moore.
This should have been the end of this wearisome affair, but it
was not. It soon appeared that Moore had violated this agreement
by concealing a number of accounts, together with a quantity of
pills, circulars, labels, and a set of plates, and, in the words
of Comstock's complaint, transferred them "to James Blakely, an
irresponsible person in Canada West." And Blakely evidently
continued to collect such accounts for the benefit of himself and
Moore. However, the Comstocks also entered the scene of strife,
and sometime during the summer of 1862 William Henry Comstock,
then traveling in Ontario, collected a note in the amount of
$7.50 in favor of A.J. White & Co., as he had every right to
do, but endorsed it "James Blakely for A.J. White & Co."
Blakely, when he learned of this, charged Comstock with forgery;
Comstock in turn charged Blakely with libel. Comstock probably
defended his somewhat questionable endorsement by the agreement
of March 26 of the previous year; in any event the case was
dismissed by a Justice of the Peace in Ottawa without comment. In
New York City, on November 25, the Comstocks had Moore arrested
again, with White at this time testifying in their support. There
was also an attempt to prosecute Blakely in Canada; his defense
was that he had bought the disputed accounts and notes from Moore
on March 11, 1861—a few days before the agreement with the
Comstocks—and that his ownership of these notes was
thereafter absolute and he was no longer working as an agent for
Moore.
This controversy was still in the courts as late as April of
1864, and its final outcome is not known. But in any case, aside
only from Moore's and Blakely's attempts to collect certain
outstanding accounts and to dispose of stock still in their
hands, the agreement of March 26, 1861, left the Comstocks in
full and undisputed possession of Dr. Morse's Indian Root Pills.
White thereafter continued in the patent-medicine business in New
York City on his own; his firm was still active as recently as
1914. The subsequent history of Moore is unknown.
The Brothers Part Company
One would imagine that the three partners of Comstock &
Brother would have been exhausted by litigation and would be
eager to work amicably together for years. But such was not to be
the case. The recovered records give notice of a lawsuit (1866)
between George Comstock on the one hand and William H. Comstock
and Judson on the other. No other documents relating to this case
were found, and thus the precise issue is not known, or how it
was finally settled. However, it was obviously a prelude to the
dissolution of the old firm.
Letters and documents from the several years preceding this event
suggest that Judson had become more prominent in the business,
and that he and William H. Comstock had gradually been drawing
closer together, perhaps in opposition to George. Judson,
although a partner of Comstock & Brother, also operated under
his own name at 50 Leonard Street and had originated several of
the medicines himself. It is not clear whether the old firm of
Comstock & Brother was formally dissolved, but after 1864
insurance policies and other documents referred to the premises
as "Comstock & Judson." In 1863 the federal internal revenue
license in connection with the new "temporary" Civil War tax on
the manufacturing of drugs
was issued simply
to B.L. Judson & Co., now located, with the Comstocks, at 106
Franklin Street.
During this period Judson and William Henry Comstock became
interested in a coffee-roasting and spice-grinding business,
operated under the name of Central Mills, and located in the
Harlem Railroad Building at the corner of Centre and White
Streets. Possibly George objected to his partners spreading their
energies over a second business; in any case, dissension must
have arisen over some matter. On April 1, 1866, balance sheets
were drawn up separately for B.L. Judson & Co. and Comstock
& Judson; the former showed a net worth of $48,527.56 against
only $5,066.70 for the latter. Both of these firms had a common
bookkeeper, E. Kingsland, but the relationship between the firms
is not known.
On April 25, Judson and William H. Comstock sold their
coffee-roasting business to one Alexander Chegwidden, taking a
mortgage on the specific assets, which included, besides roasters
and other machinery, a horse and wagon. But if this had been a
factor in the controversy among the partners, the sale failed to
end it, for we find that on December 21, 1866, George W. obtained
an injunction against William Henry and Judson restraining them
from collecting or receiving any accounts due the partnership of
B.L. Judson & Co., transferring or disposing of any of its
assets, and continuing business under that name or using any of
its trademarks. Unfortunately, we have no information as to the
details of this case or the terms of settlement, but we do find
that on February 1, 1867, the law firm of Townsend, Dyett &
Morrison rendered a bill for $538.85 to B.L. Judson and William
H. Comstock for "Supervising and engrossing two copies of
agreement with George W. Comstock on settlement" and for
representing the two parties named in several actions and cross
actions with George.
This settlement, whatever its precise character may have been,
obviously marked the termination of the old partnership—or,
more properly, the series of successor partnerships—that
had been carried on by various of the Comstock brothers for over
thirty years. William Henry, the former clerk and junior
partner—although also the son of the founder—was now
going it alone. Before this time he had already transferred the
main center of his activities to Canada, and he must have been
contemplating the removal of the business out of New York
City.
After this parting of the ways, George W. Comstock was associated
with several machinery businesses in New York City, up until his
death in 1889. During the Draft Riots of 1863 he had played an
active role in protecting refugees from the Colored orphanage on
43rd Street, who sought asylum in his house at 136 West 34th
Street.
Dr. Morse's Pills Move to Morristown
In April 1867, the home of Dr. Morse's Indian Root Pills and of
the other proprietary remedies was transferred from New York City
to Morristown, a village of 300 inhabitants on the bank of the
St. Lawrence River in northern New York State. This was not,
however, the initial move into this area; three or four years
earlier William H. Comstock had taken over an existing business
in Brockville, Ontario, directly across the river. No specific
information as to why the business was established here has been
found, but the surrounding circumstances provide some very good
presumptions.
The bulk of the Comstocks' business was always carried on in
rural areas—in "the back-woods." Specifically, the best
sales territory consisted of the Middle West—what was then
regarded as "The West"—of the United States and of Canada
West, i.e., the present province of Ontario. A surviving ledger
of all of the customers of Comstock & Brother in 1857
supplies a complete geographic distribution. Although New Jersey
and Pennsylvania were fairly well represented, accounts in New
York State were sparse, and those in New England negligible. And
despite considerable travel by the partners or agents in the
Maritime Provinces, no very substantial business was ever
developed there. The real lively sales territory consisted of the
six states of Ohio, Indiana, Illinois, Michigan, Wisconsin, and
Iowa, which accounted for over two thirds of all domestic sales,
while Canada West contributed over 90 percent of Canadian sales.
More regular customers were to be found in Canada West—a
relatively compact territory—than any other single state or
province. The number of customers of Comstock & Brother in
1857 by states and provinces follows:
Alabama
Arkansas
Connecticut
Delaware
D.C.
Florida
Georgia
Illinois
Indiana
Iowa
Kansas Ter.
Kentucky
Louisiana
Maine
Maryland
Massachusetts
Minnesota Ter.
Mississippi
Missouri
Michigan
New York State
New York City
New Jersey
New Hampshire
North Carolina
Ohio
Pennsylvania
Rhode Island
South Carolina
Tennessee
Texas
Virginia
Wisconsin
New Brunswick
Nova Scotia
Canada East (Quebec)
Canada West
Total United States
Total Canada
12
1
3
5
1
5
15
415
298
179
1
21
7
2
21
5
6
8
32
194
88
3
212
1
9
179
192
2
5
21
1
30
303
15
19
7
434
2,277
475
The concentration of this market and its considerable distance
from New York City at a time when transportation conditions were
still relatively primitive must have created many problems in
distribution. Moreover, the serious threat to the important
Canadian market imposed by White and Moore, although eventually
settled by compromise, must have emphasized the vulnerability of
this territory to competition.
It was also probable that the office in lower Manhattan—at
106 Franklin Street after May 20, 1862—was found to be
increasingly congested and inconvenient as a site for mixing
pills and tonics, bottling, labeling, packaging and shipping
them, and keeping all of the records for a large number of
individual small accounts. A removal of the manufacturing part of
the business to more commodious quarters, adjacent to
transportation routes, must have been urgent.
But why move to as remote a place as Morristown, New York, beyond
the then still wild Adirondacks? It is obvious that this location
was selected because the company already had an office and some
facilities in Brockville, Canada West.
William H. Comstock must have first become established at
Brockville, after extensive peregrinations through Canada West,
around 1859 or 1860. During the dispute between A.J. White and
Comstock & Judson, Blakely, the aggressive Canadian agent,
had written to White, on September 1, 1859, that he had heard
from "Mr. Allen Turner of Brockville" that the Comstocks were
already manufacturing Dr. Morse's Indian Root Pills at St.
Catherines. Evidently the Comstocks thought of several possible
locations, for on July 2 of the following year Blakely advised
his principals that the Comstocks were now manufacturing their
pills in Brockville. Two years later, in November 1862, when
Blakely sued William H. Comstock for the forgery of a note, the
defendant was then described in the legal papers as "one Wm.
Henry Comstock of the town of Brockville Druggist." And in July
1865, Comstock was writing from Brockville to E. Kingsland, the
bookkeeper in New York City, telling him to put Brenner—the
bearer of the letter—"in the mill." Comstock had apparently
taken over an existing business in Brockville, as receipts for
medicines delivered by him describe him as "Successor to A.N.
M'Donald & Co." Dr. McKenzie's Worm Tablets also seem to have
come into the Comstock business with this acquisition.
| FIGURE 12.—Label
for Victoria Hair Gloss, Comstock & Brother, 1855. |
This did not mean a final move to Brockville for William H.
Comstock; for several years he must have gone back and forth and
was still active in New York City as a partner of his brother and
of Judson. We have seen that he subsequently went into
partnership with Judson in the purchase of the coffee-roasting
business. In December 1866, he was a defendant in the lawsuit
initiated by his brother George, when he was still apparently
active in the New York City business. Nevertheless, he apparently
shifted the center of his activities to the Brockville area about
1860, relinquishing primary responsibility for affairs in New
York City to his brother and to Judson.
We now find the Comstock business established at Brockville.
Exactly why a second plant was built at Morristown, right across
the river, is again a matter for conjecture. It is a fair
assumption, however, that customs duties or other restraints may
have interfered with the ability of the Canadian plant to supply
the United States market. Thus, facilities on the other side of
the border, but still close enough to be under common management,
must have become essential. In an era of water transportation,
Morristown was a convenient place from which to supply the
important middle western territory. Ogdensburg was the eastern
terminus of lake boats, and several lines provided daily service
between that point and Buffalo. The railroad had already reached
Ogdensburg (although not yet Morristown) so that rail
transportation was also convenient. And the farms of St. Lawrence
County could certainly be counted upon to supply such labor as
was necessary for the rather simple tasks of mixing pills and
elixirs and packaging them. Finally, the two plants were directly
across the river from each other—connection was made by a
ferry which on the New York side docked almost on the Comstock
property—so that both could easily be supervised by a
single manager. In fact, if it had not been for the unusual
circumstance that they were located in two different countries,
they could really have been considered as no more than separate
buildings constituting a single plant.
Surviving receipts for various goods and services show that the
move to Morristown was carried out in March or April of 1867.
Although the Morristown undertaking was obviously regarded as a
continuation of the New York business, it was operated by William
Henry Comstock as the sole proprietor for many years, and the
terms of any settlement or subsequent relationship with Judson
are unknown. A "Judson Pill Co." was subsequently established at
Morristown, but this was no more than a mailing address for one
department of the Comstock business. What happened to Judson as
an individual is a mystery; like Moore, he quietly disappears
from our story.
It is also puzzling that no record of the transfer of land to Mr.
Comstock upon the first establishment of the pill factory in
Morristown in 1867 can be found. The earliest deed discovered in
the St. Lawrence County records shows the transfer of waterfront
property to William Henry Comstock "of Brockville, Ontario," from
members of the Chapman family, in March 1876. Additional
adjoining land was also acquired in 1877 and 1882.
The Golden Era
With the establishment of the Comstock patent-medicine business
at Morristown in 1867, this enterprise may be said to have
reached maturity. Over thirty years had passed since William
Henry's father had established its earliest predecessor in lower
Manhattan. Possession of Dr. Morse's Indian Root Pills was now
unchallenged, and this and the other leading brand names were
recognized widely in country drug stores and farmhouses over one
third of a continent. No longer did the medicines have to be
mixed, bottled, and packaged in cramped and dingy quarters above
a city shop; spacious buildings in an uncongested country village
were now being used. No further relocations would be necessary,
as operations exceeded their capacity, or as landlords might
elect to raise rents; the pill factory was to remain on the same
site for the following ninety years. And the bitter struggles for
control, perhaps acerbated because of the family relationship
among the partners, were now a thing of the past. William H.
Comstock was in exclusive control, and he was to retain this
position, first as sole proprietor and later as president, for
the remainder of his long life.
The patent-medicine business as a whole was also entering, just
at this time, upon its golden era—the fifty-year span
between the Civil War and World War I. Improved transportation,
wider circulation of newspapers and periodicals, and cheaper and
better bottles all enabled the manufacturers of the proprietary
remedies to expand distribution—the enactment and
enforcement of federal drug laws was still more than a generation
in the future. So patent medicines flourished; in hundreds of
cities and villages over the land enterprising self-proclaimed
druggists devised a livelihood for themselves by mixing some
powders into pills or bottling some secret elixir—normally
containing a high alcoholic content or some other habit-forming
element—created some kind of a legend about this
concoction, and sold the nostrum as the infallible cure for a
wide variety of human (and animal) ailments. And many
conservative old ladies, each one of them a pillar of the church
and an uncompromising foe of liquor, cherished their favorite
remedies to provide comfort during the long winter evenings. But
of these myriads of patent-medicine manufacturers, only a scant
few achieved the size, the recognition, and wide distribution of
Dr. Morse's Indian Root Pills and the other leading Comstock
remedies.
| FIGURE 13.—Comstock
factory buildings, about 1900. |
| FIGURE 14.—Wrapper
for Longley's Great Western Panacea. |
Of course, the continued growth of the business was a gradual
process; it did not come all at once with the move to Morristown.
Even in 1878, after eleven years in this village, the Comstock
factory was not yet important enough to obtain mention in Everts'
comprehensive
History of St. Lawrence County
.
But, as we have seen, additional land was purchased
in 1877 and 1882, obviously bespeaking an expansion of the
enterprise. In 1885, according to a time book, the pill factory
regularly employed about thirty persons, plus a few others on an
occasional basis.
Mr. Comstock, from his residence across the river in Brockville,
was the manager of the business; however, the operations were
under the immediate charge of E. Kingsland, former chief clerk of
the Judson and Comstock offices in New York City, who was brought
up to Morristown as superintendent of the factory. E. Kingsland
was a cousin of Edward A. Kingsland, one of the leading
stationers in New York City, and presumably because of this
relationship, Kingsland supplied a large part of Comstock's
stationery requirements for many years. Kingsland in Morristown
retired from the plant in 1885 and was succeeded by Robert G.
Nicolson, who had been a foreman for a number of years. Nicolson,
a native of Glasgow, Scotland, was brought to America as a child,
first lived at Brockville, and then came to Morristown as foreman
in the pill factory shortly after it was established. He was
succeeded as superintendent by his own son, Robert Jr., early in
the present century.
The great majority of the employees of the pill factory were
women—or, more properly, girls—in an era when it was
not yet common-place for members of the fair sex to leave the
shelter of their homes for paid employment. The wage rates during
the 1870s, 1880s and 1890s were $3 to $5 a week for girls and $7
to $12 a week for men; the last-named amount was an acceptable
rate at that time for a permanent and experienced adult man. The
factory management of this era was joyously unaware of minimum
wages, fair employment laws, social security, antidiscrimination
requirements, fair trade, food and drug acts, income taxes, and
the remaining panoply of legal restrictions that harass the
modern businessman. Since only a few scattered payroll records
have been recovered, Comstock's maximum employment during the
Morristown period is not known, or just when it was reached. In a
brief sketch of the Indian Root Pill business, however, Mrs.
Doris Planty, former Morristown town historian, mentions a work
force of from "40 to 50" around the turn of the century.
In 1875, twenty years after its original projection, the Utica
& Black River Railroad finally came through the village,
bisecting the Comstock property with a right-of-way thirty-six
feet wide and dividing it thereafter into a "lower shop," where
the pills and tonics were made, and the "upper shop," where the
medicines were packaged and clerical duties performed. The
superintendent and his family lived above the upper shop in an
apartment; it was in the spacious attic above this apartment that
the records of the business, in a scattered and ransacked
condition, were found. Inasmuch as the first recorded sale of
land to Comstock occurred in March 1876, almost simultaneously
with the arrival of the railroad, it is a fair surmise that the
second building was put up about this time.
The coming of the railroad also put a station almost at the
doorstep of the factory, and thereafter many shipments came and
went by rail. The company's huge volume of mailings, often ten or
fifteen bags a day, was also delivered directly to the trains,
without going through the local post office. For some years,
however, heavy shipments, including coal for the factory's
boilers, continued to come by ship. The Brockville ferry also
operated from a dock immediately adjacent to the railroad
station; one end of the station was occupied by the United States
Customs House.
Almost from the time of its arrival in Morristown, the Black
River Railroad operated a daily through Wagner Palace Sleeping
Car from New York City via Utica and Carthage, and service over
the same route was continued by the New York Central after it
took over the North Country railroads in 1891. This meant that
Mr. Comstock, when he had business in New York City, could linger
in his factory until the evening train paused at the station to
load the afternoon's outpouring of pills and almanacs, swing
aboard the waiting Pullman, and ensconce himself comfortably in
his berth, to awaken in the morning within the cavernous
precincts of Grand Central Station—an ease and convenience
of travel which residents of the North Country in the 1970s
cannot help but envy. The daily sleeping car through Morristown
to and from New York City survived as long as the railroad
itself, into the early 1960s, thus outlasting both of the
Comstocks—father and son.
The pills were originally mixed by hand. In the summer of 1880
the factory installed a steam engine and belt-driven pill-mixing
machinery. At least one rotary pill machine was purchased from
England, from J.W. Pindar, and delivered to Comstock at a total
cost (including ocean freight) of £19-10-9—about
$100. One minor unsolved mystery is that a bill for a second,
identical machine made out to A.J. White—with whom Comstock
had not been associated for twenty years—is filed among the
Comstock records; it can only be surmised that at this time
Comstock and White were again on good terms, the memories of
lawsuits, arrests, and prosecutions long since forgotten, and
Comstock either ordered a machine in behalf of White or perhaps
agreed to take one off his hands. At the time of this expansion,
certain outbuildings and a dock for the unloading of coal were
erected adjoining the lower building. During 1881 an underwater
telegraph cable was laid between Morristown and Brockville,
allowing immediate communication between the two Comstock
factories.
With the advent of the electrical age, around the turn of the
century, the Comstock factory also installed a generator to
supply lighting, the first in the locality to introduce this
amenity. The wires were also extended to the four or five
company-owned houses in the village, and then to other houses, so
that the company functioned as a miniature public utility. Its
electric lines in the village were eventually sold to the Central
New York Power Corporation and incorporated into that system.
Steam heat was also supplied to the railroad station and the
customs house, and the company pumped water out of the river to
the water tower on the hill above Pine Hill Cemetery, following
the installation of the public water system.
In 1908, Comstock built a large hotel across the street from the
upper factory; sitting part way up the hill and surrounded by a
wide veranda, it represented a conspicuous feature in the village
and dominated the waterfront scene until its destruction by fire
in 1925. The Comstock family, in 1910, also built a town hall and
social center for the village. Adjacent to the lower shop a large
boathouse was erected to shelter Mr. Comstock's yacht, the
Maga Doma
, a familiar sight on the river for many years.
| FIGURE 15.—The
village of Morristown from the waterfront. Railroad depot,
Comstock Hotel, and pill-factory buildings located left of center. |
In any large city, of course, a factory employing, at most, forty
or fifty workers would have passed unnoticed, and its owner could
hardly expect to wield any great social or political influence.
In a remote village like Morristown, things are quite different;
a regular employer of forty persons creates a considerable
economic impact. For two generations the Indian Root Pill factory
supplied jobs, in an area where they were always scarce, and at a
time when the old forest and dairy industries were already
beginning to decline. But the recital of its close associations
with the village makes it clear that the pill factory was more
than a mere employer; for ninety years it provided a spirit that
animated Morristown, pioneered in the introduction of utilities
and certain social services, linked the village directly with the
great outside world of drug stores and hypochondriacs, and
distinguished it sharply from other, languishing St. Lawrence
County villages. One may wonder whether Dr. Morse's Indian Root
Pills really did anyone any good. They certainly did heap many
benefits upon all citizens of Morristown.
|
While there was only a single Comstock medicine business,
operated as a sole proprietorship until 1902, Comstock found it
convenient to maintain several dummy companies—really no
more than mailing addresses—for some years after the move
to the North. Thus, in Morristown was to be found, at least in
business and postal directories, besides the Comstock company
itself, two other proprietary manufacturers: Judson Pill Co. and
E. Kingsland & Co.
The Judson Pill Co. preserved the name of Comstock's former
partner, while use of the name E. Kingsland perhaps flattered the
vanity of the former chief clerk and later plant superintendent.
The major Kingsland product was Chlorinated Tablets, a sure cure
for coughs, colds, hoarseness, bronchial irritation, influenza,
diphtheria, croup, sore throat and all throat diseases; these
were especially recommended by Dr. MacKenzie, Senior Physician in
the Hospital for Diseases of the Throat (was there any such
hospital?) in London, England. The Kingsland pills were also
popularized under the name of Little Pink Granules.
Over on the Canadian side of the river, where another plant
approximately the same size as the Morristown facilities was in
operation, the Comstock Company had assimilated the Dr. Howard
Medicine Co. Dr. Howard's leading remedies were his Seven Spices
for all Digestive Disorders and the Blood Builder for Brain and
Body. The latter, in the form of pills, was prescribed as a
positive cure for a wide array of ailments, but like many other
patent medicines of the era, it was hinted that it had a
particularly beneficial effect upon sexual vitality.
They have an especial action (through the blood) upon the SEXUAL ORGANS of both Men and Women. It is a well recognized fact that upon the healthy activity of the sexual apparatus depend the mental and physical well-being of every person come to adult years. It is that which gives the rosy blush to the cheek, and the soft light to the eye of the maiden. The elastic step, the ringing laugh, and the strong right arm of the youth, own the same mainspring. How soon do irregularities rob the face of color, the eye of brightness! Everyone knows this. The blood becomes impoverished, the victim PALE. This pallor of the skin is often the outward mark of the trouble within. But to the sufferer there arise a host of symptoms, chiefest among which are loss of physical and nervous energy. Then Dr. Howard's BLOOD BUILDER steps into the breach and holds the fort. The impoverished Blood is enriched. The shattered nervous forces are restored. Vigor returns. Youth is recalled. Decay routed. The bloom of health again mantles the faded cheek. Improvement follows a few days' use of the pills; while permanent benefit and cure can only reasonably be expected when sufficient have been taken to enrich the Blood.
Before the Blood Builder pills were taken, all their users were
advised to have their bowels thoroughly cleansed by a laxative
medicine and, happily, the company also made an excellent
preparation for this purpose—Dr. Howard's Golden Grains.
While the good doctor was modern enough—the circular quoted
from was printed in the 1890s—to recognize the importance
of the healthy activity of the sexual apparatus, such a
suggestion should not be carried too far—so we find that
the pills were also unrivaled for building up systems shattered
by debauchery, excesses, self-abuse or disease. Along with the
pills themselves was recommended a somewhat hardy regimen,
including fresh air, adequate sleep, avoidance of lascivious
thoughts, and bathing the private parts and buttocks twice daily
in ice-cold water.
| FIGURE 17.—Card
used in advertising Kingsland's Chlorinated Tablets. |
A few years after their initial introduction, Dr. Howard's Blood
Builder Pills somehow became "electric"—this word
surrounded by jagged arrows prominently featured on the outer
wrapper—although the character of the improvement which
added this new quality was not explained anywhere. The literature
accompanying these remedies explained that "in the evening of an
active, earnest and successful life, and in order that the public
at large might participate in the benefit of his discoveries,"
Dr. Howard graciously imparted to the proprietors the
composition, methods of preparation, and modes of using these
medicines. In other words, he was obviously a public benefactor
of the same stamp as Dr. Morse and Dr. Cunard—although by
the final years of the century, the old story about the long
absence from home, the extended travels in remote lands, and the
sudden discovery of some remarkable native remedy would probably
have sounded a trifle implausible.