[QUOTE=Siam Sam]
Don’t forget around 1900, there were a lot of little old lady drug addicts. Routine cures for every sort of ailment contained various amounts of opiates.
The Civil War produced a large number of drug addicts. I have an interesting book called Dark Paradise: Opiate Addiction in America before 1940, by David T. Courtwright, that goes into that.
[/QUOTE]
Those “Nerve Tonics” were often heavily laced with either cocaine, opium or sometimes both (Sorry I have no cite, anecdotal evidence from having worked in a museum). No wonder granny got “nervous” when she didn’t get her tonic - she was going through withdrawal.
Also, I remember a perusal of the 1904 Sear Roebuck catologue’s medical pages contained several “Patent Medicines” that were essentially pure opium.
Regards
FML