# Why Did They Use to Think Gargling Was a Good Idea? **URL:** \ **Category:** Factual Questions\ **Created:** [June 27, 2002, 4:17am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-did-they-use-to-think-gargling-was-a-good-idea/116177 "2002-06-27T04:17:27Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 8\ **Page:** 1
**Author:** ![Jim\_B](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/jim_b/32/4338_2.png) [@Jim\_B](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Jim_B)\ **Post date:** [June 27, 2002, 4:17am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-did-they-use-to-think-gargling-was-a-good-idea/116177/1 "2002-06-27T04:17:27Z")
Some time ago, when my paternal grandfather had to go to a nursing home (a very nice one, I may add), we got to go thru his house. My mother told be to take anything I wanted, since it all would soon be thrown away anyways. I took a short radio set–which I still have, and still rarely use. And I took my grandmother’s old commercial cook book, apparently published in 1924. By most accounts my grandmother (who died when I was 5) was supermom–much like my own mother. So naturally I had always wondered were she got her info from. (She used to know the answer to _everything_ when it came to mothering.) While perusing the book, I came across something interesting. It was all about general care for babies and children. Some of the stuff was weird. For example: > [@](#): > > Hot turpentine will relieve and cure cuts from rusty tin or nails. First bathe the parts with diluted carbolic acid, … :eek: ! But the one thing that I still wonder about, was the part about daily gargling. The book thought we should all do it. > [@](#): > > Teach the child early to gargle…Gargle: eight teaspoons of water to one teaspoon of listerine. I have sometimes seen old people gargle and wondered why they were doing it. So why are they? And does the same advice apply today? 😃 ---
**Author:** ![Jim\_B](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/jim_b/32/4338_2.png) [@Jim\_B](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Jim_B)\ **Post date:** [June 27, 2002, 4:29am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-did-they-use-to-think-gargling-was-a-good-idea/116177/2 "2002-06-27T04:29:43Z")
That should be _shortwave radio_. I still rarely use it, though. ---
**Author:** ![Doug\_Bowe](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/df788c/32.png) [@Doug\_Bowe](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Doug_Bowe)\ **Post date:** [June 27, 2002, 5:05am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-did-they-use-to-think-gargling-was-a-good-idea/116177/3 "2002-06-27T05:05:57Z")
Don’t catch too much TV do you? Listerine is _still_ promoting gargling to kill all those evil bacteria that infest your mouth. I guess this is ironic. Listerine didn’t promote putting the stuff in your mouth until 1919. Before then you were supposed to use it for external things, like cuts, scrapes and dandruff. ---
**Author:** ![muttrox](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/a8b319/32.png) [@muttrox](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/muttrox)\ **Post date:** [June 27, 2002, 12:58pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-did-they-use-to-think-gargling-was-a-good-idea/116177/4 "2002-06-27T12:58:04Z")
I had never heard not to gargle. The OP assumes you shouldn’t, is this true? ---
**Author:** ![postcards](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/p/8e8cbc/32.png) [@postcards](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/postcards)\ **Post date:** [June 27, 2002, 1:00pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-did-they-use-to-think-gargling-was-a-good-idea/116177/5 "2002-06-27T13:00:06Z")
What kind of commercial cook book has folk remedies in it? ---
**Author:** ![kanicbird](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/k/5f8ce5/32.png) [@kanicbird](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/kanicbird)\ **Post date:** [June 27, 2002, 1:22pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-did-they-use-to-think-gargling-was-a-good-idea/116177/6 "2002-06-27T13:22:32Z")
IS there anything wrong with gargling ---
**Author:** ![hawthorne](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/h/c89c15/32.png) [@hawthorne](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/hawthorne)\ **Post date:** [June 27, 2002, 1:27pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-did-they-use-to-think-gargling-was-a-good-idea/116177/7 "2002-06-27T13:27:25Z")
Old cookbooks are full of folk wisdom, **postcards** - even some newer ones refer to _sealing_ rather than browning the meat. Many are also part cookbook, part home economics, so a chapter on health and hygiene wouldn’t be that out of place. [hijack] My favorite slightly warped tip was from a cookbook chapter on feeding invalids, which having observed that boiling vegies in copious quantities of water leeched out many nutients advised feeding the invalids the cooking water as well. [/] I’m curious as to **muttrox** ’s query too - at worst, gargling can be an effective pain deadener. ---
**Author:** ![JRDelirious](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/jrdelirious/32/9531_2.png) [@JRDelirious](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/JRDelirious)\ **Post date:** [June 27, 2002, 1:41pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-did-they-use-to-think-gargling-was-a-good-idea/116177/8 "2002-06-27T13:41:27Z")
I don’t think Jim B. is assuming you _shouldn’t_ gargle, it sounded to me more like he sees it as something for which he does not see the point. And I can understand if his curiosity is aroused at the idea that _you should “teach the child early to gargle”_, as if it were some sort of essential life skill. _That_ does strike me as quaint.