Lily the Pink

LILY THE PINK

"Lily the Pink"

Chorus:
We'll Drink, we'll drink, we'll drink
To Lily the Pink, the Pink, the Pink
The savior of (the savior of)
The human ra-a-ace
She invented
A medicinal compound
Most effective
In any case

Henry T-Tammer
Had a t-terrible stammer
He could hardly say a wo-o-ord
So they gave him
Medicinal compound
Now he's seen but never heard

(chorus)

Uncle Paul
Was very small
He was the smallest man in town
Till they gave him
Medicinal compound
Now he's nowhere to be found

(chorus)

Ebenezer
Thought he was Ceaser
So they put him in a home
Where they gave him
Medicinal compound
Now he's Emperor of Rome

(chorus)

When Lily died
And went to heaven
All the church bells, they did ring
And she brought her
Medicinal compound
Hark, the herald angels sing

(chorus)

Lydia E. Pinkham's Vegetable Compound was sold as medicine, starting in 1873, by Lydia Pinkham of Lynn, Massachusetts. Whether the stuff was medically effective or not I don't know, but it was financially successful, making Lily the Pink the nation's first millionairess. (Source: Porter, Roy, Blood and Guts: A Short History of Medicine W.W.Norton. New York. 2002 @ Ch 2)

Ms Pinkam's Vegetable Compound was only one of many proprietary medicinal elixirs in the 1700s and 1800s, some of which had true value (Eau medicinale, sold by a Frenchman, contained colchicum, thus providing true therapy for gout, for instance) while others, to borrow a phrase from Stephen Sondheim, were "nothing more than piss and ink." All of them, regardless of merit or demerit, were scorned by orthodox medicine, but patients flocked to them. (Source: Porter, Roy, ibid @ Ch 2)

In the 1800s, in America and no doubt other places as well, there were several medical sects. At the time, medicine was not really a science, based on evidence-based therapy (even today only some portions of Western medicine are evidence-based). Each of the several medical sects had pet theories and treatments, and each, generally, scorned the practices and practitioners of the others. But there was also the eccentric sect, who reasoned that they should use whatever was shown to work, and freely borrowed from all other branches of medicine as their education and experience dictated - in short, they practiced an early type of evidence-based medicine, though their evidence was flimsy by today's standards (using cohorts, anecdotal evidence, and generally not using any type of formal study, double-blind or otherwise).(Source: The Encyclopedia of Civil War Medicine - I don't have the book in front of me for a full citation, sorry.)

In some ways, things haven't changed. Orthodox Western Medicine is still, and increasingly, facing competition in the form of elixirs (e.g. herbal remedies) and other practices, some of which have real value, most or all of which are dismissed by mainstream medicine. And the reasons for this haven't changed, either. Patients continue to know (or think they know) what's best for them, to demand quick fixes, and to be credulous to those who promise quick fixes. Western medicine continues to function as a business, to whom a competing industry is anathema. To be fair there are physicians who, with real reason, worry about the potential harm to patients that some "folk remedies" may cause, and to be fair many "folk remedies" are dangerous, but many are also not only safe but effective. It's time for the eclectics to return.