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Title
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Mrs. Winslow's Soothing Syrup Bottle
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Description
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Mothers in the late nineteenth century used Mrs. Winslow’s Soothing Syrup, made by Curtis & Perkins of Bangor, Maine, to ease their babies’ teething pain and other ailments. It lived up to its name, soothing distressed children into a peaceful sleep, a far cry from the painful medical practices of the era. Composed of a high dose of morphine dissolved in grain alcohol, the product caused many infant deaths throughout its lifespan. A series of federal laws passed in the early twentieth century forced a reformulation. Stripped of intoxicating qualities and increasingly obsolete in an age of “scientific” child-rearing, it was quietly withdrawn from the market around 1920.
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Contributor
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Lucy Davis (Graduate Student, American Material Culture, Spring 2018); photograph by Jacob Lechner.
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Date
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c. 1850-1875; photograph, April 2018.
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Format
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Glass bottle, nearly 5 inches tall and 1 inch in diameter.
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Publisher
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Rutgers University-Camden
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Relation
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Affleck, Richard, George Cress, Ingrid Weubber, Rebecca White, Kimberly Morrell, and Thomas Kutys. Phase II and Data-Recovery Archaeological Excavations of the Smith-Maskell Site Cooper Street Development Camden, New Jersey. Archaeological Excavation Report, Burlington: URS Corporation.
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Rights
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Collection of Rutgers-Camden Center for the Arts
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Source
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Recovered from excavation prior to construction of Rutgers-Camden dormitory at 330 Cooper Street, Camden, N.J.
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Original Format
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Photograph
