History 101
The Jar in the Fridge Historic Health in Chesterfield Article Aimee Pellet | Photography City of Chesterfield Historic and Landmarks Preservation Committee
I
can still picture in my mind the large jar of thick amber goo sitting at the back of my great-grandmother’s refrigerator. It was always there. One day I told her I had a sore throat. She went straight to that jar, pulled it out and said, “Here. Have a spoonful of this.” “What?” I exclaimed with disdain. Eat the unappealing substance I’d always seen sitting in the back of the refrigerator? “It’s just honey and lemon juice.” I was a kid of the 1970s. We took Children’s Tylenol or
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Chesterfield Lifestyle | January 2015
cough syrup for a sore throat, not some homemade concoction. Home remedies were commonplace before the advent of commercial medicine. As people today take a renewed interest in natural health and organic diets, it’s interesting that many of the “new” methods people are trying are just old ones–recycled. The average family had an arsenal of remedies that ranged from the regular de-worming of children using clove oil to dietary prevention methods. I can remem-
ber my dad sharing that when his family would work, out in the fields, one of the younger children would bring them a bucket of water mixed with apple cider vinegar and sugar–an approximation of lemonade for an area where lemons were rare–as well as a known antiseptic! As a community with many German immigrants, Chesterfield saw the introduction of many foods particular to that region of Europe. My family has more pickle and sauerkraut recipes than we would ever attempt to use today. And yet again, perhaps without knowing the exact science behind probiotics and natural anti-inflammatories, they did know that certain foods offered a general health benefit. These included fermented foods and foods made with vinegar, as well as foods with added spices that boasted natural anti-inflammatory properties like turmeric to pickles. There were also commercial products available at the time. Some products had possible healing benefits, such as Rawleigh’s Salve for cuts and sores–still manufactured today with turpentine as a primary ingredient, albeit sold online rather than from a traveling salesman. Other products like tonics sold like hotcakes in the latter part of the 19th century and were often little more than grain alcohol or sometimes worse! Many products of the day claimed cocaine and other similar, now-illicit substances as their principal ingredients. Yesterday, I picked up an old book that has been in my family since its publication in 1895, The People’s Common Sense Medical Adviser In Plain English. Some of the content was fairly contemporary, including linking poor digestion to anxiety, as well as listing tobacco and opium in the same section, calling both poisons. However, it did end every chapter with “testimonials” for products touted by the authors, including Dr. Sage’s Catarrh Remedy and Dr. Pierce’s Golden Medical Discovery, promising to cure everything from deafness to consumption. These were probably little more than alcohol and, while certainly making the patient feel “better” they did little to actually cure diseases.