Bring Back the Substances… ?

This week we bring to you not words, but substances.

That’s right ladies and gentlemen.  This week we are offering you a gentle stroll back in time, an ambulate through the arenas of the substances once consumed by our forefathers and mothers legally.

1. Cocaine

Cocaine was an over the counter drug commonly found in toothache drops until about 1914.  It was also, as any marketing student will tell you, a key ingredient in Coca Cola (and indubitably part of its success) before it was outlawed as an ingredient.  Cocaine was also found in tonics such as Metcalf’s Coca Wine and Vin Mariani Wine, which were basically a mixture of wine and cocaine (also known as your standard Wednesday night in Sydney’s eastern suburbs) advertising to be for “nerves, brain, and body”.

2. Quaaludes

If you have ever read any William Burroughs or Hunter S Thompson, you will notice that neither stops going on about Quaaludes.  Now illegal, Quaaludes were particularly potent sleeping pills.  They would also knock you out if you had a few too many tipples of coca-wine (see above).

3. Heroin

For a period of about 10 years as the 19^th century passed over into the 20^th, Bayer got away with marketing heroin as a cough medicine.  Cough remedies seemed to have been a commonplace for drugs both hard and soft.  Other culprits included Cosadein which contained codeine, chloroform, and cannabis, and Ayer’ Cherry Pectoral, an entry-level to getting hooked on morphine.  Basically, if you came down with a cough, you were probably having of anyone for 5 blocks.

4. Chloroform

Chloroform wasn’t outlawed as an ingredient until about 1976.  Prior to this, it was found in a wide range of pharmaceuticals from toothpaste to back ointment.

5. Amphetamines

Norodin was a brand name for methamphetamine, promising to lift the spirits.  Of course, long-term use probably deepened depression.

6. Dexedrine

Whilst not illegal, this ADHD medication was once and over the counter substance marketed at housewives to pick them up.

Some of the stranger events of the 20^th century might finally be explained…