From the Wood Library-Museum’s Ben Z. Swanson Collection, this illegibly postmarked cover (above) was sent to Johnson Pillmore, M.D., of Delta, New York. Fortunately, the “Columbus in Sight of Land” 1-cent stamp from the Columbian Issue assists us in dating this item. From Holly, Michigan, the Slocum Manufacturing Company was taking advantage of the 1893 World’s Columbian Exposition to advertise “Dental Surprise,” their new (?) “local anesthetic for painless extraction of teeth.” Suspicious of the novelty of Slocum’s wares, the journal editor of the Dental Cosmos forwarded a sample of “Dental Surprise” in 1893 to S. P. Sadtler, Ph.D., a professor at the Philadelphia College of Pharmacy. Sadtler’s chemical analysis unmasked “Dental Surprise” as merely carbolic acid fortified with 1.46% “Anhydrous Cocain Hydrochlorate.” (Copyright © the American Society of Anesthesiologists’ Wood Library-Museum of Anesthesiology.)
From the Wood Library-Museum’s Ben Z. Swanson Collection, this illegibly postmarked cover (above) was sent to Johnson Pillmore, M.D., of Delta, New York. Fortunately, the “Columbus in Sight of Land” 1-cent stamp from the Columbian Issue assists us in dating this item. From Holly, Michigan, the Slocum Manufacturing Company was taking advantage of the 1893 World’s Columbian Exposition to advertise “Dental Surprise,” their new (?) “local anesthetic for painless extraction of teeth.” Suspicious of the novelty of Slocum’s wares, the journal editor of the Dental Cosmos forwarded a sample of “Dental Surprise” in 1893 to S. P. Sadtler, Ph.D., a professor at the Philadelphia College of Pharmacy. Sadtler’s chemical analysis unmasked “Dental Surprise” as merely carbolic acid fortified with 1.46% “Anhydrous Cocain Hydrochlorate.” (Copyright © the American Society of Anesthesiologists’ Wood Library-Museum of Anesthesiology.)
George S. Bause, M.D., M.P.H., Honorary Curator and Laureate of the History of Anesthesia, Wood Library-Museum of Anesthesiology, Schaumburg, Illinois, and Clinical Associate Professor, Case Western Reserve University, Cleveland, Ohio. UJYC@aol.com.
