MEMORIES:
Linda9801 remembers...This was a must in our house! I remember being up sick and my mom would give it to me ... More »
Posted on 09/04/08
PHOTOS:
Nausea, heartburn, indigestion, upset stomach… diarrhea!
Pepto Bismol has been well-known for helping comfort these common digestion “issues” for over a century, but what’s not well-known is that Pepto Bismol actually started off as a homemade remedy created by a doctor to cure “cholera infantum.” In the early 20th century, sanitation just wasn’t as widespread it is today, or even what it was 50 years ago. Infants were suddenly coming down with cases of severe vomiting and diarrhea, sometimes causing death. The formula, a mixture of pepsin, bismuth salicylate and a number of other ingredients including wintergreen and the color pink, helped to ease the symptoms. Researchers would later learn that the illness was caused by bacterial infections, treatable with antibiotics, but the reputation was already solid for the concoction. Even after pasteurization and public awareness of the benefits of washing hands helped eliminate cholera infantum – the soothing blend was in demand for helping ease the trouble of many a digestive ailment.
With demand being far greater than the inventor could supply, the formula was brought to Norwich Pharmacal Company for mass manufacturing. Norwich even saw the greater potential for the product, which was called “Bismosal: Mixture Cholera Infantum.” Since it had no opiates in its mix, as many medicines did at the time, it was considered safer for children, and was promoted as such. By the 1919, Bismosal was changed to Pepto-Bismol, to encourage adults to buy and use the product and during the 1920s it was dispensed at drugstore soda fountains, as many medicines were at the time.
Today, the product remains much the same. The ingredients are still the same, though it was found that it was the bismuth subsalicylate that was the true active ingredient in Pepto-Bismol. The product remained a huge success throughout the decades, and remained Norwich’s top-selling non-prescription drug until the company was sold in 1982. Kids everywhere, suffering from upset tummies for a wide variety of reasons have found spoonfuls of the pink stuff found in front of them, time and time again.
After being picked up by Procter & Gamble Company, Pepto went worldwide and in the process created some memorable television commercials in the last few decades. Starting with The National Stomach Test and leading into commercials with worried, heartburn-stricken travelers, Pepto Bismol would take a life of its own in the 21st century with the Pepto Bismol Dance – ranking up there in catchiness with the classic “Plop, plop, fizz, fizz” of its stomach soothing competitor, Alka Seltzer.
So when you’re looking for relief from nausea, heartburn, indigestion… upset stomach, diarrhea… Well, you know what to do.
