Snake Oil, Hustlers and Hambones

Snake Oil, Hustlers and Hambones
Author: Ann Anderson
Publisher:
Total Pages: 208
Release: 2000
Genre: History
ISBN:

Long before television and radio commercials beckoned to potential buyers, the medicine show provided free entertainment and promised cures for everything from corns to cancer. Combining elements of the circus, theater, vaudeville, and good old-fashioned entrepreneurship, the showmen of the American medicine show sold tonics, ointments, pills, extracts and a host of other "wonder-cures, " guaranteed to "cure what ails you." While the cures were seldom miraculous, the medicine show was an important part of American culture and of performance history. Harry Houdini, Buster Keaton, and P.T. Barnum all took a turn upon the medicine show stage. This study of the medicine show phenomenon surveys nineteenth century popular entertainment and provides insight into the ways in which show business, advertising, and medicine manufacture developed in concert. The colorful world of the medicine show, with its Wild West shows, pie-eating contests, clowns, and menageries, is fully explored. Photographs of performers and of the fascinating handbills and posters used to promote the medicine show are included.

Intergalactic Medicine Show

Intergalactic Medicine Show
Author: Orson Scott Card
Publisher: Macmillan + ORM
Total Pages: 433
Release: 2009-11-30
Genre: Fiction
ISBN: 1429917830

An anthology of eighteen science fiction and fantasy stories collected from the InterGalatic Medicine Show online magazine, plus four new Ender Universe stories. Welcome to the first anthology of stories from Orson Scott Card’s online magazine, InterGalactic Medicine Show. The magazine has been at the forefront of publishing the work of new SF and fantasy talents, as well as many tales of wonder from well-known writers. Additionally, this anthology contains four stories by Orson Scott Card set in the Ender Universe. None of these stories has appeared anywhere except in InterGalactic Medicine Show, and are in print in this volume for the first time. Orson Scott Card’s InterGalactic Medicine Show is a true treasure for lovers of science fiction and fantasy, and a must-have for fans of Card’s bestselling novel Ender’s Game. Praise for Orson Scott Card’s Intergalactic Medicine Show: An Anthology “Noteworthy SF and fantasy stories from a bumper crop of talented new authors. . . . If the quality of these stories is any indication, IGMS has as much promise as the newcomers it showcases.” —Publishers Weekly

Four White Horses and a Brass Band

Four White Horses and a Brass Band
Author: Violet McNeal
Publisher: Feral House
Total Pages: 199
Release: 2019-11-05
Genre: History
ISBN: 1627310932

Violet McNeal ran away from her family’s rural Minnesota farm in the late 1880s and fell under the spell of conman and patent medicine “doctor” Will Archimbauld who hooked her on opium and promises of fame and fortune. Violet soon learned to become Princess Lotus Blossom and was the best pitchman, nostrum seller, and conwoman to roam the west in a torch-lit wagon. Four White Horses and a Brass Band is Violet’s story of life on the road with the medicine show and reveal the secrets of conman’s trade. Sick and nearly dead with addiction by age 30, she submits to the tortures of withdrawal and the “cure” to create a new life. First published in 1947, the Feral House edition features an extensive afterword on the history of the patent medicine trade and evolution of the lure of miracle cures and healers. Also included are a glossary of the grifter’s cant and samples of scripts used by Violet and other infamous “doctors”.

The Bushman's Medicine Show

The Bushman's Medicine Show
Author: Gary Lilley
Publisher:
Total Pages: 0
Release: 2017
Genre: Poetry
ISBN: 9780996858496

Gary Copeland Lilley's collection, The Bushman's Medicine Show, is a southern gothic testament delivered by an archetypical denizen of the modern south, a sort of Everyman from the Carolina low-country traversing the territories of family, the spirits, society, culture, and identity, while refusing to be eradicated. If there is some type of stigmata, a mark, some identifier of people who have transcended southern stigmas, then the personas, certainly the Bushman, surely wear such a mark. There is the sweltering of American southern heat and humidity in these poems: the dualities within nature and existence, that hard sacred and secular ride that Lilley seems very familiar with. The voice, the music of regional language, the character speech, is an essential element, the proper vehicle that drives these poems down the streets, the dirt roads, and through the piney woods. Riding with Bushman, lean forward in your seat, turn the music on.

Medicine Show

Medicine Show
Author: Mary Calhoun
Publisher: HarperCollins Publishers
Total Pages: 152
Release: 1976
Genre: Juvenile Nonfiction
ISBN:

Describes the medicine shows that not only sold cure-all medicines but also provided entertainment to small towns from mid-nineteenth century to mid-twentieth century.

The New York Times Book of Medicine

The New York Times Book of Medicine
Author: Gina Kolata
Publisher: Union Square & Co.
Total Pages: 698
Release: 2015-04-21
Genre: Medical
ISBN: 145490206X

Today we live longer, healthier lives than ever before in history—a transformation due almost entirely to tremendous advances in medicine. This change is so profound, with many major illnesses nearly wiped out, that its hard now to imagine what the world was like in 1851, when the New York Times began publishing. Treatments for depression, blood pressure, heart disease, ulcers, and diabetes came later; antibiotics were nonexistent, viruses unheard of, and no one realized yet that DNA carried blueprints for life or the importance of stem cells. Edited by award-winning writer Gina Kolata, this eye-opening collection of 150 articles from the New York Times archive charts the developing scientific insights and breakthroughs into diagnosing and treating conditions like typhoid, tuberculosis, cancer, diabetes, Alzheimers, and AIDS, and chronicles the struggles to treat mental illness and the enormous success of vaccines. It also reveals medical mistakes, lapses in ethics, and wrong paths taken in hopes of curing disease. Every illness, every landmark has a tale, and the newspapers top reporters tell each one with perceptiveness and skill.

The Medicine Show Murders

The Medicine Show Murders
Author: John A. Miller Jr
Publisher: Pima Books
Total Pages: 199
Release: 2012-08-23
Genre: Fiction
ISBN: 1479181080

A body falls off a train during a heavy downpour near Tucson, Arizona in late January of 1895. As the rain ends, the wagons of a traveling medicine show arrive in town with performers to entertain and a doctor of questionable credentials to peddle his wares. Pima Gallagher, a detective for the Southern Pacific Railroad, assisted, or at least she thinks so, by Scout Walker, his eleven-year-old stepdaughter, try to learn the identity of the corpse and whether its sudden appearance has anything to do with the nearly simultaneous arrival of Dr. Blenheim's show. Meanwhile, Pima's brother and sister, back in his home state of Mississippi, are causing him a great deal of concern with their letters about brother Jefferson's deteriorating health. Eventually things come to a satisfactory conclusion, but not before more murder and mayhem manage to put Pima and Scout in fear for their lives in the mountains and desert areas between Tucson and Phoenix.

Renaissance Medicine

Renaissance Medicine
Author: Ian Dawson
Publisher: Enchanted Lion Books
Total Pages: 72
Release: 2005
Genre: Juvenile Nonfiction
ISBN: 9781592700387

Learn about medicine during the Renaissance period.

You Are the Medicine

You Are the Medicine
Author: Asha Frost
Publisher: Hay House, Inc
Total Pages: 281
Release: 2022-03-15
Genre: Body, Mind & Spirit
ISBN: 1401963501

Indigenous Medicine Woman Asha Frost invites readers to learn the healing medicine of the 13 Ojibway moons and the spirit animals that will guide their wisdom journey. The Medicine you have been searching for lives within you. Follow the path of the 13 Ojibwe Moons with Animal Spirits and Ancestors as your guides as you unlock your connection to your own unique, inherent healing power. Through storytelling, ceremonies, and Shamanic journeys, learn to apply ancient wisdom to your life in ways that are respectful and conscious of the stolen lands, lives, and traditions of Indigenous peoples. Discover how to: - Ground and root into your own lineage and meet your Ancestral guides. - Practice self-care and rest on your journey. - Return to Ancestral ways of cleansing and purifying. - Trust and surrender so you can manifest and thrive. - Release self-doubt, fear, disconnection, and insecurity.

A Sawdust Heart

A Sawdust Heart
Author: Henry Wood
Publisher:
Total Pages: 0
Release:
Genre: Actors
ISBN:

Chronicles the life of vaudeville actor Henry Wood, and details his early life and experiences while performing in traveling medicine and tent shows in the early twentieth century. Includes black-and-white photographs.