rare and all original mid-nineteenth century deep blue aqua 8-paneled cylindrical dr. wistar's medicinal bottle fabricated for john d. park.

reference only
In stock
SKU
UR-23198-15
john d. park, cincinnati, oh.

 

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original hard to find privy dug c. 1865-1875 vibrant blue aqua dr. wistar's balsam of wild cherry 8-paneled medicinal bottle. embossed vertically on multiple panels is " dr wistar / balsam of / wild cherry / john d park / cincinnati o.". the multi-paneled round body is finished with a short neck and an applied collar. seams evidence manufacture in a keyed hinge mold. no cracks or chips. crudities are consistent with its age and date of manufacture, including bubbles, whittling and minor discoloration or haze. according to court records and advertisement, henry wistar, a doctor from virginia, invented the recipe for wistar’s balsam of wild cherry around 1838. about 1841, lewis williams, a retail druggist in philadelphia supposedly purchased the recipe and marketed the balsam of wild cherry under the company name of williams & company. williams and his investors recruited agents all over the country, as far west as cincinnati, building the business to the wholesale level, until march 1844, when for reasons unknown he sold the rights to market it “to many states and the eastern part of pennsylvania”, to a man from rochester, new york, issac butts. butts was a sharp businessman, who groomed wistar’s medicine and set the stage for its place in the national market. it was butts who designed and registered the label for the balsam with the copyright in 1844, and who designed and developed the unique eight-sided bottle stamped with his initials. butts cleverly marketed the balsam with his labels, wrappers and bottles. in march 1845, only nine months after he purchased it, he sold the rights to sell the balsam in the eastern states to seth w. fowle, of boston. butts made a handsome profit from flipping the medicine - $25,000. wistar’s balsam of wild cherry became seth fowle's livelihood, and eventually enabled him to finance the purchase of at least one other successful national brand, oxygenated bitters. for much of his early career he had to defend himself from counterfeiters and others who attempted to horn in on his rightful purchase of the balsam. now fowle purchased from butts all the “apparatus and appurtenances used in manufacturing the medicine, and all stereotype plates, pamphlets and bottle moulds used in vending the same.” this included butt’s advertisements, wrappers and labels, but not the unrestrained ability to market the medicine wherever he chose. there is no direct evidence to tell who owned the rights to sell the medicine in the "west" but in 1843, prior to the sale by williams & co. to isaac butts, the “general agents for the western states” was the firm of sanford and park. benjamin f. sanford came to cincinnati about 1840 and joined john d. park in the patent drug business, where they were retail druggists with a store at the corner of fourth and walnut downtown. over the eight years that the partnership lasted, they sought out eastern brands for which they became agents, one of which was wistar’s balsam of wild cherry. sanford, left the business in the beginning of 1849. their business also had local counterfeiters to deal with. by the time fowle purchased the rights to distribute the medicine in the eastern states, he was already being undermined by sanford & park. l. s. comstock & co., who long had a relationship with the cincinnati company as his western agents, returned a favor and offered sanford and park’s balsam for sale in new york city. all versions of the wistar bottles, except those of the sanford and park company, have philadelphia embossed on the bottle. this is interesting since the medicine did not originate in philadelphia and neither of the purchasers were from that city. in what was to become part of case law, fowle, in november of 1847, filed an injunction to stop william w. spear [sic] who counterfeited the balsam sometime between 1845-1846 and sold it in bottles with wrappers and labels identical to those fowle had purchased from butts. fowle did not meet success, as the courts decided there was no legal ground for protecting the marketing of quack medicine. though registration of trademarks was not established until 1876, it set legal precedent. in february 1849, john d. park answered wm. spear in an ad of his own, cautioning against the man's counterfeit product. for many years, fowle spend a large portion of his advertising dollars exposing the trespassers. in order to sell the balsam, park recruited wholesalers in new york and honed his advertising throughout the 1850's to emphasize that the original was now prepared and sold only by him. back in cincinnati, john d. park sought a new partner in demas barnes, a patent medicine man in new york. together they formed the firm barnes and park to sell both wine and medicine. they leased a spacious corner store at 304 broadway in new york city in september 1855. john d. park supplied ohio catawba wine and some of his medicines for the firm, but remained in cincinnati and never operated out of the new york store. by december 1855, with their vast experience and wealth of business connections, they advertised themselves as agents for well over one hundred brands, including all the big name medicines: jayne’s, kennedy’s, hostetter’s, houghton’s, mcclintock’s, radway’s, merchant’s, lyon’s, and even wistar’s. barnes and park billed themselves as, ‘dealers in all genuine family medicines.” they advertised the balsam for only one year, its sales not sufficient to support the expense, and introduced several other medicines using park’s name, but none caught the public’s attention. after that, park abandoned, at least temporarily, the use of the wistar name. barnes and park probably made some kind of deal with seth fowle & co., because in april 1860, fowle advertised to avoid those versions not sold by agents like barnes and park. the partnership was relatively short-lived, with demas barns and john park parting ways in january 1861. barnes had a new partner and firm called, “d. s. barnes”, leaving park once again without a partner. in march of 1862 barnes ran an ad cautioning druggists against john d. park's counterfeited versions of medicines he had trademarked. park took to counterfeiting wistar’s balsam and whatever deal there had been with fowle was off. park’s bottles of the 1860-1870s, had the words, “dr. wistar’s balsam of wild cherry, john d. park, cincinnati, o.” blown in the glass. it was however, too little too late, as fowle’s diligence captured the market. he even advertised in park’s territory, chicago and beyond. john d. park & sons stopped making the brand sometime in the early 1870s. by the mid 1870s, fowle’s (now seth w. fowle and sons) more than twenty year battle to be sole proprietor of the genuine wistar’s balsam of wild cherry was won.

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