Hadacol

Discussion in 'General Shaving Talk' started by Boojum1, Aug 20, 2015.

  1. Boojum1

    Boojum1 Valet Parking Available Here

    Repost from Product R.I.P. Thread

    HADACOL


    Hadacol was a patent medicine marketed as a vitamin supplement. Its principal attraction, however, was that it contained 12 percent alcohol (listed on the tonic bottle's label as a "preservative"), which made it quite popular in the dry counties of the southern United States. It was the product of four-term Louisiana State Senator Dudley J. LeBlanc, a Democrat from Abbeville in Vermilion Parish in southwestern Louisiana. He was not a medical doctor, nor a registered pharmacist, but had a strong talent for self-promotion.



    In 1943, LeBlanc conceived the idea that became "Hadacol" in New Orleans, when he had persistent pain in his foot and elsewhere. He asked a doctor to give him medication for pain: then he found that what the doctor gave him was a B-vitamin elixir, which he proposed to duplicate with a few changes and sell to a mass consumer market. (Years later, reports arose saying that LeBlanc had offered the doctor a share of the business, but the medical man refused. On a return visit, LeBlanc allegedly stole a bottle of the medicine when the nurse had left the room.)



    The label on the tonic's bottle clearly stated that the recommended dosage (1 tablespoonful taken 4 times a day) was to be taken "...in a 1/2 glass of water after meals and before retiring". However, some pharmacies in dry counties were known to sell it by the shot-glass and at least one bar in New Orleans' French Quarter was known to sell a "Tassel Cocktail" with Hadacol as an ingredient.[3] In Northbrook, Illinois, a suburb of Chicago, sales of Hadacol were limited to liquor stores.



    LeBlanc created the name "Hadacol" from his former business, the Happy Day Company, maker of Happy Day Headache Powders (which had been seized by the Food and Drug Administration (FDA)) and Dixie Dew Cough Syrup. "Happy" became "HA", "Days" became "DA," "Company" became "CO", and his own last name "LeBlanc" provided the "L". Hence the created name was "Hadacol."[5][6] However, when LeBlanc was asked about the name, he would often joke, "Well, I hadda' call it something!



    • Don't Be Satisfied With Symptomatic Relief! It's Possible to RELIEVE THE CAUSE OF YOUR AILMENTS When Lack Of Vitamins B1, B2, Iron and Niacin Cause Stomach Disturbances, Gas, Heartburn, Indigestion, Nagging Aches and Pains, and Certain Nervous Disorders.

    The ad continued with testimonials and a glowing plug for Senator LeBlanc, stressing the curative powers of Hadacol for a number of ailments "...due to lack of Vitamins B1, B2, Iron and Niacin". A capsule version of Hadacol was briefly produced, consisting solely of a B-Vitamin and mineral mixture.

    LeBlanc promoted the tonic as a "Dietary Supplement" instead of a medicine, stating that it was "...formulated as an Aid to Nature in rebuilding the Pep, Strength and Energy of Buoyant Health when the System is deficient in the Vitamins and Minerals found in this Tonic..." While Time Magazine described it as "a murky brown liquid that tastes something like bilge water, and smells worse."[7]


    The American Medical Association was not as appreciative. In an official press release in 1951, the AMA stated, "It is hoped that no doctor will be uncritical enough to join in the promotion of Hadacol. It is difficult to imagine how one could do himself or his profession greater harm from the standpoint of the abuse of the trust of a patient suffering from any condition. Hadacol is not a specific medication. It is not even a specific preventive measure."[8]

    LeBlanc flooded the airwaves with testimonials to the powers of the seemingly miraculous (yet foul tasting) brown liquid and turned the jingle called "Hadacol Boogie" into a popular recording. Promotional items included various fliers, signs and clocks, a "Captain Hadacol" comic book,[9] T-shirts, lipstick, an almanac, plastic thimbles printed with the Hadacol logo, water pistols and cowboy-style holsters, glasses used for taking the diluted mixture, and a stamped metal token redeemable for 25¢ towards the purchase of any bottle of Hadacol (LeBlanc brazenly placed his own portrait on the front of the token, and the trademarked logo on the back).[10] These items, along with the Hadacol bottles and the boxes they were packaged in, are now much sought-after items, and fetch high prices among collectors of Southern memorabilia and medical quackery.

    [​IMG]

    The Hadacol Caravan

    One of the most famous of the 20th century traveling shows was the Hadacol Caravan, sponsored by Louisiana State Senator Dudley J. LeBlanc and his LeBlanc Corporation, makers of the dubious patent medicine/vitamin tonic "Hadacol", known for both its alleged curative powers and its high alcohol content. The stage show, which ran throughout the Deep South in the 1940s with great publicity, featured a number of notable music acts and Hollywood celebrities, and was used to promote Hadacol (which was sold heavily during intermission and after the show). Admission to the show was paid in boxtops of the vitamin tonic, sold in stores throughout the southern United States. The Caravan came to a sudden halt in 1951, when the Hadacol enterprise fell apart in a financial scandal.

    LeBlanc was an entrepreneur in other areas too, but it is Hadacol that made him famous outside Louisiana. For his "Hadacol Goodwill Caravan" touring shows (the last of the big-time "medicine shows"), LeBlanc brought in Hollywood celebrities, including such luminaries as Roy Acuff,[12] Milton Berle, Lucille Ball, Minnie Pearl, Connee Boswell, Mickey Rooney, Bob Hope, Cesar Romero, Dorothy Lamour, Carmen Miranda, George Burns and Gracie Allen, Judy Garland, Jack Dempsey, Chico Marx, Hank Williams and James Cagney to help him market the product. He also sponsored a separate touring show featuring notable Jazz and Blues musicians to attract black customers. Admission to the Hadacol gala was two Hadacol box tops for adults, one for children. Considering that the 8 ounce bottle cost $1.25 and the "family size" 24 ounce bottle cost $3.50 each during the late 1940s, this was not cheap (Adjusted for inflation, the prices would be around $10 and $30 in 2007). Sales of the tonic at the shows were brisk.

    According to musician Weldon "Big Bill" Lister, who performed in the Hadacol Caravan, "The only way you could get into that show was with a Hadacol box top, And believe me, we played to crowds of ten, twelve thousand people a night. Back in those days there wasn't many auditoriums that would hold that many people. We played ball parks, race tracks - you know anywhere where they had enough big bleachers to handle those kind of crowds." The final show was on 17 September 1951.[13] Paul Schrader wrote a script entitled Eight Scenes from the Life of Hank Wlliams, which has not yet been produced. It includes a sequence on his performances with the Hadacol Caravan.[14]


    In a 15-month period ending in March 1951, LeBlanc sold more than $3,600,000 worth of the tonic. In another six months, after LeBlanc sold his interest of the LeBlanc Corporation (Hadacol's parent company) to investors for $8,200,000,[15][16] the enterprise collapsed under the weight of debtors. It was discovered all too late that LeBlanc was spending more for advertising by that point than he was taking in as receipts (turning its $3,600,000 profit into a $1,800,000 second-quarter loss), had concealed both $2,000,000 in unpaid bills and a $656,151 tax debt, and another $2,000,000, listed in the ledgers as "Accounts Receivable", were cases of the tonic out on consignment, much of which was being shipped back. In an official court statement, the Federal Trade Commission stated that the publicity behind the tonic was "false, misleading and deceptive" in representing the nostrum as "an effective treatment and cure for scores of ailments and diseases."[17] The ensuing bad publicity played a contributing factor to LeBlanc losing a gubernatorial election in 1952 and effectively halting his future statewide electoral chances.

    Martin Gardner's In the Name of Science (1952) mentions an interview that LeBlanc gave on Groucho Marx's radio program: When Groucho asked him what Hadacol was good for, LeBlanc gave an answer of startling honesty. "It was good," the senator said, "for five and a half million for me last year." In 1954, after the Hadacol fiasco, LeBlanc tried to re-enter the patent medicine market with a lemon flavored non-alcoholic vitamin tonic named "Kary-On".[18] Unlike Hadacol, it quickly vanished from production.

    The name "Hadacol" has become synonymous with any panacea or "cure-all" of dubious origin.


    According to the United States Patent and Trademark Office, there were two attempts to revive Hadacol. The first was in 1987 by Edmondson Enterprises of Shreveport, Louisiana.[19] The second attempt was in 1997 by Au Pharmaceuticals of Tyler, Texas.[20] Both attempts to revive the brand were unsuccessful. In 1976, "Hadacol" Multi-vitamins were distributed by the Atlanta, Georgia based "Hadacol Corporation" in an unsuccessful attempt to revive the brand name.



    Influences

    • Hadacol was the subject of several Country, R&B, and Cajun tunes of its time:
      • "Drinkin' Hadacol" by "Little Willie" Littlefield
      • "Everybody Loves That Hadacol" by Tiny Hill and His Orchestra
      • "Hadacol (That's All)" by the Treniers, "Hadacol Bounce", written and recorded by Bill Nettles and performed also by Professor Longhair
      • "Hadacol Boogie," covered by a number of musical acts, notably Bill Nettles and His Dixie Blue Boys and, more recently, the 2006 collaboration of Jerry Lee Lewis and Buddy Guy (whose version on Lewis' Last Man Standing album ends with an outro alluding to LeBlanc's "Hadda call it somethin'" joke)
      • "Hadacol Bounce" by Professor Longhair
      • "Hadacol Corners" by Slim Willet (backed with the soon-to-be classic "Don't Let the Stars Get In Your Eyes")
      • "Valse de Hadacol" (Hadacol Waltz) by Cajun musician/composer Harry Choates
      • "H-A-D-A-C-O-L" by Al Terry (Allison Theriot).
    • In the late 1990s, the American roots-rock band Big Iron, to avoid confusion with another band with the same name, changed the band's name to "Hadacol".[21] The cover of their 1999 debut CD, Better Than This, is based on the label used on the tonic bottles.
    • In 1948, Blues pianist Elmore "Elmo" Nixon made his debut as a "front man" when he recorded two songs under the name "Elmore Nix and the Hadacol Boys".[22][23]
    • In 2005, Brent Green created an animated short entitled Hadacol Christmas. The animator describes the threadbare 12 minute film this way: "Santa Claus invents Christmas with a belly full of cough syrup and a head full of dying crows."[24] Mr. Green posted the film on You Tube in two parts (Part1 and 2).
    • "Hadacol Corner" was the originally proposed name for the town of Midkiff in Upton County, Texas, but the U.S. Postal Service objected (presumably because it disapproved of a registered brand name's being used as the name of a town).














     
    Last edited: Aug 20, 2015
  2. gorgo2

    gorgo2 geezerhood

    I always preferred Anacanapanacan from Howard/Fine/Howard Laboratories.
     
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  3. Boojum1

    Boojum1 Valet Parking Available Here


    Henry Roeland "Roy" Byrd was born in Bogalusa, Louisiana. (December 19, 1918 - January 30, 1980), better known as Professor Longhair, was a New Orleans blues singer and pianist. Professor Longhair is noteworthy for having been active in two distinct periods, both in the heyday of early rhythm and blues, and in the resurgence of interest in traditional jazz after the founding of the New Orleans Jazz and Heritage Festival.
     
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  4. cmorris357

    cmorris357 catching flies.........

    Reminds me of Vitameatavegamin. image.jpg
     
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  5. Boojum1

    Boojum1 Valet Parking Available Here




    Willie Littlefield, billed as Little Willie Littlefield (September 16, 1931 – June 23, 2013),[2] was an American R&B and boogie-woogie pianist and singer[3] whose early recordings "formed a vital link between boogie-woogie and rock and roll".[3] Littlefield was regarded as a teenage wonder and overnight sensation when in 1949 at the age of 18 he popularised the triplet piano style on his Modern Records debut single "It's Midnight".[4] He also recorded the first version of the song "Kansas City" — originally issued as "K. C. Lovin'" — in 1952.
    Littlefield was born in El Campo, Texas, and grew up in Houston with his mother. By 1947, at the age of sixteen, Littlefield was already a local attraction on many of Houston's Dowling Street clubs and was recording for local record shop proprietor Eddie Henry who ran his own label, "Eddie's".[5] He formed his first band with saxophonist Don Wilkerson, a school friend.[3]

    Littlefield was strongly influenced by boogie-woogie pianist Albert Ammons. A particular favourite of his was Ammons' Swanee River Boogie, which he later recorded for Eddie's Records.[5] Other major influences on Littlefield's style were Texas musicians Charles Brown and Amos Milburn[2] Littlefield learned most of their "chops" and soon developed his own distinctive "triplet style", which, by the early 1950s, was widely copied in the R&B field, particularly by Fats Domino who incorporated it into his successful New Orleans rhythms.[5]

    His first recording, "Little Willie’s Boogie" was a hit in Texas in 1949, and brought him to the attention of Jules Bihari, one of the Bihari brothers of Modern Records in Los Angeles, California, who were searching for a performer to rival the success of Amos Milburn.[3] Bihari flew to Houston in July 1949 to investigate the city's black entertainment venues and heard of a "teenage wonder boy pianist" who was causing a stir at the Eldorado Ballroom. Bihari went to hear Littlefield and soon arranged for an audition at a local studio. The session was captured on acetate disc, with Bihari, clearly audible in the background, calling for Littlefield to play the popular R&B tunes of the day.[5]

    Back at Modern Records, he recorded "It's Midnight", which became a national hit reaching #3 on the Billboard R&B chart. Its follow-up, "Farewell", reached #5 on the R&B chart.[6] He became a major nightclub attraction and recorded with West Coast musicians such as Maxwell Davis. Don Wilkerson, Littlefield's old school buddy and the leading saxman in his band, also travelled to Los Angeles, but Milburn promptly stole him to lead his own new band 'The Aladdin Chickenshackers'.[5]

    Modern Records booked Littlefield for three recording sessions during October 1949, followed by more sessions in the following two months at Radio Recorders in Hollywood. During these three months alone, over 22 sides were cut - an unusual output when compared to most other artists who averaged only two sessions a year. Other musicians for these sessions included saxophonists Maxwell Davis and Buddy Floyd, guitarists Chuck Norris and Johnny Moore, and drummers Al Wichard and Jessie Price.[5] One of his 1950 recordings, "Happy Pay Day", a song written by Jack Holmes, was later rewritten by Holmes with entirely different lyrics as "The Blacksmith Blues", which became a hit for Ella Mae Morse.[7]

    In 1951, his duet with Little Lora Wiggins, "I've Been Lost", reached #10 on the R&B chart.[6] In 1952 he moved to the Federal subsidiary of King Records, his first session producing "K. C. Loving", written by Leiber and Stoller and later re-recorded by Wilbert Harrison as "Kansas City".

    By 1957 Littlefield had moved to Northern California and continued to record for Don Barksdale's Rhythm label in San Francisco where he produced the single "Ruby, Ruby".[5] Littlefield’s recording and his subsequent releases were not successful, although he remained a popular club act in the San Francisco area.

    In the late 1970s he toured Europe successfully, settling in the Netherlands and releasing a number of albums from 1982 into the late 1990s for the Oldie Blues label from Martin van Olderen.[8]

    [​IMG]

    Littlefield in Germany, 2006
    After touring for more than 50 years, Littlefield stopped in 2000. After five years of retirement in his adopted home country, the Netherlands, he decided to play again, starting in 2006, declaring: "I went fishing for five years - now I know every herring in Holland by name - it got boring. I feel great and I want to be back with my audience."[9]

    In his later years Littlefield continued to perform occasionally, mainly at festivals, particularly in the UK. In 2008 he played at the 20th Burnley Blues Festival and in July 2009 at the 5th annual UK Boogie Woogie Festival at Sturminster Newton in Dorset. Having appeared at Shakedown Blues Club, at Castor Hall, near Castor, Peterborough in 2006, Littlefield made a return appearance in October 2010.[10]

    He died at his home in Voorthuizen, Netherlands, in 2013 at the age of 81. He had cancer.​
     
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  6. GDCarrington

    GDCarrington Burma Shave

    ... but ATOMCOL will make a new man out of you!

     
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