Most Extraordinary Invention. Pulvermacher's Patent Portable Hydro-Electric Chain for Personal Use. [...] Acute nervous pains, such as Head, Tooth, and Ear Ache, Rheumatic Pains, &c. are relieved instantaneously, the moment the Chain is applied [...]
[n.d., c.1851.]
Letterpress with wood-engraved vignette. Sheet 135 x 75mm (5¼ x 3"). Trimmed to printed border, laid on card.
An advert for a type of voltaic battery invented by Isaac Lewis Pulvermacher and marketed as a tool for electrotherapy. It includes a glowing testimonal from Golding Bird, a Fellow of the Royal College of Physicians, who had been given a sample to test and found it a good source of electricity for medical purposes. However it was used here by Charles Meining, the Pulvermacher Company's London agent, without permission, alongside outrageous claims about its benefits. Bird's threat of legal action (against Meining as a quack rather than Pulvermacher) caused The Association Medical Journal, Medical Times and The Lancet to remove adverts for the machine.
See Wikipedia 'Pulvermacher's chain' for details of the construction and history.
[Ref: 58750] £45.00
Letterpress with wood-engraved vignette. Sheet 135 x 75mm (5¼ x 3"). Trimmed to printed border, laid on card.
An advert for a type of voltaic battery invented by Isaac Lewis Pulvermacher and marketed as a tool for electrotherapy. It includes a glowing testimonal from Golding Bird, a Fellow of the Royal College of Physicians, who had been given a sample to test and found it a good source of electricity for medical purposes. However it was used here by Charles Meining, the Pulvermacher Company's London agent, without permission, alongside outrageous claims about its benefits. Bird's threat of legal action (against Meining as a quack rather than Pulvermacher) caused The Association Medical Journal, Medical Times and The Lancet to remove adverts for the machine.
See Wikipedia 'Pulvermacher's chain' for details of the construction and history.
[Ref: 58750] £45.00