America's Pastime: Patent Medicine Trade Cards on Pain Main Menu Introduction Student Projects The Power of Emotional Marketing: How Vintage Medical Trading Cards Used Children to Sell Their Products to Parents The late 19th and early 20th centuries saw the rise of patent trade medicine cards across the country. Prominent among the many marketing strategies employed were those involving child imagery. By exploring the historical juncture between child imagery and society, new insights are gained regarding the appeal of child imagery and its employment in various marketing approaches. - By Kevin Kerr, Curran Whitney-Vazquez, Chandler Warth, Samuel Sakowski, Eden Breslauer-Friedman Clothing as Tool of Expression: Utilizing Fashion in 19th Century Marketing In analyzing our group’s medicine trading cards, we were able to convey the significance of clothing throughout its relation to medicine. Various forms of clothing demonstrate symbolism towards an indvidual’s perception on medicine as well as foreshadowing the message in which the trading cards demonstrate. The various forms of clothing and stances the individuals and characters in the trading card portray indicate symbolize towards various forms of clothing and stances to highlight the social class and hierarchy of power with its purpose in medication trading cards. The way that every individual is dressed eludes to different perceptions of varying social classes as the medical epherma is not targeted to one specific group. This persuades individuals to buy the medicines and adapt to their encouraged medicine techniques. - By Brittney Abdi, Alan Torres, Jolene Matian, Zoe Rosenberg, Javier Perez Mejia Humanity, Animals, and Religion: The Metaphorical Sense of Rebirth and Apotheosis of Purity. In the late 19th and early 20th century, America saw a rise in Patent Medicine leading up to the civil war. It was a lucrative trade that encouraged individuals to cultivate their own brand and medicinal products. The rise in Patent Medicine could be explained by a multitude of factors, such as rapid increases in industry and manufacturing, urban living, the absence of drug regulation, and the lack of accessibility and distrust of contemporary medical practices. During this period, Patent medicine companies vigorously marketed their products through small, colorful cards that featured illustrations , along with information about the medicine's supposed benefits and ingredients. To persuade consumers to purchase their products, patent medicine companies utilized a variety of marketing techniques. Some of the most popular ones being the portrayal of humanity, animals, and religion to convey the notion of rebirth and purity. - By Dominic Castillo, Vanessa Jiang, Stephen Liu, Leo Martinez, Selena Quispe The Utilization of Youthful Figures, Both Humans and Animals, in Medical Trading Cards The UCLA Library Digital Collections consist of a diverse collection of Patent Medicine Trade Cards that depict historically meaningful and strategic methods of medical advertising, specifically focusing on irregular and alternative medicines. The following trade cards investigate the significance of youthful figures in medical advertisements, as seen in both humans and animals. - By India White Cloud, Shanya Rostami, Andreas Tunney, Noah Orshansky, Netaniel Daee, and Justin Vayakone The Appeal of Youth and Family in Patent Medicine Trading Cards Medical Ephemera has had a long history of using emotional tactics to appeal to its intended target audiences. One of the most prevalent motifs is that of youth and children. Through visual and written rhetoric, this theme appeals to many family oriented communities and their values. From reliability to rejuvenation, for many people children can represent what they want in a medicine. However, this era of trade cards was particularly deceitful towards audiences by using this rhetoric, yet had a significant impact on marketing tactics that are still seen and thriving today. - By Lauren Tanaka, Allison Bushong, Mollie Brown, and Garrison Hallum Innocent Imagery: A Technique of Patent Medical Trade Cards The evolution of curing pain and uplifting human welfare greatly interested the public. To help combat this suffering, medical corporations turned to advertising through Patent Medical Trade Cards. These small cards significantly helped sell medicines throughout the 19th and 20th centuries in the United States of America. Specific techniques and styles, such as Innocent Imagery, assisted in attracting the consumer to purchase the drug. For instance, harmless animals, delicate flowers, and emotional characters were critical sources of visualizing innocence. -By Lauren Heiberg, Sean Eshraghi, Bradley Reed, Camila Ramirez-Leng and Shayan Mansourian The Children of Medicine: An Appeal to Consumer Emotions Our group page explores the intricacies of 19th century marketing strategies that heavily revolved around depictions of children and the youth in an attempt to psychologically appeal to the emotions of consumers in hopes of converting sales. However, we also discuss how problematic this can be, especially when the product advertisement itself is deceiving and may even pose a threat to the lives of consumers. Though effective, using the youth to advertise products can be unethical and as a result, there were different legislations enacted to combat this and different marketing strategies have evolved in conjunction with it. - By Johnny Thai, Margarita Balbuena, Ryan Nelson, Chuntao Qiu How Depictions of Women and Children Sell Medication In this page, we examine the usage of women and children portrayed on patent medicine trade cards to advertise and sell medication. Throughout this page, we employ the collection of patent medicine trade cards from the UCLA Library Digital Collections, analyzing the images and text to gain a deeper understanding of this form of advertising. - By: Jacquelyn Bakshian, Abby Kim, Tyler Maghen, David Sagizadeh, Shana Simanian, Mia Tumbaga The Influence of Innocence and Purity in Patent Medicine Trade Cards This page will explore how themes of innocence and purity were primarily utilized in patent medicine trade cards in order to generate enticing advertisements to consumers at the time. Themes of purity, innocence, and femininity entwined with the audience's perception of an ideal person, and this page will dissect how these themes were utilized to create an impactful advertisement for medical ephemera. —By Lesley Sierra, Alejandro Haro, Taylor Sullivan, Karina Tairyan, Jennifer Lay, Parinaz Kyavar The Healing and Appealing Powers of Purity and Femininity Our group page focuses on the use of femininity and purity in advertising as a means to demonstrate the efficacy of the advertised medications. Through close inspection of various Patent Medicine Trade Cards from the UCLA Biomedical Library Special Collections, our group has gained an understanding of advertising strategies and the use of cultural norms to demonstrate medicinal efficacy. Women, ideas of femininity, and purity found in nature are the central themes of our scalar book and reveal advertising strategies of medications in the late 19th and early 20th centuries. These cards as well as our own individual pages will explore the complex and historically relevant themes of femininity and purity through the lens of advertising strategies of medications and medicinal products in the late 19th and early 20th centuries. - By Stephanie Zager, Ella Kitt, Megan Sparrow, Corey Gear, Neda Afsharian Parental Protective Instincts: Child Imagery in Patent Medicine Trade Cards In the late nineteenth century to early twentieth century, pharmaceutical companies established marketing strategies in which they value child imagery upon the medical trade cards. By evaluating and uncovering new insights regarding the appeal of child imagery, the selection of six cards from the UCLA’s Patent Medical Trading Card collection will elucidate its marketing values and how it appeals to buyers. By Chelsie, Adrian, Micaiah, Princess Animals used In Medicine Trade cards Our presentation focuses on the use of animals in Patent Medicine trade cards, as advertisements , essentially animals are used are marketing tools. By using animals as the main focus on the image, the companies are able to grasp the attention of the viewers. - By Aaron Kohanbash, Aaron Ezra Kohanbash, Elan Amona, Samuel Kohanteb, and Avner Shamtoub The Usage of Various Species in Advertising Medicinal Products The UCLA Patent Medicine Trade Cards expounds on medicine under a variety of labels and names through its collection of 247 patent medicine trade cards. With the variety of medical products on the market, companies utilized artwork to advertise their products to the general public. Specifically, various species and the attributes associated with them were one common theme among patent medicine trading cards. - By Hoyeol Lee, Fady Tawfik, Daniel Rabkin, Mia Kubal, Sarkis Vartanyan, and Daniel Pirian Utilizing Trade Cards as a Key Advertising Technique Trade card makers employed them as a medium to promote medical products, utilizing various advertising tactics to entice consumers and guarantee profitable sales. These marketing approaches included leveraging maternal connections, portraying children, emphasizing the product's "healing powers," and presenting visually appealing designs. By- Hannah Shaye, Yaelle Shaye, Leah Tabibi, Odelia Safadel, Ely Gabbaypour, and Arya Afgham 19th Century Remedies for Women's Daily Troubles During the 19th century, patent medicine trade cards often were marketed to women. These cards advertised products that intended to relieve ordinary women of troubles that they faced on a daily basis. Many of these products included cure-alls, medicine for mothers, and medicinal makeup, which addressed the frequent concerns women experienced regarding bodily health, motherhood, and femininity. – By Omotola Adesina, Gengjia Lin, Renateh Moradian, Grant Pate, and Brooke Vallone.

Youth as a Marketing Tactic to Relieve Pain

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Our group has has accumulated extensive research in relation to medicine and the patent trade cards over the course of this quarter. Over the course of the 19th century physicians were creating patent trade cards to promote alternative medicine products which came in numerous forms including tonics, beverages, and pills. These cures were advertised through the trade cards and were promised to heal a board range of daily pains and illnesses from coughs, to digestions, to blood, to liver disease. Our group's research project is centered around the advertisement stratifies that were utilized by the physicians to entice customers to buy their products. These strategies included portraying the youth on the front of the cards, deceptions of women, and babies that highlighted their innocence, cuteness, and youthfulness, attracting customers to buy the products. They also appealed to the public with their advertisement techniques through utilizing unique phrases and images which allowed for the cures to be utilized by everyone. Thus, people were able to cure themselves of their illness through these types of alternative medicine as seen through our groups trade card in which they were enticed by the pictures, women, and phrases on the cards.



Carter's Little Nerve Pills is an intriguing and imagery-filled trade card that focuses on the use of youthfulness, innocence, and positive emotions to treat one's nerves for sleep. A key component of this card is the clever utilization of an alluring and innocent young woman who exhibits this key marketing strategy, which many patent medicine trading cards conveyed at this time period to being youthful figures into products. Consumers who are looking for nerve treatment will immediately draw interest from the depiction of this individual looking out into nature with a clam and tranquil face. Additionally, an optimistic and positive approach to marketing exists here as her calm emotions show how the average individuals with constant nerve wants to feel, which is ultimately the point of use for this product


The Allen's Root Beer Extract trade card further highlights the marketing strategies physicians utilized to sell their products. The front of this trade card depicts a young girl who is dressed up to look very cute with a bow tie on her head and holding flowers in her hands. Her youthfulness and innocence is presented as well as her kindness which makes the advertisement more appealing as consumer become drawn to it. Consumers are more drawn to images that portray youth as they too want to become more youthful and take all their pain away through taking the advertised medicine.




This trading card is of Parker’s Ginger Tonic which is a hair balsam. The cover includes a vivid illustration of a little girl in a little striped dress. The blushing cheeks illustrated on the girl adds to the innocence of the child, which can pull on the hartstrings of cardholders, and increase the chances of them purchasing the product. Additionally, the young girl is posed in a way that portrays her to be very playful and harmless, which can also attract customers. Instead of scaring cardholders into purchasing the product, it uses a cute, eye-catching illustration of a child to capture their attention. Ultimately, the marketing strategy of utilizing youth to relieve pain is undoubtedly utilized within this card as depicted in the beautiful illustration on the front cover.


This trade card is Boschee's German Syrup, August Flower, and Ague Conqueror card. I chose this specific card because I believed it was the most eye catching card as there are such vibrant colors and many different things going on. A man, a few children, and a poster on a wall are seen on the front image of the card. "Use the old dependable Boschee's German Syrup for coughs & lung problems," is stated on the poster on the left. By August Flower, dyspepsia of any severity can be treated. A mother standing there with one of her children in her arms and her other child standing next to her is adjacent to the man chatting to the small boy. This trading card displays a wide range of colors. The man's choice to address the little boy rather than the mother holding a youngster in her arms grabbed my eye. The fact that the man is pushing the syrup to the boy demonstrates that it can be utilized by people of all ages. I think it is interesting how the man is holding a pipe while he is trying to advertise medication for lung diseases.

It is common to see youthful illustrations of women on advertising cards like Dr. C. McLane's Liver Pills patent trade card. During the late 19th and early 20th centuries, many advertisers believed that using images of attractive, youthful women would help to capture the attention of consumers and encourage them to buy their products. These images were often romanticized and idealized, portraying women as delicate, innocent, and beautiful. This image relates to the topic of our group page as including this young woman in a nice dress is a marketing tactic to relieve pain and make the card more appealing to customers and potential buyers.
 

This page has paths:

  1. Student Projects Chien-Ling Liu Zeleny

Contents of this path:

  1. Women, Medicine, and Strategic Advertisement
  2. The Youth, Marketing Techniques, and Medicine
  3. Youthful Illustration of Women and Nature
  4. Effective Marketing Strategies including Storylines and Vivid Illustrations
  5. The Effects and Significance of Emotion in Patent Medicine Trade Cards
  6. Marketing Strategies For Medicines Using Children, Appealing Illustrations, and Vibrant Colors

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