culture
Vintage Toronto Ads: Up in the Ozone
But what were the real facts behind Powley's Liquified Ozone?
Source: the Toronto World, May 21, 1902.
“Facts are not too good for anybody,” eh? Alright then, here are the facts: it’s doubtful that the wonders attributed to Powley’s Liquified Ozone were due to the product in question. It’s likely that liquefied ozone would kill any germs affecting you, but only your mortician or whoever picked up the shattered frozen parts of your body that were exposed to it would know for sure. Any substance that turns into liquid when its temperature drops to -112 degrees Celsius would induce a bone-chilling effect. Based on a chemical analysis prepared for investigative journalist Samuel Hopkins Adams in 1905 the wonder product was 99 per cent water with trace amounts of sulphuric and sulphurous acids—the ad doesn’t mention if Mrs. Mason felt a burning sensation while the miraculous healing powers of Powley’s attacked her “female trouble.”
Source: the Toronto World, May 14, 1902.
By the time Adams uncovered “The Great American Fraud” of patent medicines in a series of articles for Collier’s Weekly, Toronto-based Powley’s Liquified Ozone had been bought by an American named Douglas Smith, who moved its operations to Chicago and renamed the product Liquozone. Under its new label, the product’s claims grew more exaggerated, its testimonials more suspect. J.B. Banks and Reverand C.A. Coakwell may well have written testimonials, but they also might have included complaints that were crossed out with a blue pencil. Respected institutions like Chicago’s Hull House denied providing the glowing recommendations that accompanied ads. A creative copywriter invented the tale of the remedy’s supposed inventor, a German named “Dr. Pauli” who endured 20 years of poverty and ridicule while perfecting a method of liquefying oxygen to revitalize sick souls. By the time Adams’s series reached print, Liquozone was banned in jurisdictions ranging from Kentucky to San Francisco. We suspect its fortunes in Toronto were also affected by the bad publicity, as advertising of Liquozone in local papers ceased by spring of 1906.