• Welcome to this forum . We are a worldwide group with a common interest in Birmingham and its history. While here, please follow a few simple rules. We ask that you respect other members, thank those who have helped you and please keep your contributions on-topic with the thread.

    We do hope you enjoy your visit. BHF Admin Team

A malady M'Lady

Another standby product when I was little - Vaseline. Still use it for all sorts of things often not what it was intended for eg oiling door hinges. It's the 150th year of production!
 

Attachments

  • vas.jpeg
    vas.jpeg
    6.7 KB · Views: 1
We has a little tin of Zam-buk, Mom put it on everything. I did buy some recently but of course it's not the same. Golden Eye ointment for styes, I always seemed to have one. I haven't heard of Indian Cerate siince I was a child. I like Savlon and Germolene now.
rosie.
 
We still believe in the healing power of Zam-buk and disappointed when we could no longer get it. However, about twelve months ago saw some in a catalogue. Price was terrible, about £6 for a little tin. Still bought it though. Still as good as ever.
As far as Virol is concerned, can anyone remember the picture on it of two girls, they were my cousins, [at least I think it was virol they were on.
Yes, yak to Scotts Emulsion but Yum to Codliver oil and malt
 
In our medicine tin were much of what you all had, and some what you had I have never heard of. In our biscuit tin with a dark red lid. Four Oils the only thing that decongested me. We had a red flat round tin of yellow I think it might have been basilicon, Nan called it Yeller Mazellicar, very gooey but good for cuts and scrazes. Boric Acid Powder she called Borassic. Oil of Clove in a tiny bottle with cotton wool and a matchstick selotaped to it. The same went for ear drops in a rubber squeezable dropper. All sorts of bandages, cotton wool pads, lint and gauze, Bonjela. A brown cough medicine, with a thick white liquid the brown floated you had to shake it. Some thick pink liquid in a clear bottle. (They put purple stuff on a lad's hair at school when he had nits.) A tin of Quickies. TCP. Wytch Hazel. A liquid flowery smelling plastic camphor bottle. Pongy rub. (Nan's cupboards had arrow root, liquorice root, glycerine. Haliborange tablets. Sulphur tablets. Iron tablets.) Arnica in a green hexagonal bottle, a dark blue bottle with a cork? Some loose corks. Big pink nappy pins. Syrop of figs. corn plasters. A small round flat brown bottle of smelling salts. A watch key for black heads. Nan used dock leaves and spit for stings and nettle rash. And an split ivy leaf in her shoe for her sore fayte.
 
In our Kitchen in Ashted Row we had a round chocolate tin full of all our Medicines.
Looking back, there always seemed to be a round tin of Germolene, once you prised the lid off you invariably found it was just a thin ring of ointment that had semi crusted around the edge....oh, and it usually had an unidentifiable piece of something in it.
Half a bottle of Calamine lotion...that was another one, especially with hardened runs of the stuff on the outside of the bottle..
Mom dabbed that on us for Heat lumps..it was only years later I knew themto be bedbug bites.
Blackjack, Moms mainstay..good for anything from Boils and Splinters toopen Heart surgery.
A folded square of cheap plasters..you cut what you needed off to size,
They lasted about 3 seconds and had the sticking power of Teflon.
Medicines..loads of them..like most folk we never threw them out just because we'd got better..
Among those beauties you could always find a ribbed bottle of white medicine with a perished cork in it...never did find out what the medicine was though.
A old razor blade..Dad used one for cutting off bunions, hard skin and slicing boils.
Fullers Earth..Why? I dont even know what it is..
Cough medicine, brown thick and sticky..I think it stopped us coughing by glueing the insides of our throat together
Witch Hazel for red eyes although usually Mom tipped wet tea leaves into a bit of damp cloth..by the 'eck..the flavour floods out.
A much used Nit comb..usually in Brown or black
And some nameless purple lotion...
No one ever seemed to fill our tin up back then yet it never seemed to empty.
I know something though..you never found Aspirin or allergy stuff.. A headache you got on with with it and think back..who did you know with an allergy?
I can't send you a PM maybe because you are a guest. I wonder if you can send me one? I am interested that you lived in Ashted Row where one of my birth relatives lived.
Nico
 
Ellimans Embrication. Then Deep Heat. And Permagum of Potash in a tin for smelly feet. That was in the top drawer of the sideboard.. We had a Vick Stick that was dad's I think we all used it! It was in little vase on the fireplace with hairpins, spills paperclips anything. Oil of juniper berry to keep insects at bay, made me wretch and gave me a headache. I think it should have been diluted and nan put a big blob on my teeshirt, neat. She had these horrible insipid lozengers I can't remember what for but they were pastel shades with a powdery taste. Same size as Refreshers. And Rinstead Pastilles. Junior Disprin you diluted. Anadin in a plastic flat box you tapped to shake them out that were impossible to get out. My mate's Dublin mum gave my mum a miniature vodka bottle with holy water in. To keep in her handbag. Mum had a recurring sty. She bathed it in it. She told his mum I think the vodka might do me more good.
 
Last edited by a moderator:
Nico,

Kandor can generally be found on FaceBook, though it's two or three years since I last chatted to him.

Maurice :cool:
 
Kaolin and morphine for upset stomachs
i was given a puppy. it kept doing a woops. so i took it to the vet. he said it has distemper put it to sleep. i said no. and left.i took it to the PDSA.they had a look and said it has a upset stomach. give her a drop of this every 4 hrs. i did. we were together for 18 years
 
Back
Top