Paralysis in a Bottle: the Jake Walk Story
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Bottles and Extras Winter 2006 7 PARALYSIS IN A BOTTLE (The “Jake Walk” Story) by Cecil Munsey Copyright © 2005 Fig. 1 RECOLLECTIONS patent medicines. Prominent among Jamaica Ginger, with the empties “JAMAICA GINGERS,” an article by them would be a good supply of various always landing in the river, and I went Dewey Moss that appeared in Western brands of Jamaica Ginger. This product there expecting to see him fall in too. I Collector in 1967, was my first introduction was an amber color, colored perhaps don’t know what I would have done if to Jamaica Ginger and the bottles in which with burnt sugar or ginger itself. he had fallen—somehow he never did. it came. Moss was one of several pioneering Usually on the label would be the “One day I asked my dad why the old authors who devoted themselves to creating alcoholic content, which was always watchman had such a peculiar limp. literature for bottle collectors during the above 90% [75-90% would be more ‘Jake leg’ was his reply. first years of organized collecting. The accurate]. This was the beverage the ‘What’s Jake leg?,’ I asked. following is his short article based on weathered drinkers would buy very ‘Well, son, when a man drinks Jake recollections from his youth in the 1930s: cheaply and with no trouble. long enough he gets a sort of paralysis “In the town was a mill powered by a in one or both legs,’ he told me. [This “Years ago the counties here in Utah water wheel. After the shift would leave, is not exactly true. Jake had been used regulated the sale of liquor; some were one of the old guzzlers would take a seat for almost 100 years as a cheap source dry while an adjacent one was wet. above the water wheel as a watchman. of alcohol. Only Jake of the early 1930s Travel then was slow, but on special I found it very amusing to sit on a hill, that contained a toxic adulterant caused occasions ‘the boys’ would pool their which overlooked the mill as well as paralysis. It took seven to sixteen days money and send one of the gang by train the river and spy on the ‘watchman.’ for onset of symptoms, and many cases to a wet county for a supply of their After he was there just a short time he resulted in permanent neurological favorite brands of hard liquor. would take from a lunch box a bottle of damage]. “I was a small boy but I can remember Jamaica Ginger, extract the cork stopper “Still a little confused, I asked him the merry makers meeting the train with and drink the entire contents in one what Jake meant. ‘That’s short for a buckboard, their eager hands gulp. Even today I marvel at how he Jamaica Ginger. He drinks it every day outstretched to help the returning could do that without gasping for breath and one of these days he’ll die in one of member struggling with two heavy or dropping dead from lack of oxygen. his drunks on Jake.’ laded ‘please don’t rain’ suitcases Very soon he would be woozy, stagger “1 cannot recall whether dad’s (cardboard). Being a curious kid, I around and cut ‘figures.’ prediction came true. However, looking managed to get hold of some of the “I took my perch evening after evening back on those days and the people of bottles and read their brands. If the gang watching this character get falling- those days, I cannot help wanting a fair- was prosperous the brand was usually down-drunk on about four bottles of sized collection of Jakes (empty or full). ‘Yellowstone,’ but when they were short of funds the brand would invariably be Fig. 2 ‘Joe Folsom.’ “There were a few older gents in my town who were ‘alcoholics,’ these codgers having to have their drink daily. Although the county was dry and the sale of whiskey, wine or beer prohibited, it was perfectly legal to buy and sell a much stronger drink. The merchant who sold everything including wagons, rakes, harnesses and all hand tools dispensed this product. I can picture so vividly the cracker barrel, the pickle barrel, the cheese cutter, the tobacco cutter, the many bolts of cloth, along with the spools of thread and the many brightly colored ribbons. And, there were always the coils of hemp rope. “In one corner of the store were the 8 Winter 2006 Bottles and Extras alcohol, the label had to say so. extractives (oils and resins) were increased 3 Jake was the alcoholic “essence” of to twice the previous level. At this Jamaica ginger, extracted from the concentration the tincture became pulverized root and closely resembled the extremely unpalatable unless diluted; and standard pharmaceutical preparation illicit preparations began to appear on the “Tincture of Ginger” described in the market to sidestep the restriction. Although United States Pharmacopoeia (U.S.P.). It labeled as conforming to official was one of several thousand dubious but specifications, these misbranded products generally harmless patent (proprietary) were actually adulterated, substituting medicines that Americans had been relying molasses, glycerin, castor oil, and other on for over a century. It was a pale orange- additives for much of the oleoresin of to-amber concoction usually packaged in a ginger, thus greatly reducing the strong small glass bottle, and promoted as a pungent taste. “They were not large bottles and were carminative, headache cure, a remedy to The economics of National Prohibition almost always aqua, and the names treat catarrh, flatulence, “late by 1930, eleven years after it started, homed embossed in the glass are interesting. menstruation” and other real or imagined in on the urban and small-town poor. Many makers of sarsaparilla, whiskey illnesses. Because it averaged 80% alcohol Affluent cityfolk could buy bonded liquor and patent medicine also produced and (160 proof), a small bottle packed the kick from Canada; backwoods hillbillies often sold Jamaica Ginger. The earlier Jakes of four jiggers of whiskey. Priced at 25 to had access to stills, but low-income are crude, many with short tapering 35 cents, it was readily available in local townsfolk drank what they could get— collars. The old ‘F. Brown’s Ess of drugstores, groceries, and even dime stores; rubbing alcohol, hair tonic, doctored Jamaica Ginger’ with a pontil scar is and anyone, including preachers and antifreeze. These desparate people were very much desired. The tapered collar schoolmarms, could slip the little flat aqua referred to as “rummies,” “stewbums,” on these is so much more attractive than or clear glass bottle into a pocket for a “boozegobs,” “hooch histers,” or simply the newer square collared F. Brown’s. discreet nip at home or away. Common “drunks.” Some would take Three-in-One “Perhaps Jamaica Ginger did some “drunks,” however, might take a bottle into shoe polish and strain it through a powder good when properly used. In our house the store’s back room, which many Jake it was used as a toddy greatly reduced sellers kept as low-rent speakeasies, mix Fig. 5 with water and sweetened with sugar the Jake with Coca-Cola or some other for the relief of stomach cramps mixer and have their own furtive and colds, administered at night little party. before retiring and again in the Jamaica ginger bottles, easily morning. The more temperate recognized by shape, label, and 4 families used similar toddy but embossing were available in made from ground ginger root hundreds of different brands and and other spices with no are sought by today’s collectors. alcoholic content. Most are considered common and “Some seasoned drinkers often generally not expensive, but they used Jake for ‘sobering up’ [‘hair do represent an interesting period of the dog’]; how one could in American social and health ‘sober up’ on a 90% alcoholic history. A random photographic drink is beyond me, but that’s the selection of Jamaica ginger bottles way it goes. is shown throughout this article. “My collection—well, it’s The Volstead Act, also relatively small when you known as the National Prohibition consider the number of Jakes Act, went into effect February 1, available, but that means its 1920 to further define exactly always challenging and what was prohibited by the just rewarding to find a maverick.” ratified 18th Amendment. It turned every state dry, but banned only Jake beverage alcohol. Essence of The Pure Food and Drugs Act Jamaica Ginger and other of 1906 had in effect guaranteed alcoholic “medicines” originally neither pure food nor pure drugs. were exempt from the ban. By It required only honest labeling. 1925, however, in the face of If a patent medicine contained widespread use of Jake as an morphine, opium, cocaine, heroin, intoxicating beverage, the alpha or beta eucaine, chloroform, Treasury Department had ruled cannabis indica (marijuana), that it could be sold over the chloral hydrate, acetanilide, or counter only if the ginger root Bottles and Extras Winter 2006 9 muff , “. .it would be just as clear as water,” Reconstruction Hospital in Oklahoma City. according to one writer. It was not The patient’s feet dangled like a One of the first newspaper stories about uncommon for foolhardy drinkers to filter marionette’s, so that walking involved the epidemic was headlined, “The Worst Sterno (“canned heat”) through bread to swinging them forward and slapping them Has Happened.” A one-paragraph story in separate-out most of the ingredients except onto the floor. Within a few days - in the the Topeka Daily Capitol exclaimed, alcohol.