So, a week into the new year, how are those resolutions coming along? Well, it might help to know that for as long as we've been marking time, we've been promising to fix the nits and gnats of our habits and character come New Years Eve. It's also pretty striking that we've been promising to change the same things about ourselves for time immemorial: get fit, get a better job, go out and experience life, or kick bad habit "x".
Case in point, a hundred years ago the Newell Pharmical Company of St. Louis, MO promised to "banish the tobacco habit" with its bupkis cure-all Tobacco Redeemer. So far I haven't been able to find any information on what Tobacco Redeemer actually contained, it may have been heroine for all I know, but I'm pretty sure it didn't cure you of tobacco cravings in 48 to 72 hours. All I can say for sure is that from the time of World War I through the twenties, Newell was plastering every trade magazine with ads for the stuff.
It might be telling that Newell Pharmical eventually became Rubbermaid, producer of trash cans since it looks like they spent the first half of their existence selling garbage.
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