You only have to look a few magazine advertisements from the early 20th century or even the 60s and 70s to understand how far medicine has come so quickly. It seems ludicrous that vintage medicine ads were easily found for the throat soothing advantages of cigarettes or the stimulating body and mind effects of a soda such as Coca-Cola or 7-Up. Even pushing the cola drinks onto young children as not only a safe, but a recommended action to help your little ones.

Say what?

Of course, including actual drugs such as cocaine can be forgiven, after all, I’m sure it did work as a pain reliever. What is harder to believe is that Heroin was advertised as a main ingredient in Bayer’s product along with aspirin. Some other vintage medicine advertisements were included for the sheer comedic value they impart, such as the Vibra-Finger, Stoner Placebo Capsules and Gingervating Ginger Ale. We hope you have fun seeing how lucky you are to be in the 21st century where advertising finally speaks the truth.

Philip Morris Throat Tested Cigarette Advertisement

I hope they were testing for throat cancer; but I doubt it. The creepy kid to the right doesn’t make me want to smoke, but he does frighten me a bit.