Friday, January 22, 2016

Baldwin’s Nervous Pills

In some severe situations, when the calming power of the useful German motto: Nicht ärgern, nur wundern is exceeded, I dare say Baldwin’s Nervous Pills could come in handy.


According to a guest post on the Londontopia website, the "folks behind London Peculiar" tried to find out about the history of these magic pills, with limited success: "This original poster dates from around 1880s. After some research, I can’t find a lot out about what the pills may have contained in order to fix so many ailments...". Does anyone have any further information?

Update 5 February:
Thanks to Jacqui Birnie for providing a link to a fascinating account of The Empowered Physician: William Wilberforce Baldwin and 19th century medical therapeutics.

Further update 5 February:
If all else fails in terms of stress relief, why not try the rage room in Moscow?

Protected by a hard hat and overalls, a customer of the
Debosh stress relief service smashes household objects in a rage room
(TASS / Barcroft Media, Guardian Eyewitness picture of the day, 4 Feb 2016)

Update 13 April:
Die aktuellen Deutschland-Nachrichten der Deutsche Vertretungen in den USA verweisen auf einen Bericht vom Deutschlandfunk über den ersten Wutraum in Deutschland und bieten folgende Zusammenfassung:
Mal so richtig Wut ablassen, das ermöglicht der erste Wutraum Deutschlands in Halle. Gestresste können dort einen Raum mieten und Möbel, Computer oder Geschirr zerstören. Das ist anstrengend, aber verschafft mitunter auch Entspannung.