This hobby can lead you down many rabbit holes! I’ll share my latest. This is a One Penny Copper Token minted by Moore of Birmingham for “Professor” Thomas Holloway a manufacturer of “patent medicine” between 1837 and 1883. It was made for distribution in Australia. The obverse features Holloway and is clearly designed to be regal and the reverse is a nod to the classics with a depiction of Salus or Angitia surrounded by the legend “Holloways Pills and Ointments” Recently I have been collecting shipwreck coins and artefacts as a side interest to my main collecting. Following the purchase of a couple of non-coin related SS Republic items I stumbled across Thomas Holloway. Holloway was probably the most successful 19th Century seller of Quack cures and in respect of marketing would have put Samuel Colt in second place and that’s an achievement! Typically, he sent stooges to Apothecaries demanding Holloway’s ointment and pills explaining with much gnashing of teeth and wailing that without them they would die! Needles to say the Apothecary hadn’t heard of it and there would be quite a scene in their shop but fortunately in the next day or two Holloway or one of his salesmen would turn up to sell them stock. He spent a fortune on advertising and wrote his own testimonial and endorsements to newspapers claiming the efficacy of his potions. His brand, at one time, was the most advertised visible brand in Great Britain. Nevertheless, he was mercilessly criticised by doctors, politicians and satirical magazine such as “Punch”. This is a typical cartoon lampooning Holloway. One story that could have been invented by him as it created huge publicity, is that he sent Charles Dickens a cheque for £1000 to recommend his pills and ointments in one of Dickens’ latest novels. It is said that Dickens returned the cheque! His success was due to selling pills and potions to the masses who could not afford doctors. Holloway claimed that his ointment would cure Ulcers, Sore Heads, Sore Breasts, Gout, Bad Legs and a host more, He shamelessly paid for references and accolades even claiming his ointment was the best on the Moon! Although a marketing genius and extremely wealthy he was not flamboyant and worked 18 hours a day and lived frugally. His focus was on his products and not himself and it is said that he refused a Baronetcy from Queen Victoria. He looked after his staff and on his death left them all annuities so they would never have to work again. He also became one of the most important Victorian philanthropists spending £600,000 the equivalent of £150 million/$200 million today on the Holloway Sanatorium in Virginia Water, Surrey, and Royal Holloway College, a college of the University of London in Englefield Green, Surrey. The College was exclusively for woman and he said that it was his wife who inspired him to create a seat of learning for women who were excluded at that time from most Universities. Both buildings were designed by the architect William Henry Crossland, and were inspired by the Cloth Hall in Ypres, Belgium, and the Château de Chambord in the Loire Valley, France. They were founded by Holloway as “Gifts to the nation” and survive today. He was an eccentric and had had an unconcealed prejudice against doctors, lawyers and parsons He also became a notable art collector purchasing some of the most famous paintings of his day which were displayed in his Sanatorium and University. After his death his potions and pills were analysed and whilst they did not contain deadly mercury or arsenic that many of his contemporaries used, nor did they contain anything really useful as a curative. Holloway intimated in private correspondence that he knew that the worth of his product was for a placebo effect and nothing else. Ironically both Holloway and his wife died of bronchitis one of the main ailments his ointments advertised to cure. I found a biography on Holloway written by a descendant of his. I read it yesterday and it is enthralling and touches on many facets of 19th Century life. I am interested in Polar exploration and one chapter describes how Holloway tried to persuade Sir John Franklin to take his ointments on his Polar Expedition but Franklin refused which was probably just as well as everyone on that expedition died! He amassed a huge collection of newspaper articles relating to Franklin’s failed expedition from around the world and purchased Landseer’s famous painting “Man Proposes, God Disposes” which was a melancholic scene inspired by Franklin’s lost expedition. I would recommend the book as highly entertaining.
Thanks for the thread and info, very interesting indeed. Numista states that the on the reverse is Hygeia, the ancient greek god of health. I have one that was possibly cleaned and then coated with some type of shellac. It is still a nice specimen. https://en.numista.com/catalogue/pieces18017.html
That is an attractive coin @alurid. There is quite a debate around Hygeia and Salus as you will appreciate, the Numista view is probably the correct stance on this but as a Roman collector, I tend to lean towards Salus. There is a certain irony surrounding the use of the image of Hygeia when the term "snake oil salesmen" was derogatory then as it is now.
