Dr A.E. Mintie was an interesting character to say the least. Although I have not had the time to do a detailed research on him I will present what little information that I have gathered.
The first mention I can find of Dr. Mintie is this advertisement for his product Nephreticum in the Sacramento Daily Union 1878
Dr. Minties Nephreticum San Francisco
lignum nephriticum (Latin for "kidney wood") was a traditional diuretic derived from the wood of two tree species, the narra (Pterocarpus indicus) and the Mexican kidneywood (Eysenhardtia polystacha). The wood was capable of turning the color of water it comes in contact with into beautiful opalescent hues that changed depending on light and angle, the earliest known record of the phenomenon of fluorescence. Due to this strange property, it became well known in Europe from the 16th to the early 18th-century Europe. Cups made from lignum nephriticum were given as gifts to royalty. Water drunk from such cups, as well as imported powders and extracts from lignum nephriticum, were thought to have great medicinal properties.
The Nephreticum was, more than likely, playing second fiddle to the Great English Remedy in the above advertisement
Dr. Mintie was arrested for distribution of handbills on the streets of San Francisco (now a days you can walk naked on the streets of San Francisco and not get arrested)
Sometime in the 1890's Dr. Mintie moved to Los Angeles
this ad is from the 1896 L.A. Herald
Dr. Mintie had been practicing medicine for over five years with out a license
The Dr. Minties Nephreticum bottle
The Dr. Minties Nephreticum bottle comes with both an applied and tooled top and was more than likely produced from the 1870's and into the 1880's.
Great post Rick...The date of mid to late 1870s seems about right as these also come with a tooled top. I think they also were produced well in to the 80s. It is amazing that anyone would actually care about whether Mintie was a real doctor, as so many meds and bitters were named after ficticious doctors. Dr. Rosenbaum? Nobody can even verify he actually existed...many other so called "doctors" were pretty grey to say the least. Not sure if there was a true "Dr. Wonser", and the Henley's Indian Queen Hair Restorative eliminated the "Dr." from the embossing while the IXL Bitters continued to have "Dr." embossed...the Indian Queen has a very obvious mold alteration where "Dr." was purposely removed. Dale M.
ReplyDeleteOne of my all time favorite Western meds ! You just cant beat the name "Dr Mintie" and the product name "Nephriticum". I still remember tripping-out on these names when I dug one of these in my very first outhouse back in junior high.
ReplyDeleteAP