Stop smoking now . . .

The graphic shows an advertisement from the December, 1919 issue of Popular Mechanics. The full page ad is selling a smoking cessation method called Tobacco Redeemer so that smokers can all live happier, healthier lives. Uh-huh.

The graphic along the left side of the ad claims that:
Tobacco tells on nervous system
Tobacco ruins digestion
Tobacco stunts boy’s growth
Tobacco robs man of virility
Tobacco steals from you the pleasures, comforts, luxuries of life

The text is as follows:
Immediate results
Trying to quit the tobacco habit unaided is a losing fight against heavy odds, and means a serious shock to your nervous system. So don’t try it! Make the tobacco habit quit you. It will quit you if you just take Tobacco Redeemer according to directions.

It doesn’t make a particle of difference whether you’ve been a user of tobacco for a single month or 50 years, or how much you use, or in what form you use it. Whether you smoke cigars, cigarettes, pipe, chew plug or fine cut or use snuff – Tobacco Redeemer will positively remove all craving for tobacco in any form in from 48 to 72 hours. Your tobacco craving will begin to decrease after the very first dose – there’s no long waiting for results.

Tobacco Redeemer contains no habit forming drugs of any kind, and is the most marvelously quick, absolutely scientific and thoroughly reliable remedy for the tobacco habit.

Not a substitute
Tobacco Redeemer is in no sense a substitute for tobacco, but is a radical, efficient treatment. After finishing the treatment you have absolutely no desire to use tobacco again or to continue use of the remedy. It quiets the nerves, and will make you feel better in every way. If you really want to quit the tobacco habit - get rid of it so completely that when you see others using it, it will not awaken the slightest desire in you – you should at once begin a course of Tobacco Redeemer.

Results absolutely guaranteed
A single trial will convince the most skeptical. Our legal, binding money-back guarantee goes with each full treatment. If Tobacco Redeemer fails to banish the tobacco habit when taken according to the plain and easy directions, your money will be cheerfully refunded upon demand.

The anti-smoker brigade has been shrilly screaming about the negative effects of tobacco consumption for hundreds of years; ever since the Indian weed was discovered, in fact. And, snake oil salesmen have been trying to make a buck selling smoking cessation products to a mostly unwilling public for almost as long.

I wonder if the makers of NicoDerm would be willing to offer a money back guarantee if use of their product doesn’t stop the user from smoking? Can the makers of Nicorettes make the claim that their product contains no habit forming drugs? Can any drug or program on the market today get you to quit in three days or less?

The medicine men peddling Tobacco Redeemer to the public 90 years ago offered such guarantees. They eventually went out of business (or wound up in jail). I wonder why?