Proprietary
Medicines and
The Crisis of American Pharmacy, 1918-1942
Joseph M. Gabriel, PhD, Florida State University
Abstract: In
the four decades before World War II pharmacists increasingly dispensed
mass-produced drugs sold under brand names instead of compounding
prescriptions. This talk describes how the increased sale of proprietary
medicines led to a professional crisis among pharmacists related to their loss
of autonomy, economic instability, and increased legal jeopardy. It will also
discuss how pharmacists responded to this troubling situation.
Joseph
M. Gabriel is Associate Professor of History
in the Department of Behavioral Sciences and Social Medicine at Florida State
University. He is the author of Medical
Monopoly: Intellectual Property Rights and the Origins of the Modern
Pharmaceutical Industry (University of Chicago Press,
2014) and the co-editor of Drugs
on the Page: Pharmacopeias and Healing Knowledge in the Early Modern Atlantic
World (University of Pittsburgh Press,
2019). Among other topics, he has written on the history of drugs and
pharmaceuticals, the cultural history of addiction, and the history of clinical
drug trials. He lives in Tallahassee.