[Philadelphia and various places: no publisher, 1910-1920].
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Unbound. A collection of four pieces of ephemera related to Dr. Edward Parker Read. Read was credited with opening the “first drug store ever conducted by colored people in Petersburg, Va” in 1889 and the first drug store owned by an African-American in Philadelphia a year later. Read was in reality an entrepreneur and not a doctor, who peddled cure-alls that claimed to aid everything from nervousness, constipation, and sleeplessness to colic, headaches, and blood purification, sold under different business names: East Indian Remedy Company, Powhatan Indian Herb Manufacturing Company, and Ever Ready Herb Remedy, to name but a few. He was quite successful in his time, eventually expanding his store to four locations, as well as opening the Eclectic Optical Institute. Along the way he helped establish the Readville section of Lawnside, New Jersey, acted as a judge in nearby Camden County, and became the proprietor of the Cosmopolitan Educational Institute and Eureka Sanatorium, which he claimed was “The only Colored Institute of its kind.” The law finally caught up to Read in 1921 when he was sued by the Commonwealth of Pennsylvania and forced to admit that he was not a graduate of any medical school and had no certificate to practice medicine. A nice archive of turn-of-the-century medical quackery. None of the items found in *OCLC*. The Archive includes:
1. [Caption title]: Life Prosperity Chart. Small broadside. 7½" x 8½" (possibly trimmed). Printed on thin paper. Near fine. Apparently printed for Read, mostly about his products, but aimed at churches.
2. [Postcard]: Peace and Goodwill Toward Mankind Ethiopian Anthem. 4" x 6". About fine. Printing the anthem on one side and an advertisement for the Powhatan Indian Herb Manufacturing Company on the other side.
3. [Envelope]: Mineral Water Make Your Own Water-Tablets. 5" x 2¾". Fine. Apparently an unused paper envelope for pills, with copious advertising on both sides.
4. Printed Check Signed ("E.P. Read"). Check for $13.80 made out by Read to Howard Haines, dated in 1913. About fine.
Item #400332
