Just the name "Ru-Ter-Ba" is enough to loosen bowels.

Long before Jamie Lee Curtis was overly concerned with the regularity of your bowel movements, the chorus girls of the wildly popular 1901 Florodora Broadway stage musical were lending their good names to Ru-Ter-Ba, some sort of herbal laxative.

The Edwardian musical comedy, which had previously played in London, began its New York stint in 1900. The comedy and its sextet of show girls became a huge hit and opened avenues for product endorsements.

Although the ad claims the medicine is good for “calming nervousness” and creating “vim, vigor and vitality,” the final line acknowledges that they are “pellets for constipation.” An Albany outfit called Dr. J. C. Brown Medical Company sold Ru-Ter-Ba for 25 cents a pop. An excerpt from he ad:

“The necessary daily routine in the lives of all theatrical people is of the most exacting nature. Long weeks of study, rehearsals at inconvenient hours, the arbitrary, and oftentimes exasperating discipline of the manager, must all be endured before the artists can appear at a public performance and receive the encouragement from the plaudits of the audience.

Then comes the wearing hours of work on the stage. Anxiety to win success, the heartache that follows even the slightest failure to win the good will of the audience, unavoidable exposure to draughts of air; all these contribute to a constant depletion of physical and nerve force.

The necessity for sustaining and nourishing food at late hours, after the close of the performance, and the constant interruption to the normal hours for sleep, lay the foundation for Insomnia, Dyspepsia and Nervous Prostration…the hearty endorsement of ‘Ru-Ter-Ba’ as Nature’s Tonic, by the members of the Florodora Sextet, is the strongest possible proof of its merit.”

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