Episode details

Sounds,07 Feb 2025,37 mins,

Dr. Brinkley's Miracle Cure For Impotence (with Betwixt The Sheets)

Cautionary Tales with Tim Harford
Contains very strong language.

Available for over a year

Cautionary Conversation: In the 1920s, a conman convinced America that goat testicles were the secret to male virility. Tim Harford and Dr Kate Lister (Betwixt the Sheets: The History of Sex, Scandal & Society) dive into the bizarre and grisly tale of "Doctor" John Brinkley. This snake oil salesman mobilised the power of radio marketing to build an empire on goat gland transplants and other quack "cures". And Brinkley might have got away with it, were it not for his nemesis: the tenacious Dr. Morris Fishbein. For a full list of sources, see the show notes at timharford.com

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