While it is an old remedy, snake oil is still used today to help cure different ailments. In Oriental medicine, the oil from the Chinese water snake has been found to be high in omega-3 fatty acids and is used for arthritis. However, western snake oil was made from a different snake and is often associated with quackery, although there are no recent studies as to whether it is an effective cure for certain ailments or not. [SOURCE 2]
It Really Was Rattlesnake Oil
We all have heard the term “snake oil” bantered about to describe a medical product that doesn’t really work. The snake they are referring to is the rattlesnake. In the late 1800s to the early 1900s, there was a huge market for rattlesnake oil because people believed that it would cure them of a number of ailments.
Of course, rattlesnake oil provided no real or known cures, but it continued to be sold as medicine. This is how we get the modern term “snake oil” or “snake oil salesman.” [SOURCE 1]
Harvesting Snake Oil
There were many methods used to harvest the oil from the rattlesnake. In one account from out of Tennessee, a snake farmer named “Snaky George” would kill a number of his rattlesnake stock and toss the bodies into a cauldron of boiling water. As the snake bodies cooked, the fat, or oil, would rise to the top to be harvested.
In Pennsylvania, rattlesnakes were killed, skinned, and then hung up by their tails in the sun. Troughs were placed beneath the hanging snake carcasses. As the sun heated up the snake’s fat, it dripped down into the troughs. [SOURCE 1, 3]
Good Money
People made really good money hunting and harvesting rattlesnakes. In a report from 1909, a young Oklahoma man discovered that he could make anywhere from fifty cents to a dollar from a single rattlesnake hide. The rattlesnake oil could bring in anywhere from two to five dollars an ounce.
Clothing was often made from rattlesnake hides. A simple rattlesnake vest could be sold for about twenty-five dollars in the early 1900s. This meant that an entire family could get involved in the rattlesnake industry, from the men hunting the snakes to the women sewing the clothing. [SOURCE 4]
Huge Industry
The rattlesnake oil industry was huge in the state of Pennsylvania. There were many hotbeds of rattlesnakes in northern Pennsylvania and towns developed out of the riches that rattlesnake oil provided.
Along with harvesting rattlesnakes, the area was also rich in lumber. Together, the lumber and the huge cans of rattlesnake oil were floated down the canals that were built throughout the area to be sold off to different parts of the country.
The oil was often sold outright to the lumbermen. Sometimes it was bartered for booze and there were occasions when the snake oil was shipped on commission. [SOURCE 1]
Dangerous Work
The problem with harvesting rattlesnakes for their oil was the risk of being bit. There was no real cure for rattlesnake bites during the height of the rattlesnake oil trade. Instead, there were a bunch of strange folk remedies.
One of the cures involved killing a chicken and tying the freshly dead chicken over the wound. Another cure was chopping up an onion and placing it over the bite. It was believed that the onion would draw out the snake venom.
A popular cure for snake bites in the late 1800s was coal oil. The victim was supposed to place the bitten area in a tub of coal oil to soak. The venom was supposedly drawn out of the wound by the oil and would float to the top of the tub. [SOURCES 5, 6]
Rattlesnake Farms
Because of all the money that could be made from rattlesnake oil, some ingenious people decided it would be easier to raise the rattlesnakes rather than hunt them out in the wild.
In a 1912 newspaper report, a Cecil Miles bought twelve acres of land in Massachusetts to use as a rattlesnake farm. His plan was to start off with a hundred rattlesnakes. Allowing them to breed on his land, he planned on getting about $5 per pint of the rattlesnake oil he would collect. [SOURCE 7]
A Cure For Deafness
While there is no actual “cure” for deafness, there were many ads in newspapers in the late 1800s for deafness remedies. One of the cures talked about was the rattlesnake oil cure. According to one article published in 1897, a person could cure deafness by putting drops of the snake oil in his ears.
Interestingly enough, the same person who touted the effectiveness of snake oil for deafness, also believed that wrapping a living snake around a person’s neck would cure him of neck swelling. A rubber band was put around the snake’s jaw before the snake was wrapped around the patient’s neck. [SOURCE 8]
Rub It On
The most popular use for rattlesnake oil was as a cure for rheumatism. Snake oil ads filled the newspapers claiming to cure rheumatism, kidney problems, sprains, cramps, and an assortment of skin diseases. It was even used to get rid of warts and treat rabies. It was generally rubbed onto the skin, although there were some pills being sold that claimed to have rattlesnake oil in them.
Livestock was also treated with rattlesnake oil. It was believed to help make fowl grow larger and it was fed to sheep who had problems chewing their fodder. [SOURCES 9, 10, 11]
Rattle And Tongue
The oil from the rattlesnake wasn’t the only thing people used for miracle cures. The rattle, for instance, was worn around the neck of an infant to help prevent convulsions. If an adult wore the rattle necklace, it would protect him from rheumatism.
Even stranger, it was believed that the rattlesnake’s tongue could bring about love. Superstition claimed that a man was supposed to place the snake’s tongue in the palm of his hand and wear a glove overtop of it. He would then extend this hand to a woman he was interested in and if she took his hand, she would fall madly in love with him. [SOURCE 12]
The Axman Scare
In Texas, African Americans began harvesting the oil from rattlesnakes for a different purpose.
Between 1910 and 1912, there was serial killer known as the Axman who was terrorizing Louisiana and Texas. He would brutally murder entire families in their sleep. It is estimated that the Axman killed at least 10 families and is sometimes called the “American Jack the Ripper.”
To counteract this bad voodoo, African American men harvested rattlesnake oil and sold it off as a counter charm to the Axman. They believed that the rattlesnake oil, as well as other charms, would keep their families safe from the Axman. [SOURCES 13, 14, 15]
