Bradshaw
In January 1951, Time magazine described Dudley J. LeBlanc as “a stem-winding salesman who knows every razzle- dazzle switch in the pitchman’s trade,” and that was a understatement.
A St. Louis Post-Dispatch article on Christmas Eve 1950, called him “a modern medicine man who works with full page newspaper ads, radio spot announcements, and … trainloads of Hollywood stars” to promote “the most talked- of, joked-about patent medicine since Lydia Pinkham’s Vegetable Compound.”
LeBlanc was at the height of his powers in 1950, using every instrument he could find to sell Hadacol, his patent medicine that was bringing in millions of dollars even though Time described it as “a murky brown liquid that tastes something like bilge water, and smells worse.”
That description and the Hadacol jokes didn’t bother Dudley. He said people expected medicine to taste bad and the jokes just made people want to try it. He spent nearly $1 million a month (more than $10 million in today’s money) in 1950 for ads in newspapers and radio spots that were filled with testimonials about Hadacol’s miraculous powers.
He’d also begun the famous Hadacol Caravan, a traveling medicine show that featured big stars such as Bob Hope, Mickey Rooney, Chico Marx, Carmen Miranda, Milton Berle, Minnie Pearl, and Hank Williams. The price of admission was two Hadacol box tops for adults, and one for kids, and the performances drew enormous crowds. Bottles of Hadacol were available at concession stands, along with dozens of promotional products such as Captain Hadacol comic books, T-shirts, lipstick, an almanac, plastic thimbles printed with the Hadacol logo, water pistols, drinking glasses, and a token worth 25¢ toward the purchase of a bottle of Hadacol. (Dudley’s picture was on one side, the Hadacol logo on the other.)
Bradshaw
He ballyhooed his trinkets and especially his elixir at Christmas time, putting up signs on billboards and the sides of barns claiming that the twinkle in Santa’s eye and the pep for his Christmas Eve dash came from Hadacol. The billboards suggested that a bottle or two might help anyone’s holiday spirits, which was probably true. The concoction was 12 percent alcohol.
Dudley also found this time of year perfect for turning kids into Hadacol salesmen.
Advertisements in newspapers during the week before Christmas 1950 invited kids to “Giant” Hadacol Christmas parties in movie theaters across Louisiana. Each of them promised a “first-run” Westen starring Hopalong Cassidy, a Woody Woodpecker cartoon, and “gifts for every child.” The ad for the party at the Bob Theater in Abbeville said the presents included candy, balloons, toys, whistles, and novelties. Ads in other towns offered similar lists.
The party and gifts were free; the price of admission was just one Hadacol box top. Every ad urged kids to “ask Mom and Dad to get you a Hadacol box top!” Or maybe more than one. Hadacol also promised that a Schwinn bicycle would be given away at each party to the boy or girl bringing the most box tops.
The Hadacol boxes were easy to find. Every drug store and a lot of grocery stores had them, and some listed the stuff with their holiday specials. David’s Market in New Iberia, for example, offered a five-pound bag of sugar for 43 cents, a pound of coffee for 59 cents, a can of pork and beans for a dime, and a family-sized bottle of Hadacol at the special price of $2.25 ($22.50 today).
And, lest anyone forget, the ads also were a reminder that a bottle of Hadacol was a perfect gift for just about anyone on your gift list.
Santa and the kids and Dudley’s marketing schemes paid off. An ad in the Crowley newspaper on December 29, 1950, claimed that 26 million bottles were sold that year. At $2.25 a bottle, that paid for a lot of balloons, toys, novelties, and Schwinns – and made Dudley’s eyes twinkle even brighter than Santa’s.
You can contact Jim Bradshaw at [email protected] or P.O. Box 1121, Washington LA 70589.
