A castor oil ad, circa 1920. One of the more commonly seen vintage ads in New York.

I was recently informed over several e-mails from fading ads enthusiast, Barbara Roberts, that Castoria was not a castor oil at all but a prune-flavored laxative for children.

She stated the ingredients were cascara sagrada, syrup of figs and extract of prunes. Mmm. So I guess "Syrup of Figs" (ad #24) wasn't a dessert topping.

This is recently in from Chris Riley who wrote me in May 2000 as follows:

"Actually, Fletcher's Castoria was manufactured by Charles Henry Fletcher beginning in 1871 and had been patented in 1868. The initial patent for Castoria included "senna, sodium bicarbonate, essence of wintergreen, taraxicum, sugar, and water." It was modified later to include other things like pumpkin, anise, wormseed to improve the taste to be more like root beer - although I'm not so sure it does! :-)"

Thank you Chris for the Fletcher's update!

For more information about Castoria products, visit the Centaur Company website!