According to the Lancaster Medical Heritage Museum, Lee’s Save the Baby, made by William W. Lee & Co. in the early 1900s, was a children’s cough suppressant to be applied externally to the chest area (although the back cover of the box pictured here said it could be used “Externally or Internally”). The main ingredients included camphor.
Gotta love the foresight to include the disclaimer stating:
The name “Save-The-Baby” is not intended to imply that the product will save babies …
The Lancaster medical museum says:
“The liquid medication has a dark yellow color and it is contained in a glass bottle with a red screw on cap. … The original formula of this product died with Ester Lee in 1974, the last member of the Lee Family.”
I always used save the baby on my kids, only as a rub on chest to loosen up pflym. Worked wonderful!
Can you still buy it
According to this link I found, yes. https://www.dutchmansstore.com/product/original-save-the-baby-soothing-vapor-rub-1-75-oz
As a child I was given save the baby when I had the croup. Mother would put a fourth teaspoon of sugar with about three or four drops of save the baby and I would take it internally followed by a glass of water. It cut the phlegm and the cough. It worked wonderful.
My mother always had a bottle of Save the Baby on hand. Our family doctor would recommend it when one of us eight kids had a bad cold. I would buy a bottle of it when we went up to NY to bring back to PA for my kids. It always worked.