Portable Potions: The Itinerant Apothecary

Not long ago, my friend mentioned something about a traveling apothecary, which led me to do some web research. (Again, my immense gratitude for an open resource like the Internet!) Soon after beginning my quest during downtime at work on December 12th, I stumbled on a whole passel of amazing photographs, representing the history of portable apothecaries.

In the Victorian and Edwardian eras and before, doctors, druggists and surgeons would bring their kits with them when they either traveled or made house calls. I suppose they do the same today, although they arrive in ambulances or cars bearing fancy plastic boxes and high-tech instruments.

But in the bad old days before plastic, professionals in these fields sported some truly exquisite, handmade kits of wood, metal and glass, often lined with velvet or leather. They were simply the heirs and supplanters of an earlier tradition of country healers, who arrived at a house with pouches and cases filled with herbs.

In the early expanding and competitive medical profession, drugs and potions might be dangerous or scarcely tested, and the practitioners unscrupulous, if not outright criminals and quacks. I recently bought a lovely little "trial bottle" of Dr. King's New Discovery, one such dubious remedy containing chloroform!

But even an honest doctor or druggist, when taking to the road, had to pack every chemical and potion he/she might need, so as to be ready for anything -- especially if a client called in a panic or couldn't accurately describe the affliction at hand.

Since doctors and druggists often compounded their own recipes for medicines, it helped to have a full stash of supplies at their disposal. Each kit might be a little different, depending on the specialty and expertise of a particular medical professional.

At some point, of course, I would love to make one of these beautiful varnished traveling apothecary boxes -- as close as it comes to a real "potion kit" -- for myself. I certainly have no shortage of bottles, nor of the test tubes I've been buying from Scrap by the dozen (now for the corks!).

The joy, potential, and yes, status symbol of having a kit this functional and elegant is very appealing to me. Let us say, when it comes to toys and tools, it's a goal high on my list. Forget the video game console, the flat screen TV, the jet ski or high-rise pickup truck . . . I'll keep my secondhand snowboard and I'll take one of these.

The only thing better would be a magic box with hidden Extension capacity, in which a multitude of little bottles can appear out of seemingly nowhere, a la Mary Poppins' bag or Magica de Spell's carpet. But that, alas, is a province for those folks like Snape and their impossible cinematic magic. In the Disenchanted or "muggle" world these real-life apothecary boxes, complete with ingredients, scale, spoons and other implements, are hard to beat for sheer coolness.