You could conquer common ills
eating Fleischmann’s Yeast

100 years  ago Fleischmann’s Yeast  promised that eating their fresh yeast cakes would end indigestion, banish constipation, eliminate skin eruptions—and more!

In the 1920s, the renowned adver­tis­ing agency J.Walter Thomp­son Com­pa­ny cre­at­ed a cam­paign for Fleischmann’s Yeast designed to pro­mote the eat­ing of yeast cakes as a way both to get vit­a­mins and pre­vent con­sti­pa­tion. (JWT claimed to be the “idea” agency.)

Fleischmann’s Yeast slogan for the campaign:

THIS FAMOUS FOOD tones up the entire system—aids digestion—clears the skin—banishes constipation.

The cam­paign used med­ical and per­son­al tes­ti­mo­ni­als to increase the sales of Fleis­chman­n’s Yeast. Three adver­tise­ments from that cam­paign are repro­duced below; the “tes­ti­mo­ni­als” are tran­scribed below each adver­tise­ment. It’s obvi­ous that these prod­uct endorse­ments were writ­ten by copy­writ­ers in J. Wal­ter Thomp­son adver­tis­ing agency. The pho­tographs are posed. We’ll nev­er know whether com­pen­sa­tion was paid for the endorsements

“Pic­tures of Health,”
“This way—HEALTH!”
“Try this Recipe for Health”

They con­quered the com­mon ills—found glo­ri­ous vital health—by eat­ing a sim­ple food 

A sim­ple method that has con­quered old ills and shown thou­sands the way to new life and energy

An easy way to ban­ish old ills and restore the Vig­or of Per­fect Health 

Not a “cure-all” not a medicine—Fleischmann’s Yeast is sim­ply a remark­able fresh food.

The mil­lions of tiny active yeast plants in every cake invig­o­rate the whole sys­tem. They aid digestion—clear the skin—banish the poi­sons of con­sti­pa­tion. Where cathar­tics give only tem­po­rary relief, yeast strength­ens the intesti­nal mus­cles and makes them healthy and active, dai­ly releas­ing new stores of energy.

Eat two or three cakes reg­u­lar­ly every day, one before each meal: on crack­ers, in fruit juices, water-or milk—or just plain, in small pieces. For con­sti­pa­tion dis­solve one cake in hot water (not scald­ing) before meals and at bed­time. Dan­ger­ous habit-form­ing cathar­tics will grad­u­al­ly become unnec­es­sary. All gro­cers have Fleis­chman­n’s Yeast. Buy sev­er­al cakes at a time—they will keep fresh in a cool dry place for two or three days.

And let us send you a free copy of our lat­est book­let on Yeast for Health. Health Research Dept. F‑34, The Fleis­chmann Com­pa­ny, 701 Wash­ing­ton Street, New York.

Testimonials November 1926  Pictures of Health

I HAD BEEN TROUBLED WITH INDIGESTION accom­pa­nied by dizzy spells. Many peo­ple before I was ill had asked me if I ate Yeast, so it occurred to me to try it. I ate Yeast in sal­ad or in milk three times a day. It brought great relief. My dizzi­ness dis­ap­peared in a month or so and I felt bet­ter in every way. Now I just take the Yeast occa­sion­al­ly to keep my stom­ach in real­ly good con­di­tion.”   HATTY LININGER, Mia­mi, Fla.

“SINCE MY LITTLE BOY HAD PNEUMONIA I have giv­en him Fleis­chman­n’s Yeast at lunch and before sup­per, to build him up. He has improved rapid­ly. His appetite is bet­ter and he has start­ed in at school. I find, too, that I nev­er have to give him any lax­a­tive. With the Yeast he is absolute­ly reg­u­lar.” MRS. FELIX A. GRIFFIN”, Bal­ti­more, Md. 

“MY ENERGY BEGAN TO FLAG soon after accept­ing my posi­tion as sec­re­tary to the pres­i­dent of a large bank. I became ner­vous and irri­ta­ble. Then I dis­cov­ered Fleis­chman­n’s Yeast. In six weeks, mar­vel of mar­vels, I found that I was not so tired. I was no longer ner­vous and irri­ta­ble.” ETHEL Y. GINZ, Indi­anapo­lis, Ind.

“WHILE HEAD COACH AT A LARGE UNIVERSITY the mem­bers of the foot­ball squad were tak­en down with boils. I tried every known rem­e­dy with no results. A train­er of anoth­er Uni­ver­si­ty team rec­om­mend­ed Fleis­chman­n’s Yeast. In a short time after giv­ing my play­ers Yeast the boils began to dis­ap­pear. The team was able to make a splen­did record.”  TOM THORP, Rockville Cen­ter, L. I., well-known foot­ball referee.

“I SUFFERED FROM CONSTIPATION. As an avi­a­tor for three years my life was a pret­ty hard one, you can imag­ine, The food gen­er­al­ly was not of the best and was usu­al­ly gulped down in a hur­ry. My face broke out too. Physics afford­ed me but slight tem­po­rary relief. Final­ly I com­menced tak­ing Fleis­chman­n’s Yeast reg­u­lar­ly. I had no more trou­ble. My face cleared and con­sti­pa­tion became a thing of the past.” ALFONSO GOMEZ IZQUIERDO, San Fran­cis­co, Calif.

 Testimonials December 1926  This way health

“AFTER SUFFERING FOR YEARS FROM SICK HEADACHES brought on by stom­ach trouble—sometimes two attacks in the same week —I was advised by a Den­ver doc­tor to eat Yeast. I began tak­ing Yeast three times dai­ly, I have been free from headaches for sev­er­al months, Fleis­chman­n’s Yeast cer­tain­ly did for my stom­ach trou­ble what all oth­er reme­dies failed to do.” EDWARD A. SPROUL, Den­ver, Colo.

“I HAD SEVERE PAINS IN MY INTESTINES. I have been a chauf­feur for twen­ty years and sit­ting in a car for ten or twelve hours a day, with prac­ti­cal­ly no oth­er exer­cise, final­ly told on my sys­tem. A friend advised Fleis­chman­n’s Yeast. I tried it. In two months I absolute­ly was a dif­fer­ent per­son. I was entire­ly well.” R.S.Burnwood, Venice, Calif.

“LAST YEAR I BECAME TIRED AND LISTLESS, owing to the lack of prop­er exer­cise. I was also trou­bled with indi­ges­tion and my com­plex­ion lost its fresh­ness. I was seri­ous­ly alarmed. On  a doctor’s advice , I began tak­ing Fleischmann’s Yeast. I can­not praise it too high­ly. Every trace of indi­ges­tion van­ished. My com­plex­ion returned. I am still eat­ing Fleischmann’s Yeast to keep fit.” Eleanore G. Reade, New York City

I BROKE OUT FROM HEAD TO FOOT WITH SKIN ERUPTIONS. My entire body was cov­ered with angry welts. I could not rest at night and dur­ing the day I was so tor­tured I thought I would lose my mind. Then some­one sug­gest­ed Fleis­chman­n’s Yeast. I took three cakes of Fleis­chman­n’s Yeast a day and now I am well. That was three years ago and I have not had any trou­ble since that time.  Mrs. Frank G Mehrling, Bal­ti­more, Md.

MY LITTLE BOY WAS AFFLICTED WITH A SEVERE CASE OF CONSTIPATION at the age of four.  This is a cold coun­try and con­sti­pa­tion is preva­lent here. Nev­er­the­less I was deter­mined to cure him. I start­ed feed­ing him Fleischmann’s Yeast cakes each day. He ate them like cheese. This seemed to sup­ply some defi­cien­cy in his diet. In a few weeks, the con­sti­pa­tion began to dis­ap­pear. Now elim­i­na­tion is reg­u­lar and there is no trace of the old trou­ble left. The boy is a fine stur­dy fel­low now—and the cred­it is due to Fleischmann’s Yeast. It has been a great aid in keep­ing him fit.  Mrs. B Hard­en­brook, Stan­ford, Mont.

Testimonials January 1927 Try this recipe for health

“I SUFFERED FROM CONSTIPATION FOR MANY YEARS on account of con­stant trav­el­ing. I am some­thing of a sol­dier of for­tune, hav­ing cir­cum­nav­i­gat­ed the globe sev­er­al times and have lived in near­ly every coun­try of the plan­et. A friend in the Antipodes advised Fleis­chman­n’s Yeast. Those cakes have kept me in the pink of con­di­tion and my con­sti­pa­tion has van­ished.” Thomas Sta­ple­ton, San Fran­cis­co, Calif.

“LAST YEAR I BECAME VERY RUN DOWN. As a bal­let dancer it is nec­es­sary that I keep in excel­lent phys­i­cal con­di­tion. I suf­fered from loss of vital­i­ty and after a per­for­mance I would be so tired I could hard­ly walk. I was advised to try Fleis­chman­n’s Yeast. I did so. In a few weeks I noticed a remark­able improve­ment. Now my ener­gy is com­plete­ly restored.” HARRIETTE G. BENDLI’, New York City

“MY DAUGHTER, HENRIETTA, HAD BEEN TROUBLED WITH CONSTIPATION since birth. Three years age I start­ed tak­ing Fleis­chman­n’s Yeast for indi­ges­tion and I noticed that it was also a good reg­u­la­tor. So I gave it to Hen­ri­et­ta. It soon stopped her con­sti­pa­tion. My oth­er chil­dren also have their dai­ly Yeast. Since they began to eat it they have become pic­tures of health.” MRS. GEORGE L. KOENIG, Newark, N. J.

“I HAD BEEN A VICTIM OF INDIGESTION FOR THIRTY-FIVE YEARS. Every time I ate rich food like sausage or pas­try I would have a severe attack. It would seem as though my entire ali­men­ta­ry tract was poi­soned. Then I began eat­ing Fleis­chman­n’s Yeast. I ate three cakes of Yeast reg­u­lar­ly every day. In a remark­ably short time I began to improve and now I can indulge myself with any­thing I wish to eat. With such won­der­ful results I’ll nev­er give up my Yeast.” J. A. RlTCHEY, Bal­ti­more, Md.

“LAST FALL WAS TROUBLED WITH SEVERE SKIN ERUPTIONS for some time. I tried numer­ous reme­dies in vain. They all failed to relieve me. Final­ly I was advised by a friend to try Fleis­chman­n’s Yeast cakes. I began to eat Fleis­chman­n’s Yeast and at the end of two months I was com­plete­ly rid of my afflic­tion. I high­ly rec­om­mend Fleis­chman­n’s Yeast cakes to any per­son so trou­bled.” MABEL C. MACKENZIE, St. Peters, Nova Scotia

From an article featured in the July/August 2018 issue of The Saturday Evening Post. 

For decades, home­mak­ers used fresh yeast to make their family’s bread. But yeast sales plum­met­ed in the 1910s as busy Amer­i­cans start­ed buy­ing bread at gro­cery stores. To boost sag­ging sales, Fleischmann’s Yeast pro­mot­ed yeast as a health food. They claimed it was an impor­tant source of vit­a­mins, which had only recent­ly been dis­cov­ered. It could also cure con­sti­pa­tion, bad breath, acne, boils, and slug­gish­ness and could ensure “inter­nal clean­li­ness.” Fleischmann’s rec­om­mend­ed drink­ing a half-ounce yeast cake dis­solved in water three times a day.

Of all the wild claims, none was as out­ra­geous as the asser­tion in a 1921 ad that yeast was “very palat­able nib­bled from the cake. Spread with but­ter on crack­ers, toast or bread, it is delicious.”

By the 1930s, the Fed­er­al Trade Com­mis­sion stepped in to ask why none of the doc­tors fea­tured in the ads prac­ticed in Amer­i­ca. And what exact­ly was “inter­nal fatigue” — a symp­tom claimed to be cured by yeast? Fleischmann’s even­tu­al­ly bowed to pres­sure to pro­duce more respon­si­ble ads, but not before its “Yeast for Health” cam­paign had increased its sales 1,000 percent.