November 19 marks the annual Lydia Pinkham Open Studios event in Lynn, Massachusetts, showcasing artists at the historic factory where Lydia’s famous Vegetable Compound for Women was manufactured.
Patented in 1875, the popular elixir contained a small mix of roots and herbs, but its active ingredient was 18% alcohol. Women’s healthcare was quite primitive at the time, but Lydia offered 40-proof relief. Testimonial ads filled newspapers nationwide, with women describing dramatic, life-changing results.
During Prohibition, men liked Lydia too. “Lydia the Pink” became a popular drinking song, humorously spoofing the problems of those who ingested Lydia Pinkham’s elixir and their surprising transformations.
Lydia died in 1882, but women continued to write to her. Her heirs ran the factory, published testimonials, and adjusted the ingredients over time.
What does Lydia Pinkham have to do with the Turtle Mountain Reservation? A little monetary relief for industrious but impoverished residents. The highbush cranberry grows abundantly there and provides “cramp bark” used to ease female ailments. Men, women, and children collected and peeled the bark for Lydia Pinkham buyers. Gunny sacks of bark were taken to the Big Store in Belcourt.
The berries had long been important in the fur trade, mixed with bison meat and fat to make pemmican, or “too-roo,” which could be stored indefinitely. The place name Pembina refers to the highbush cranberry. The Pembina Band of Chippewa played a key role in the Red River fur trade, and many later settled at Turtle Mountain.
In the 1940s, tribal council leader Louis Marion established a cranberry bark and oak post industry. Bark was neatly stacked in pyramids outside the Big Store, and both the Tribe and its citizens profited from the contracts. Collected in winter, the outer layer of the bark peeled off easily.
Dakota Datebook by Lise Erdrich
Sources:
- North Dakota Department of Public Instruction, 1997. The History and Culture of the Turtle Mountain Band of Chippewa, Page 19.
- https://www.indianaffairs.nd.gov/sites/www/files/documents/pdfs/History_and_Culture_Turtle_Mountain.pdf
- Pembina Band of Chippewa Indians. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pembina_Band_of_Chippewa_Indians
- Cambridge Library Edition, 2015: New Light on the Early History of the Greater Northwest: The Manuscript Journals of Alexander Henry and of David Thompson, 1799-1814, Volume I. Edited by Elliot Coues
- Historical and Cultural Society of Clay County, MN. Idahgo Manipi: Clay County at 150. Hjemkomst Center exhibit text.
- Turtle Mountain Indian Reservation, Belcourt, North Dakota. St. Ann's Centennial: 100 Years of Faith 1885-1985.
- Patrick "Au-nish-e-nau-bay" Gourneau, History of the Turtle Mountain Band of Chippewa Indians. Rolla: Star Printing, 1971
- Wikipedia: Lydia Pinkham https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lydia_Pinkham
- https://www.indianaffairs.nd.gov/sites/www/files/documents/pdfs/History_and_Culture_Turtle_Mountain.pdf
- Female Complaints: Lydia Pinkham and the Business of Women’s Medicine. 304 pages, illustrated. Norton.
- Rita Gourneau Erdrich interview. October 5, 2025
