Hi Bill,

I have been out of town so I couldn't respond to your question about Cimicifuga
sooner.  Several people have already commented that your pharmaceutical product
is an extract of Cimicifuga racemosa, known commonly as black cohosh and black
snakeroot.  It was an important 19th century medicine, particularly for
eclectic physicians although conventional allopathic doctors also used the
product.  The missing letter in the paper label is a "P" making it U.S.P.  In
other words, it was prepared according to the standards of the United States
Pharmacopoeia.  This information is useful for dating, since the U.S.P. was
revised every 10 years or so.  I have the 9th and 11th revision, listing
official U.S.P. drugs in 1916 and 1936, respectively.  Cimicifuga is listed in
the 1916 edition, but not in the 1936 edition.  This means your product
predates 1936, and if it is not listed in the 10th edition (which I do not have
access to), it would be pre-1926.

The use of Cimicifuga extracts in the 19th century is discussed in detail in
Wood and Bache's "The United States Dispensary, 12th Edition", 1865, pp. 250-
252, and they represent the consensus of the conventional physicians of the
time.  Cimicifuga extract was more important to the eclectic physicians and was
discussed in detail by John King in the "American Dispensatory, 8th Edition",
published in 1870.  In both references, several uses for this product were
given, but a number of physicians were convinced that Cimicifuga was an
effective tonic for uterine tissue and, therefore, useful for what 19th century
doctors called "women's diseases."  Consequently, Cimicifuga became a key
ingredient in several very popular women's medicines, such as Lydia Pinkham's
Vegetable Compound and Dr. Pierce's Favorite Prescription.  These patent
medicines faded out during the 20th century.  Ironically, in the mid-20th
century, medical attention turned to phytoestrogens, plant hormones with
estrogen-like activity, and black cohosh (Cimicifuga) was shown to have
considerable phytoestrogen content.  After a few successful clinical trials
with black cohosh extracts, the German equivalent of the U.S. Food and Drug
Administration approved black cohosh extracts as an off-the-counter drug for
alleviating menopausal discomfort.  Varro Tyler wrote a very interting paper on
Lydia Pinkham's Vegetable Compound in which he concluded that Ms. Pinkham's
original formula contained sufficient black cohosh to be useful for treating
menopausal and menstrual discomfort, much as the Lydia Pinkham Company
claimed.  See Tyler "Pharmacy in History," Vol. 37, No. 1, 1995, pp. 24-28.

Sorry to be long winded, but this is a subject I am working on & interested in.

Allen

P.S. I am not familiar with the base embossing "H.W. and O." that you
described, but it may be the initials for the pharmaceutical manufacturer
rather than the glass maker.  Companies like Eli Lilly and Parke, Davis & Co.
had their bottles embossed with their initials.