Learn Something New Every Day??

[docat]

I'm inclined to want to believe the first one...

That's the one I chose too.

[OLChemist]

I'm sorry if it sounded like I was criticizing your late husband. I was going for a variation on the stock disclaimer I put on any info about medicinal chemistry. I know too many New Agey types who think they can just play herbalist. In someways, I think their attitude is a kind of unconscious contempt for our culture. "It's got to be simple, after all these primitive people developed it."

There is a lot involved in safely gathering and using wild food, or traditional medicines. And most of us in the modern world don't have enough exposure to plants. I grew up with two generations that foraged for wild foods and herbs, and I what I learned is what I don't know. There were plants my auntie wouldn't harvest if it was dry because she said they weren't good then. One of them I later learned from a colleague, who was extracting and identifying compounds in the home remedies used by mountain people in the Ozarks, produced a toxic alkaloid in response to stress to prevent predation. It takes an years of guidance and experience to learn to safely gather, prepare and use traditional foods and medicines. Our ancestors were skilled practical botanists and chemists. And they invested much time and energy into transmitting this knowledge, which cannot be casually acquired.

Many of these plants are leaving our daily lives, even for those of us in cities. This fall I went back to the town where I grew up and back to my where my grandparents farm used to be for the first time in over twenty years. Like I said in my earlier post there used to be wild food and medicinal plants in ditches, right aways and creek beds. So much is gone. Widespread use of herbicides, in particular N-(phosphonomethyl)glycine, has decimated the broadleaved "weeds". Milkweed, ironweed, ragweed, false globe mallow, morning glory and so many plants were just gone from the roadsides and ditches. Places I used to pick touch-me-not leaves to put on bug bites were all invasive species now. And I won't have eaten the elderberries that were limping along in some of the places that used to me lush gardens of berries.

MoonWoman, touch-me-not, jewelweed, Impatiens capensis sap contains 2-hydroxy-1,4-naphthoquinone a natural dye which turns your skin orange/brown/yellow. Some scientists say the sap has antifungal properties. It is a widely used folk remedy for poison ivy and bug bites. Your teachin' for the day *wink*

[docat]

I'm sorry if it sounded like I was criticizing your late husband. I was going for a variation on the stock disclaimer I put on any info about medicinal chemistry.

No, it didn't sound like criticizing in the least. I totally understand and agree. I was a huge nag about it because I thought it was dangerous. He was fascinated with chemistry and the old time remedies. He had a "chem cave," his version of the "man cave." It's a good thing he passed before he would have found this forum; he would have attempted to monopolize your time on here! You speak his dialect.

Our daughters grew up calling him a mad scientist and complained of the odors of burning cubebs and sulfur coming from the chem cave or from the open bag of Asafoetida that arrived in a non-air tight bag in the mail.

When I had a bad cough once, he made a bunch of home made cough drops from one of his old formularies. They were called "Bronchial Troches." I didn't want to use them; however, I didn't want him to see me throw them out since they were supposedly only "harmless cough drops." I didn't want to hurt his feelings, so I buried them in the dirt of one of the houseplants.

Within a week, I was on the mend, but that plant was well on its way to dying. Now it could have died because I disturbed the roots. But something tells me that there was some active ingredient that was toxic to it.

DH stopped short of growing Papaver somniferim for his own manufacture(poppies, for those readers who aren't botanically inclined)...however, if he had been in pain, I don't doubt he would have.

[OLChemist]

They were called "Bronchial Troches."

Boy, I had to look that up. The 1866 patent was something.

Ammonium chloride, tail pepper, extract of licorice, gum arabic, wintergreen, tolu balasam aren't too surprising. This stuff would have tasted like a cross between Finnish salted licorice, wintergreen lifesavers, pepper and a pine tree. I imagine the flavor would have cured your cough by making your mouth, throat and nose relocate to a safe distance -- say 30 or 40 miles -- from your lungs. Your breath after these would have stripped paint, LOL.

But the ingredient that gets me is chlorate of potash -- KClO3. The chemist in me is recoiling. While it is a disinfectant, this is one of the milder compounds from the land of fireworks, rocket fuel, blast guards and cracked fume hood sashes. It is a fun oxidizer. You can make plastic explosives with it. It likes to react with things and liberate lots of heat and oxygen. It burns with things you "rarely" find in labs, like dust and lint and paper. Was it in there to blow the freaking gems up? I can't imagine how Mr Samuel O Henszey, Jr made the first batch without autoignition of one or more of the ingredients. Or his fingers.

No wonder the plant died.

Extract of licorice, gum arabic, wintergreen, and tolu balasam are still used in cough medicines today. The methyl salicylate in oil of wintergreen is antiseptic and pain relieving. (Before anyone goes crazy with oil of wintergreen, 1 tsp contains enough methyl salicylate to administer a lethal adult dose. And it is absorbed through the skin.)

[docat]

Boy, I had to look that up. The 1866 patent was something.

Ammonium chloride, tail pepper, extract of licorice, gum arabic, wintergreen, tolu balasam aren't too surprising. This stuff would have tasted like a cross between Finnish salted licorice, wintergreen lifesavers, pepper and a pine tree. I imagine the flavor would have cured your cough by making your mouth, throat and nose relocate to a safe distance -- say 30 or 40 miles -- from your lungs. Your breath after these would have stripped paint, LOL.

But the ingredient that gets me is chlorate of potash -- KClO3. The chemist in me is recoiling. While it is a disinfectant, this is one of the milder compounds from the land of fireworks, rocket fuel, blast guards and cracked fume hood sashes. It is a fun oxidizer. You can make plastic explosives with it. It likes to react with things and liberate lots of heat and oxygen. It burns with things you "rarely" find in labs, like dust and lint and paper. Was it in there to blow the freaking gems up? I can't imagine how Mr Samuel O Henszey, Jr made the first batch without autoignition of one or more of the ingredients. Or his fingers.

No wonder the plant died.

Extract of licorice, gum arabic, wintergreen, and tolu balasam are still used in cough medicines today. The methyl salicylate in oil of wintergreen is antiseptic and pain relieving. (Before anyone goes crazy with oil of wintergreen, 1 tsp contains enough methyl salicylate to administer a lethal adult dose. And it is absorbed through the skin.)

WOW, 1866, indeed that would have been the era of at least one of the formularies. Plastic explosives??? Oh my, I'm glad the plant suffered in my place. They didn't smell good, and I can see that this is the correct formula because the mix of smells sounds spot on. That tailed pepper is cubeb, I think.

Oh planned and unplanned fires in the chem cave were not all that uncommon. The house was all electric and we had to put in natural gas for his burners. He had a soapstone lab table and sink and all the gear salvaged from a high school chemistry lab from a school that had been consolidated with another one. Oh, and you can imagine his "list for Santa" for holiday gifts he needed. LOL

The oil of wintergreen reminds me... Back in the 80s, he was experimenting with different "carriers" (not sure if that's the right term or not, but that's what he called them) that would allow a person to have medicine administered through the skin in a patch. I'm not sure where he got the carriers...and maybe I'm not remembering it right. It was a long time ago. But back then, I don't recall that medicines were administered in patches. In fact, he didn't call them patches but something else...but the idea is the same.

DH had good intentions. He was thoroughly fascinated with his formularies. I remember one had homeopathic formulas in it with some pretty deadly ingredients, but as you know in homeopathic preps, the toxic element is very weak. This surprised me to see this in his book that was over 100 years old (I think it was Kilner's formulary--at least that's the name that rings a bell) because I have seen homeopathic preparations in modern natural medicine. Between you and me and anyone who has read this far, I don't think I believe that homeopathic preparations really work... perhaps it is more of a placebo effect? DH didn't agree with me.

Some of these old formularies had preps that weren't medicine, but helpful things you'd pick up at a pharmacy, like hair dye that uses galls and sugar of lead. There were other preps for removing stains and removing worms in horses.

[OLChemist]

Some of these old formularies had preps that weren't medicine, but helpful things you'd pick up at a pharmacy, like hair dye that uses galls and sugar of lead. There were other preps for removing stains and removing worms in horses.

Oh, yes. So much we buy and use to clean our homes or bodies, or doctor ourselves or our animals was prepared from scratch. When my grandmother passed at 104 we found her grandmother and mothers kitchen diary. It had two generations of recipes going back to the 1870's. You would turn the page and go from recipes for everyone in towns version of bread and butter pickles, to brass polish made with brick dust, to a pain killing draught made with laudanum.

Sugar of lead? I think I'd let my hair go gray thank you very much.

[docat]

Oh, yes. So much we buy and use to clean our homes or bodies, or doctor ourselves or our animals was prepared from scratch. When my grandmother passed at 104 we found her grandmother and mothers kitchen diary. It had two generations of recipes going back to the 1870's. You would turn the page and go from recipes for everyone in towns version of bread and butter pickles, to brass polish made with brick dust, to a pain killing draught made with laudanum.

Sugar of lead? I think I'd let my hair go gray thank you very much.

DH would have been totally at home in your grandmother's kitchen. I had a hard time keeping him out of mine. I remember some kind of experiments with different leavening agents, one smelling like ammonia!

One thing he did that I was totally behind was his work with natural dyes. Now that was something he could prepare that I could actually use. The red was made from crushed up red bugs that he had ordered from the Canary Islands. He said that this dye could additionally be used as food coloring like for a cake. I didn't use the dye for food--the idea of putting red bug juice on a cake wasn't too appetizing. However, the dyes and mordants were great for my animal and vegetal homespun yarns...

Wow, I'm really taking rabbit trails down memory lane! We had the strangest plants cultivated in our garden. I really liked the Jimsonweed we had. It was a pretty plant with strange--but not unpleasant--smelling trumpet flowers. He made something from the seeds. My neighbor said the plant is called "loco weed." I wonder what he needed that for. I looked up Datura stratonium, but I couldn't find what the seeds could be used for. The plant is considered toxic.

[OLChemist]

...I remember some kind of experiments with different leavening agents, one smelling like ammonia!

Baker's ammonia, ammonium carbonate (NH4)2CO3. That's really old school leavening. You have to special order that nowadays.

...The red was made from crushed up red bugs that he had ordered from the Canary Islands. He said that this dye could additionally be used as food coloring like for a cake. I didn't use the dye for food--the idea of putting red bug juice on a cake wasn't too appetizing....

Cochineal, cactus scale bugs. The famous trade product of the indigenous peoples of Oaxaca. The source of the amazing, light stable reds and purples of the Pre-columbian textiles of the Maya and Aztec.

Calcium and Aluminum salts of the carminic acid extracted from the bug are indeed widely used in food stuffs. The odds are good you'll eat some today. Natural red 4, E120, carmine, and crimson lake are all cochineal extracts. The cosmetic and food industry are what saved cochineal cultivation. Alizarin crimson and other artificial anthraquinones largely displaced the labor intensive cochineal dyes. However, some of these were later discovered pose a potential long term health risk when used in foods. Cochineal and extracts from chiles have largely replaced these.

DDW Color House info on chochineal

Whats so stunning about cochineal and anthraquinones in general is the range of hues. The phenol groups on these molecules can be deprotonated changing the energies of the molecular orbitals, thus changing the color. By selecting different mordants, changing the pH and the chelating metal atom you can get purples, reds, pinks, crimsons. One year when I was at Arrowmont School of Crafts, I walked outside at lunch and the entire balcony outside the fiber's studio was full of drying swatches of cochineal dyed silk. An amazing range of colors, subtle and bold. Just lovely.


BTW, I wanted to ask did you weave the piece in your avatar?

[docat]

Baker's ammonia, ammonium carbonate (NH4)2CO3

I remembered another was "pearlash." There used to be different leavening products available other than the usual baking soda, baking powder, and yeast. Evidently the medicinal chemist provided those leavening agents as well.

Cochineal, cactus scale bugs. The famous trade product of the indigenous peoples of Oaxaca. The source of the amazing, light stable reds and purples of the Pre-columbian textiles of the Maya and Aztec. Calcium and Aluminum salts of the carminic acid extracted from the bug are indeed widely used in food stuffs. The odds are good you'll eat some today. [snip]

Natural red 4, E120, carmine, and crimson lake are all cochineal extracts.

I don't like the thought of eating bugs. I remember the old scare back in the 60s about red dye #2. Was that one of the synthetic reds?

Whats so stunning about cochineal and anthraquinones in general is the range of hues. The phenol groups on these molecules can be deprotonated changing the energies of the molecular orbitals, thus changing the color. By selecting different mordants, changing the pH and the chelating metal atom you can get purples, reds, pinks, crimsons.

I completely handed the dyeing of thread/cordage/yarn etc over to him as his chemical knowledge in this was superb and the chem cave was a perfect workspace for that. If I had nettle, dogbane, sheep's wool, cattail, basswood etc, I could hand him a paint chip and he could come pretty close. Sometimes I wanted a color that wasn't possible for that fiber and he'd look at it and say that it couldn't be done with that fiber.

BTW, I wanted to ask did you weave the piece in your avatar?

No, this particular mat was one my great aunt wove. As these mats age, they take on a warmer hue like that one. This old pattern is achieved by fingerweaving cattail leaves that are treated in such a way that they are very soft to work, like chamois. Here is a fuzzy pic of one in progress. These all look alike, so I didn't think to photograph them.

[OLChemist]

Peralash, K2CO3, is another old school leavening agent. Chemical shortages during WWII shifted North American bakers to new products. Plus people moved more to double acting chemical leavening products. This made the time elapsed between mixing to baking less critical.


The eating bugs doesn't bother me much. By the time it is processed for food use all the buggy bits are gone. The stuff is extracted, purified, sterilized... It's just a chemical from a natural source.

Now, my mother organically grown broccoli, which has been known to show up at the table with steamed caterpillars hiding in the heads, that's another matter. There is nothing like finding half a caterpillar in the bite on your fork, LOL.


Amaranth, red dye #2, is an azo dye. Some studies found it could cause cancer in female rats. It was banned in the US in 1976. But it is still in use in Europe and Canada.


Kewl on the weaving by the way. I can't wait to see something you've made.

[docat]

buggy bits

I'm going to add that term to my scientific lexicon. LOL

Now, my mother organically grown broccoli, which has been known to show up at the table with steamed caterpillars hiding in the heads, that's another matter. There is nothing like finding half a caterpillar in the bite on your fork, LOL.

Those are buggy bits you don't want to find, yes! I found that if I soaked cabbage types in salt water for a time that those bugs crawl out of hiding. Unfortunately after seeing them crawl out and floating in the water, I lose my appetite.

Amaranth, red dye #2, is an azo dye. Some studies found it could cause cancer in female rats. It was banned in the US in 1976. But it is still in use in Europe and Canada.

Amaranth, the grain? I always wonder how much of something they give these rats that causes cancer in them.

I remember cyclamates were banned like in the 1970s. I knew people who made trips to Canada to get it because the replacement then was not as good. They created a black market within the WeightWatcher's community.

Kewl on the weaving by the way. I can't wait to see something you've made.

I still own just about every NDN craft piece that I've made in storage...not having money to leave my children, I figured I would leave all these NDN crafts to them. Maybe someday they'll be worth something.

So I have a lifetime of crafts stored away for them in acid free conservation boxes...unfortunately they aren't nearby to snap pics, but I'm thinking of making more of these mats. I haven't made one since DH passed. But retired now, I have the time. I should make them.

I put up the mat pic for my avatar after a friend here in jest teased me about being a doormat regarding some argument...and I left it up.

[OLChemist]

Amaranth dye - trisodium (4E)-3-oxo-4-[(4-sulfonato-1-naphthyl)hydrazono]naphthalene-2,7-disulfonate -- was named after the grain. But I don't believe that they have anything to do with one another. The dye is a coal tar derivative, like most azo dyes.


I think we have now throughly highjacked poor MW's thread. She's probably wandered off to find some less nerdy conversation.

[docat]

Amaranth dye - trisodium (4E)-3-oxo-4-[(4-sulfonato-1-naphthyl)hydrazono]naphthalene-2,7-disulfonate -- was named after the grain. But I don't believe that they have anything to do with one another. The dye is a coal tar derivative, like most azo dyes.


I think we have now throughly highjacked poor MW's thread. She's probably wandered off to find some less nerdy conversation.

I choose to look at it in another way...I think we've probably provided a wealth of information to fuel her thirst for new knowledge.

I hope she took notes. There WILL be a quiz. LOL

[OLChemist]

...There WILL be a quiz. LOL

Oh lordy, I knew I'd pay for putting the full IUPAC name for amaranth dye. Can I plead physical chemist, not orgo, juggle a few Hermitian operators and take the make-up?


I could share a method for making a pin back for brooches I saw today.

I've made the old two pin deals with the tubing hinge and the double hook. Or the ones you make with wire and work harden and form into a spring after soldering. Like these:

Double pin back

Both of these are not particularly hard wearing. I've used prefab hinge, pin stem and safety catch combinations, which are about the best in terms a strength. But I about lose my religion trying to get those safety catches soldered in place. And woe betide you if you over heat them and they warp. And the pins in the sterling are still soft.

Today I saw a guy fabricate the hinge from a oblong of 24 ga sterling. He used a center punch to put in some dimples, folded it into a U. Made a simple slot hook in sterling. Then for the pin stem he used a corsage pin with the head cut off. He turned a small two loop spring in blunt end. He left a bit of a tail of wire hanging out to press against the brooch back. Then mounted the pin in the hinge by pinching it shut, so the two dimples from the center punch acted as both pivots and restraints. Pretty kewl.

Now, I know I've cleared the room, LOL.

[docat]

Now, I know I've cleared the room, LOL.

Sounds interesting. Metalwork seems pretty complicated to me. If it were up to me, I'd be globbing gorilla glue to the back or super glue with a safety pin.

Thanks! I learned something new. :)

And no, you didn't clear the room. No one has shown up with the metaphorical asafoetida yet.