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The North of Boston Businesswoman of the Year awards are presented in honor of Lydia Pinkham who was born in Lynn in 1819. Raised in the city, she went on to become a school teacher. She began a business in 1875 selling her homemade herbal remedy called Lydia E. Pinkham's Vegetable Compound. The business became a phenomenal success.
The awards in her name recognize the achievements of one woman in each of three categories: small business, large business and non-profit/civic. Twenty women will be selected as finalists from all nominations received. Submit your nomination based on the following criteria: Integrity, Character, Professional Accomplishments, and Community Service.
Lydia Estes was born in Lynn February 9,
1819. One of 12 children of Quaker parents, she attended the former Lynn
Academy and was an early advocate of women’s rights and the abolition of
slavery.
After teaching school in Lynn for several
years, she married Isaac Pinkham in 1843. The couple had four children —
three boys and a girl —- from 1844 to 1858. Legend has it that Lydia got
the original recipe for her formula from a Lynn machinist named George
Todd, who owed Isaac $25 and could not afford to repay him so he gave him
the formula.
Lydia E. Pinkham’s Vegetable Compound,
which contained 18 percent alcohol, was billed as “a positive cure for all
those painful complaints and weaknesses so common to our best female
population.”
In 1875, some women from Salem came to
Pinkham’s door and asked to buy the compound they had heard so much about.
Lydia reluctantly sold them six bottles for $5. Her sons urged her to go
into business.
Will, the youngest son, helped her mix
and cook the compound in the basement of the family home on Western
Avenue. It was his idea to advertise in newspapers starting in 1876, the
year the Lydia E. Pinkham Medicine Company was incorporated.
The business expanded to a building next
door in 1878. In 1879, Lydia posed for a portrait to be used as the
company symbol and business soon doubled. The company did $250,000 in
sales in 1881 and re-invested $150,000 into advertising. Tragedy struck
that year as both Dan and Will died of tuberculosis, leaving Charles, the
oldest child, to run the company with his mother.
Lydia suffered a stroke that left her
paralyzed in 1882 and died a year later at the age of 64. The company
continued to flourish after her death, and the original Pinkham Building
on the current site was built in 1886. In 1898, the compound was the most
heavily advertised product in the country. The company did more than $1
million in sales in 1899.
By 1925, there were plants in Mexico,
Cuba and Canada and the company grossed $3 million in sales. Lydia
Pinkham’s heirs sold the firm to Cooper Laboratories, a pharmaceutical
firm, in 1968. Cooper eventually sold it to Numark Laboratories, which
still manufactures the compound in Edison, N.J. |
