Object Details
- G. D. Searle and Company
- Description (Brief)
- The popularity of “the Pill” created a new market for pharmaceutical companies. For the first time, healthy women would be taking medication for an extended period of time. Pill manufacturers developed unique packaging in order to distinguish their product from those of their competitors and build brand loyalty. Packaging design often incorporated a “memory aid” to assist women in tracking their daily pill regimen, as well as styled cases to allow pills to be discreetly carried in bags and purses. The National Museum of American History’s Division of Medicine and Science’s collection of oral contraceptives illustrates some of the changes that the packaging and marketing of the Pill underwent from its inception in 1960 to the present.
- Searle & Company produced this Ovulen brand oral contraceptive in San Juan, Puerto Rico, around 1978. The pills are contained in Searle’s trademarked Compack tablet dispenser. Inside the Compack is a 21-pill blister pack that organizes the monthly pill regimen into weekly rows, labeled by day of the week. A pink booklet with butterflies on the cover entitled “Birth Control . . . with ‘the Pill’” is included is included along with a paper insert with user information.
- Location
- Currently not on view
- Credit Line
- Gift of Gladys Abell and Lester D. Johnson, Jr., M.D.
- ca 1978
- ID Number
- 1981.0760.047.B
- accession number
- 1981.0760
- catalog number
- 1981.0760.047.B
- Object Name
- contraceptive, oral
- Other Terms
- Contraceptives; Patent Medicines; Drugs; Non-Liquid
- Physical Description
- ethynodiol diacetate, 1 mg (drug active ingredients)
- mestranol, 0.1 mg (drug active ingredients)
- Measurements
- overall: 11.5 cm x 9.3 cm x 1.6 cm; 4 1/2 in x 3 11/16 in x 5/8 in
- overall, as stored: 5/8 in x 3 3/4 in x 4 5/8 in; 1.5875 cm x 9.525 cm x 11.7475 cm
- place made
- Puerto Rico: San Juan, San Juan
- See more items in
- Medicine and Science: Medicine
- Health & Medicine
- Birth Control
- National Museum of American History
- Subject
- Birth Control/Contraception
- Women's Health
- Record ID
- nmah_730768
- GUID (Link to Original Record)
- https://n2t.net/ark:/65665/ng49ca746a5-996d-704b-e053-15f76fa0b4fa
