Talk:Jamaica ginger

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Opening comment[edit]

Anyone know if this is the origin of Rolf Harris's "Jake the Peg / With my extra Leg" ? --/Mat 04:39, 8 Apr 2004 (UTC)

  • After looking at the lyrics, I would think not, unless it inspired him to choose the name, and that seems unlikely. The incident was not well known, even in the US, where it happened. Then again, since it's Rolf Harris, anything might be possible. Brian Rock 11:46, Apr 8, 2004 (UTC)
  • Heh, you have a point. Seemed a bit of a coincidence to me (Jake isn't the commonest single-syllable name) but then again coincidences happen. --/Mat 11:08, 13 Apr 2004 (UTC)

The article seems fairly weak[edit]

It glosses over the fact that authorities ignored the problem for a considerable period of time, and even after the problem was brought to the attention of the manufacturers they continued to sell the product. And the manufacturers never were punished in any way for the damage they caused. To some degree the "jake leg" incident led to the creation of the present day FDA. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 24.159.203.105 (talkcontribs) 19:59, 20 August 2006

Feel free to improve it. -R. S. Shaw 20:46, 3 September 2006 (UTC)[reply]

I agree -- the article greatly understates the time that the concoction was on the market, and the weak response to the incident in general. The New Yorker article http://www.newyorker.com/archive/2003/09/15/030915fa_fact_baum gives a detailed and well-researched history of the incident. drh (talk) 12:53, 19 July 2012 (UTC)[reply]

Merge[edit]

I will perform the requested merge now, since it has been two weeks with no comment. Jlittlet 20:15, 17 September 2006 (UTC)[reply]

External links[edit]

I dropped two links. One was to a page about alcoholic beverages in general with no specific link to Jake Leg. The other was spam for a band. Neither contributed important information. Please speak up if I missed a valuable bit! Ben 11:58, 9 April 2007 (UTC)[reply]

Five grams per cc?[edit]

I've added a cite-needed tag for the statement that the Treasury Department required five grams solids per cc of alcohol; I don't know that it's wrong, but it seems hard to believe that it would be physically possible, so a source or explanation of how it's possible would be welcome. Five grams of solids in the nature of dried ginger from the spice cabinet, mixed with one cc of alcohol, wouldn't make a liquid mixture but more of a paste. Are the stated units of measure incorrect? Is there a lot of other liquid (such as water) in the mixture besides the alcohol? (That'd be a reasonable way to make an extract, but it would contradict the 70-80% alcohol figure elsewhere in the article.) Are they counting something I wouldn't normally think of as solids in the "solids" category (which seems possible given the mention of molasses) so that it's really more like "5 grams of non-volatile substances"? 69.63.55.224 (talk) 22:45, 19 October 2008 (UTC)[reply]


Requested move[edit]

The following discussion is an archived discussion of a requested move. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made in a new section on the talk page. No further edits should be made to this section.

The result of the move request was: page moved. Vegaswikian (talk) 07:57, 28 April 2010 (UTC)[reply]


Jamaican gingerJamaica ginger — Relisting. Vegaswikian (talk) 22:05, 20 April 2010 (UTC)[reply]

Move over existing redirect. This patent medicine's name is Jamaica ginger, not Jamaican ginger. See, for instance, the medicine bottle labels in the photo in article. R. S. Shaw (talk) 03:38, 12 April 2010 (UTC)[reply]

The above discussion is preserved as an archive of a requested move. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made in a new section on this talk page. No further edits should be made to this section.

Jake's Leg[edit]

Jake's Leg has been removed since it has nothing to do with the topic and appears to be using Wiki for traffic. I suggest making a Wiki page for Jake's Leg instead.--Jsderwin (talk) 05:08, 28 August 2011 (UTC)[reply]

FDA, et al[edit]

It should be noted that the FDA, as such, didn't exist at this point in time, and there was no government agency with the authority to order the TOCP-contaminated stuff off the market. Thus it continued to be produced for some time after the cause of the paralysis was identified.

There was an extensive article on this topic maybe 4 years back in the "New Yorker" that would be a good source for additional material.drh (talk) 21:36, 4 December 2011 (UTC)[reply]

Needs References[edit]

The first four paragraphs of History cite no references. — Preceding unsigned comment added by 128.219.49.14 (talk) 15:15, 18 February 2015 (UTC)[reply]

Source dump[edit]

Will be back for these. ♠PMC(talk) 22:49, 23 August 2019 (UTC)[reply]

Article doesn't even say what the Jamaica ginger was supposed to be[edit]

I mean, you can read between the lines and *guess* that it's just a tincture of ginger root - but that isn't actually stated anywhere in the article. 95.147.177.78 (talk) 15:02, 3 June 2021 (UTC)[reply]