The Shocking History of Lysol: From Dangerous Birth Control to Household Cleaner

America has always been a wild place, but the fact that Lysol was once advertised as a feminine hygiene product just might take the cake in today’s installment of U.S. history that makes no sense!

From the 1920s to the 1960s, the leading disinfectant brand was marketed as a feminine hygiene product – an indirect word for contraception. Lysol was even referred to as a“gentle and trustworthy” feminine aid and became the first company to promote itself as a douching agent.

What’s more, Lysol was even considered to be a top-selling feminine product during the Great Depression. “I use Lysol always for douching,” read one ad for the product from the period. In reality, however, the products were being used as a form of birth control, which was illegal for married couples in the U.S. until 1965 and up through 1972 for singles.

Not only is it wild that women were using the product as a method of birth control, but what’s even crazier is that, at the time, Lysol products were much more potent than they are today. Before 1953, the brand’s formula contained cresol, “a phenol compound reported in some cases to cause inflammation, burning, and even death.”

“By 1911, doctors had recorded 193 Lysol poisonings and five deaths from uterine irrigation,” read one report from Mother Jones. “Despite reports to the contrary, Lysol was aggressively marketed to women as safe and gentle. Once the formula replaced cresol with ortho-hydroxyphenyl, Lysol was pushed as a germicide good for cleaning toilet bowls and treating ringworm.”

Yet still, the company responsible for the creation and distribution of the product, Lehn & Fink’s, “continued to market it as a safeguard for women’s ‘dainty feminine allure.’”

Lysol wasn’t the only brand with a questionable start. Similarly, Coca-Cola products were advertised as something completely different from the beverage the world has grown to love today. Moreover, its early ingredients included cocaine.

The National Institute on Drug Abuse reports that when the drink was first invented, it was initially advertised as a “patent medicine.”

At the time, cocaine was legal and a common ingredient used in medicines.