Doris’ Memoir

The Medicine Show

Doris is a professional saleswoman, now retired, who projects an image of complete competence. She worked for many years in the electronics industry, representing Zenith, Magnavox and other companies that have fallen by the wayside. She is twice widowed and lives in a neat and tidy manor home in suburban Chicago.

Her roots are in South Dakota and her early story doesn’t fit the image she projects today. Back in the 1930s, South Dakota was a wild, rural place. Even today its large cities are just small towns compared with more industrial parts of America.

Doris’ father and mother survived the depression by making and selling an elixir to heal all ills. Doris grew up in the wagon of a medicine show. Summers are short in South Dakota and the time for selling their product was limited. An old station wagon containing the family’s personal necessities and an inventory of the elixir was packed full every selling season.

They would go out on the road, stopping in small towns and putting on what is commonly known as a “medicine show.” Doris mother would sing and do a little tap dancing. Entertainment was hard to come by in those towns and the locals would come out to see whatever entertainer chose to grace their town with a bit of music and charm. Doris’ dad played a concertina as accompaniment. When she grew a little older, at the age of five, Doris would join in the dancing and charm the town population.

Then her dad would take over and give his sales pitch about the magic elixir guaranteed to cure just about any ailment that might strike the farmers or their families. Doris remembers seeing solemn native Americans, wrapped in Indian garb, silent and watching. Often men in cowboy attire would be part of their audience. This was, after all, just a few years after the period of the Wild West.

Doris doesn’t remember what the recipe was for the magic elixir, or even what the main ingredient was. Did it work? She really doesn’t know that either. But the medicine show and her father’s sales talent allowed her small family to survive the greatest economic period of hardship the country has ever known.