Object Details
- 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.
- Parke-Davis and Company of Detroit, Michigan, produced this Norlestrin Fe 2.5/50 brand oral contraceptive around 1993. The 28 pill plastic pack fit inside a black plastic wallet. The monthly dosage consisted of 21 pink hormone pills and 7 brown iron supplements arranged in four weekly rows of 7, with each column labeled a day of the week.
- Location
- Currently not on view
- Data Source
- National Museum of American History
- maker
- Parke-Davis Pharmaceutical Research Division of Warner-Lambert Company
- date made
- ca 1993
- Credit Line
- Dr. Linda S. Potter
- Physical Description
- ethinyl estradiol, 0.05 mg (drug active ingredients)
- norethindrone acetate, 2.5 mg (drug active ingredients)
- plastic (packaging material)
- paper (packaging material)
- Measurements
- overall: 6.1 cm x 9.7 cm x .4 cm; 2 13/32 in x 3 13/16 in x 5/32 in
- overall: 2 1/2 in x 3 3/4 in x 1/8 in; 6.35 cm x 9.525 cm x .3175 cm
- Object Name
- contraceptive, oral
