William J. A. Bailey

Who was William J. A. Bailey?

William John Aloysius Bailey was a Harvard University dropout who falsely claimed to be a doctor of medicine, and who promoted the use of radioactive radium as a cure for coughs, flu, and other common ailments. Although Bailey's Radium Laboratories in East Orange, New Jersey was continually investigated by the Federal Trade Commission, he died wealthy from his many devices and products, including an aphrodisiac called Arium, marketed as a restorative that "renewed happiness and youthful thrill into the lives of married peoples whose attractions to each other had weakened."