RS99b SB Hartman & Co. Medicine Stamp

Benjamin Mishler was born in Reamstown, Pennsylvania in 1814, and about 1857 he and his brother Isaac used their liquor distillery located in East Cocalico Township to commence the manufacture of Mishler’ s Herb Bitters. The manufacture of the Bitters was conducted in Lancaster, Pennsylvania. So successful was the nostrum, that Benjamin parted com­pany with his brother to devote his full attention to the proprietary business. In 1867, Mishler joined in partnership with Samuel Brubaker Hartman, M.D., and in 1879 the firm known as Mishler’s Herb Bitters co. was formed moving to Columbus, Ohio, where Hartman introduced his famous Peruna. In the meantime Mishler left the firm and introduced another nostrum called Keystone Bitters, which was continued by his son, Henry L. Mishler until his death in 1882. Hartman lived until 1918 peddling Peruna and working from his Celebrated Sanitarium in Columbus, Ohio.

(Holcombe, Henry w., Collectors Club Philatelist, 19: 159-166, July, 1940; also weekly Philatelic Gossip, 64: 18-19, March 2, 1957