Samuel Hopkins Adams’s The Great American Fraud (1905) is a celebrated muckraking exposé of the patent-medicine industry. Originally published in Collier’s Weekly, the articles revealed that popular “cures” were often laced with alcohol, opium, or dangerous drugs, while their makers made fraudulent claims to a trusting public.
Adams’s reporting named brands and quoted chemical analyses, galvanizing public outrage and helping to secure passage of the Pure Food and Drug Act of 1906. A model of investigative journalism in the service of reform, it remains a vivid case study in how the press can protect consumers. Download the free EPUB of this influential exposé.