Meet Isaac E. Emerson. He earned a chemistry degree, then moved to Baltimore and opened up a pharmacy. Soon he had three pharmacies.

Emerson noticed that his customers were always complaining of headaches. The products he was selling weren’t doing the trick. He, being a chemist and all, decided to make a concoction that would cure what ailed them.

This is how we get Bromo Seltzer, which turned out to be a mild tranquilizer and was lethal in high doses. The FDA banned the product in the 1980s.  But the company had almost a 100-year run and amassed millions before that happened.

But that’s not what we’re here to talk about.