As if I don’t have enough to do with a full-time job, my vinegar business, a new furry family member and brother for Petunia, and a full complement of summer guests, I am now the new secretary for the Petty Harbour Museum Committee.

But I’m happy to do it.  This community has so many layers to uncover, it’s going to keep my ADHD brain supplied with dopamine until they take me out of my house feet first (when I die in my sleep at 110 after cooking a big dinner for friends).

The museum is open during the summer months and we’ve just launched a Facebook page (search for Petty Harbour Community Museum) to promote the museum in general and share some of the amazing displays and artefacts.

Speaking of history, remember the old nursery rhyme, Jack and Jill went up the hill?  After Jack fell down and broke his crown, he mended his head with vinegar and brown paper. That was a genuine old folk remedy for cuts and scrapes – before antibiotics became widespread, vinegar was regularly used as an agent to combat infection, in particular those in burn wounds.  Even Hippocrates, the father of modern medicine, used vinegar to treat his patients.

Those ancient Greeks also used vinegar (mixed with water and honey) as a beverage but more about that in a later post!

And a little closer to home, vinegar was available regularly in pharmacies both as an anti-bacterial and mixed with other materials to make cough syrups.  The Pharmacy Museum here in St. John’s has a small collection of vinegars that were manufactured or packaged in St. John’s meant to be diluted to use as table vinegar.

Interesting that historical pharmacies, like today’s Shopper’s Drug Mart, sold non-medicinal materials alongside medicines.  Bet they didn’t have self-check outs though … don’t get me started …