Apprentice Rattlesnake Wrangler Wanted

Charles A. Henneberger was the proprietor of the Eagle Hotel on Main and High streets in Newville. A collector of taxidermy, among his specimens of birds and beasts were a wild-cat and a snow-white squirrel from the North Mountain. He also collected reptiles. In September 1882, Henneberger purchased a mammoth rattlesnake from an old hunter who lived at Doubling Gap. The snake was four feet six inches long with fourteen rattles. There was a great demand for rattlesnake fat, and the old hunter told Henneberger he was seeking an apprentice who he would teach how to catch the snakes and how to extract their fangs in order to remove the fat. When the fat was scraped off the sides of the snake’s ribs and rendered, it became snake oil. The hunter said that any young man wishing to learn this skill could get the particulars at the Eagle Hotel.¹

Snake oil was introduced to America in the mid-1800s by Chinese laborers who came by the tens of thousands to build the Transcontinental Railroad. “Snake oil,” obtained from the Chinese water snake, contained omega 3 fatty acids, and was an ancient remedy used to treat arthritis and joint pain. Americans were impressed with the results the Chinese workers got from rubbing snake oil on their joints. Not understanding that just any snake’s fat would do, Americans began harvesting rattlesnakes to make the oil.  

All kinds of concoctions were promoted as cure-alls. Medicine men and peddlers traveled the country hawking their elixirs, ointments, and snake oil in village streets and town squares. There were no regulations on patent medicines. The Pure Food and Drug Act of 1906 was created to regulate the sale of patent medicines. The very popular Stanley’s Snake Oil Liniment was seized by the government in 1917. When tested, it was found to contain mineral oil, red pepper, turpentine, and not a drop of snake oil.