In 1947, Leslie Gay, an allergist working out of the Johns Hopkins’ allergy clinic, met with a woman who had broken out in hives.
Gay and his colleague, Paul Carliner, happened to be testing an experimental antihistamine drug at the time, and this patient with hives provided an opportunity for testing their new treatment. As a result, the woman received repeated doses of “Compound 1694”.
Her hives cleared up, but something else also happened.
The woman had suffered from motion sickness all her life. She arrived at her appointments feeling nauseous because she had to take the Monument Street trolley to reach the allergy clinic. However, she felt nausea-free when she rode the trolley home after her treatment.
Gay and Carliner recognized that they might be on to something. So, with the cooperation of bigwigs in the United States Army, they launched ‘Operation Seasickness’.
Operation Seasickness’ was an involuntary experiment using U.S. soldiers sailing to postwar Germany. Soldiers were either given the experimental drug (now called Dramamine) or a placebo. Soldiers who took the pill did not get seasick during the trip. Furthermore, soldiers who received a placebo, and suffered seasickness on the way to Germany, were cured when they took the experimental drug.
Shortly after that, Dramamine became available for public use. It is still used for motion sickness today.
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