Gross American History

Disgusting History of What Americans Used to Eat, Drink, and Smear on Their Bodies

History class just got way more disgusting — and way more fun.
Gross American History reveals the shocking, hilarious, and totally real things people once ate, drank, wore, and trusted to keep themselves healthy. Long before modern safety laws, everyday life was a dangerous experiment. From radium face cream to arsenic medicine, miracle tonics, toxic makeup, fake cures, tainted milk, and products that literally glowed in the dark, Americans (and much of the world) tried it all — and paid the price.
Perfect for teens, homeschool families, and curious readers, this book explores:
✔ The era of fake doctors, traveling cure shows, and miracle elixirs
✔ Poisonous beauty products people loved anyway
✔ Scary household chemicals and “safe” cleaning tricks
✔ Radium health treatments (yes, people drank it!)
✔ Early food scandals that led to modern safety laws
✔ Why grocery stores, hospitals, schools, and homes finally became safer
Written with humor, real historical facts, and stories pulled from public-domain sources, Gross American History makes learning unforgettable, gross, and laugh-out-loud entertaining.
If you love weird history, shocking facts, and true stories too strange to make up… you’ll love this book.