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In America, early settlers used fats left over from their butchering or from cooking to make soap and candles. Later their observations of the Native American use of buffalo and bear fats were not lost on the Europeans both here and abroad.According to some sources, bear’s oil was being advertised for use on the hair.Later bear’s grease and bear’s oil were one of the more popular pomades for the hair. Some used it to give a sleek look to the hair while others were sold on its regenerative powers for restoring the hair to its natural color or even simply restoring the hair.
Companies who were already involved in making fat or oil based products, such as soap and perfume makers, dominated the trade in bear’s oil. These entrepreneurs were frequently chemists who used their knowledge to produce, drugs, medicines, chemicals and perfumery articles, fancy soaps, shaving soaps or dental products. Their equipment for making these goods, along with their knowledge of perfume science, would have allowed them to process the bear’s grease into marketable products. Bear’s grease was advertised as "highly perfumed", not surprising when you consider the primitive conditions under which the raw materials must have been collected. It was not uncommon to use rancid fats.
Among the biggest American suppliers of bear products were the companies on Chestnut Street in Philadelphia, the largest being Jules Hauel and Eugene Roussel de Prunay. In 1842 Roussell purchased a shop at 114 Chestnut. An early advertising poster for Roussel’s business, owned by The Free Library of Philadelphia, shows the front of his store with a stuffed bear in the window. In 1843, he advertised "Roussel’s Bear’s Oil" warranted pure and from a " fine fat bear" caught by a "Mr. Choshley near Gray’s ferry" with this and another bear he was fattening, he provided the public with a large supply of pure and genuine bear’s oil in bottles. He states the bear’s oil of his competitor’s was brought to the city in barrels from the West and adulterated with lard and other fatty substances. He also states "bears wanted, highest prices paid". Even by this early date, it seems, bears were getting hard to come by.
Bile is a liquid which was produced by the liver and it is stored in the gallbladder. It is an acidic mixture of acids, cholesterol, water and electrolytes that aids in the digestion of food. Bile of bears has been used in traditional Chinese medicine for a variety of reasons for over the years. The gallbladder of a bear, usually an Asiatic black bear known as moon bear was the source of the bile. Inorder to collect the bile the bear have to be killed.
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