The blessings of radium water made his head disintegrate

Robert Hiner Winn, an attorney for the Federal Trade Commission, approached the magnificent home at Southampton, Long Island on September 15, 1930 and knocked on the door.

The FTC was conducting interviews on the efficacy of a patent medicine and energy drink called Radithor, which was distilled water containing two radioactive substances, radium and mesothorium. The manufacturer, Bailey Radium Laboratories of East Orange, New Jersey, wildly claimed Radithor, in addition to being an excellent energy tonic, cured a variety of illnesses, including “backward development,” anorexia, hysteria, insomnia and dozens of others.

The beautiful home belonged to a 51-year-old Pittsburgh industrialist and sportsman named Eben MacBurney Byers. Byers had been an enthusiastic proponent of Radithor and reportedly consumed over 1,400 2-oz bottles of the tonic over a five-year period following an injury on a party train following a Yale-Harvard game in 1927. Winn was tasked with interviewing Byers at his home as he was reportedly too ill to appear at the hearing in person.

When Byers opened the door, Winn was horrified: half of his face was missing. Only two “chipmunk teeth” protruded from a bone fragment…