Valentine’s Meat Juice

Two Black workers, one of whom is wearing a ripped shirt, pose with dozens of boxes of Valentine’s Meat Juice stacked on wheeled carts. The man on the left is identified in the photograph's caption as Daniel Williams. In 1870 Richmond resident Mann S. Valentine Jr., brother to sculptor Edward Virginius Valentine, concocted a mixture of egg whites and meat juice that he profitably marketed and sold as a health drink. He advertised that Valentine’s Meat Juice was effective in “quieting the irritable stomach, aiding digestion, restoring the appetite, and strengthening the patient, when other forms of food fail.” Valentine used his fortune to amass a large collection of art and artifacts.