RetroSimba

Popeye the Sailor had his spinach. The Cardinals had Vitamin B1 tablets.

In 1941, Cardinals owner Sam Breadon became convinced Vitamin B1 would enhance the performance of his players.

According to the St. Louis Globe-Democrat, Breadon bought 5,000 Vitamin B1 capsules to distribute to his players during spring training and the regular season.

In a popular comic strip at the time. Popeye boasted, “I’m strong to the finish because I eats me spinach.”

Spinach contains many nutrients, including Vitamin B1, also known as thiamine, but rather than load up on the greens, Breadon opted for the pills.

Getting a boost

Vitamin B1 was produced in tablet form starting in 1936. According to specialists at Johns Hopkins Hospital in Baltimore, “the tablets have been used frequently in England to quiet war nerves,” The Sporting News explained. “Furthermore, the pills are said to be effective in aiding eyesight.”

The Cardinals wanted their players to take B1 “because this vitamin has shown great effectiveness in aiding the relief of nervousness, indigestion and the lack of energy,” the Globe-Democrat reported, “and therefore should help build up the players’ health, poise and staying qualities.”

Breadon, 65, was described as “a vitamin enthusiast” who “believes Vitamin B1 is just the thing for the athletes to help build up their appetites, health and the resistance they need for the physical effort they put forth,” according to the Globe-Democrat.

According to United Press, Breadon called B1 the “morale vitamin.”

Pep talk

When Cardinals players arrived for 1941 spring training at St. Petersburg, Fla., each player was given a bottle of the Vitamin B1 pills, the Chicago Daily News reported. The recommended dosage was three a day for 10 days, two a day for the next 10, and one a day thereafter.

The Sporting News hailed it as “a revolutionary step in training camp methods,” but also cautioned that “until the time when it is definitely established that capsules will provide all the energy needed after a hard workout, Cardinals players probably will pin their faith on Kansas City steak with French fries and a double order of pie.”

Cardinals vice-president Bill Walsingham Jr., a nephew of Breadon, said every player on the club would receive the Vitamin B1 capsules and would be encouraged to digest the medicine.

“We can’t force the players to swallow the capsules,” Walsingham said to the Globe-Democrat, “but, naturally, the club would like to have the players in line regularly for the B1 issue.”

According to United Press, “Bottles of the things were lying around the clubhouse in such profusion that baseball writers wondered whether they were in a spring training camp, or had blundered into the biennial convention of the American Pharmaceutical Association.”

In an editorial, the St. Louis Star-Times declared, “Breadon’s experiment of feeding his young stalwarts vast quantities of Vitamin B1 tablets, to give them vitality and pep, was the most courageous exhibition of crawling out on a limb since Babe Ruth bragged in the World Series of 1932 that he would hit a home run in the center field bleachers.”

Vitamin B1 didn’t hurt the Cardinals, but how much it helped is inconclusive. The Cardinals got off to a strong start, winning 31 of their first 42 games, and finished the season in second place at 97-56. The Dodgers won the pennant with a record of 100-54.

Years later, Webmd.com noted that naturally ingested “Vitamin B1 plays an important role in the body. It is needed to maintain the health of the nerves and the heart,” but added, “Most people who eat a normal diet do not need extra Vitamin B1.”