Interesting facts

The scientific name of the pale-purple coneflower comes from the Greek "echinos" = hedgehog, and appropriately describes the spiny appearance of the flowerhead. At the end of the 19th century, white settlers in North America discovered the importance of the pale-purple coneflower, which had long been used by the Indians as medicinal plant. The homeopath Dr. Meyer watched an Indian woman crush an echinacea plant between stones. She also showed him how he could treat wounds and injuries with the fresh plant pulp. Around 1870 he put the world's first echinacea preparation on the market in the mid-west of the USA under the name "Meyer's Blood Purifier". Initially he did not even know the name of the medicinal plant which was so successful in the treatment of numerous complaints. He later had it identified by Lloyd Brothers in Cincinnati, the largest suppliers of herbal drugs in North America at that time. At the end of the 19th and the beginning of the 20th century there was such a boom in the sale of echinacea that it became the most frequently sold herbal drug in the USA.