A Harvard University dropout, Bailey falsely claimed to be a doctor of medicine and promoted the use of radioactive radium as a cure for coughs, flu, and other common ailments.
[1] Although Bailey's Radium Laboratories in East Orange, New Jersey, was continually investigated by the Federal Trade Commission, he died wealthy from his many devices and products, including an aphrodisiac called Arium, marketed as a restorative that "renewed happiness and youthful thrill into the lives of married peoples whose attractions to each other had weakened.
[3] In 1918, Bailey claimed that radium added to drinking water could be used to treat dozens of conditions, from mental illness and headaches to diabetes, anemia, constipation, and asthma.
Bailey created Radithor by dissolving radium salts in water to deliver 1 microcurie of radiation from each of 226Ra and 228Ra, claiming its curative properties were due to stimulation of the endocrine system.
[8] During World War II, Bailey was the wartime manager of the electronic division of International Business Machines.