Miltown

Part of speech: noun

Definitions

1. A brand name for a medication used to treat anxiety and agitation that acts as a tranquilizer
2. A pharmaceutical product that belongs to the class of drugs known as anxiolytics and helps relieve stress and anxiety symptoms
3. A specific formulation prescribed to manage anxiety disorders, often associated with calmer moods and reduced emotional tension

Etymology: Miltown was the first tranquilizer to become a mass-market sensation, and its name comes from a place rather than from a chemist's coinage. The drug was developed in the late 1940s and marketed in the 1950s by the Wallace Laboratories company of Cranbury, New Jersey, and the name honors nearby Milltown, New Jersey, a small town in the same part of the state. The name was chosen as a brand, so its link to the town is a matter of commercial naming rather than any chemical or medical meaning. The drug's generic name, meprobamate, is a separate coinage, and the brand name is what most people remembered. Its success helped launch the wider class of anxiolytic medicines that followed.

Synonyms: tranquilizer, sedative, antianxiety drug, meprobamate