Reported in 1937 in an Australian newspaper:

Although a magnet for tourists from all over the world, Budapest has for several years been known to its own people as The City of Suicides. The favorite method adopted by most Budapest melancholics [is] drowning, and patrol boats are stationed along the boundary near the bridges to rescue citizens who seek consolation in the dark waters of the Danube.

Now, however, a “Smile Club” has been inaugurated to counteract the suicide craze it was originally begun more as a joke by Professor Jeno and a hypnotist named Binczo, but somehow it caught on.

The organizers have now a regular school and guarantee to teach the Roosevelt smile, the Mona Liza smile, the Clark Gable smile, the Dick Powell smile, the Loretta Young Smile, and various other types

I half-wonder if the “solution” wound up causing more suicides than it saved. At the very least, those smiles should be part of a horror movie. It’s like clowns without the makeup.

Sunday Times Perth via io9.