Funny Vintage Ads (46)

 

 Advertising has always been an interesting way to look at history. But when you see these vintage advertisements, the past seems a lot stranger than you thought.

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Cockroach racetracks were just one of the many products sold by the International Mutoscope Reel Company, but the sales weren't enough to save the company from bankruptcy in 1949.

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"...behind her twinkling eyes lies tragedy -- and each line and wrinkle that etches her face marks the hardship and responsibility she had to face after her husband passed away." Subtle!

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"In seven brilliant Coney Island colors. Let the ‘wet look’ softcore chair make your rooms come alive. Pump the chair full of beer and throw a party."

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The first life-sized tricorder replica was produced by Mego Corporation in 1976 and was actually a cassette tape player.

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 The Indiana Silo & Tractor Company started out as the Star Tractor Company of Findlay, Ohio. The Star tractor introduced in 1917, could do the work of 5 horses.

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"Dedicated foe of evil. Defender of the weak. Champion of truth and justice" ... with a very odd-shaped head.

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As an added bonus the helmet acts as a sauna for your face.

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"And it can also function just like a calculator — something a desktop computer can’t do." The TRS-80 Pocket Computer was first introduced in 1980.

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This advertisement promoting the sale of enslaved Africans was published in the 1780s in the South Carolina Gazette and paid for by a prominent firm that imported enslaved Africans to Charleston. The ad stresses that they are free of smallpox, a common disease on the Atlantic crossing.

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Kellogg's All Bran: it’s number one for number two.

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The Worcester Skirt Company was founded in 1861 in Worcester, Massachusetts, by David Hale Fanning. It specialized in making hoopskirts to support the full skirts that were in vogue. In 1872, the company began making corsets and was renamed the Worcester Corset Company.

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The perfect gift for your little commando.

Pull back on the calibrated loader, and send the plastic grenade sailing 30 feet through the air.

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In 1869, Daniel F. Packer, an adventurer and entrepreneur, invented and sold “Packer’s All Healing Tar Soap”. Pine tar soap has antibacterial and antifungal properties and  is designed to be gentle to the skin.This famous soap now called “Packer’s Pine Tar Soap”, has been marketed continuously for over 150 years.

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IBM started by combining several companies that built devices to automate routine business transactions, including the first punched card based data tabulating machines and time clocks. Today IBM holds more patents than any other U.S. based technology company.

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The ad copy would work well for a boner pill, but Kurtis Party Tabs was probably just caffeine.
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They are not laughing with you, they are laughing at your bike.

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A common theme for recruiting posters during World War One was mothers volunteering their sons for military service.

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Turns out Chesterfield's "Science" was just as fake as Arthur Godfrey's folksy charm.

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 The FDA allowed polystyrene to be added in small amounts to baked goods, frozen dairy products, candy, gelatins, puddings and other food until 2018.

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In 1937, Ice Industries developed a refrigerator that not only cooled but regulated its humidity and filtered the air.

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Eliminate costly hair repair bills NOW!
In the 1970s, British men could (apparently) rent hair.

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"That Battle-ax expression is more often caused by nervous tension than by temper!" Or maybe an ill-fitting sanitary pad!

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“Cascarets,” is derived from the bitter tasting bark of a species of buckthorn tree. Cascara had been prescribed by druggists as a remedy for constipation and related ills as early as 1877. But it was not until 1894 that the Sterling Remedy Company came up with a candy version.

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Tangee Cosmetics began in the 1920s by George William Luft. The name Tangee came from the word tangerine because of the color of the brand’s most iconic product, the Tangee natural lipstick.

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Early speedometers measured up to 60 mph, and included an odometer and a trip meter.

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Bromides are a class of tranquilizers that were withdrawn from the U.S. market in 1975 due to their toxicity. Their sedative effect probably accounted for Bromo-Seltzer's popularity as a hangover remedy.

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Ads for the air freshener Mentholine claimed it could cure everything from headache to sciatica.

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Spangles were introduced to the British public in 1950, when sweets and sugar were still rationed because of World War 2, and you needed points in your ration book to buy them.

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In the 1930s, advertisements for purchasing baby gators by mail were common in magazines. This ad offered a free gator in return for two subscriptions to a magazine called, "Open Road for Boys."

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Asbestos siding was used extensively in buildings and homes from the 1930s until the 1970s, when its use was banned.

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Funny Vintage Ads (45)

 

 Advertising has always been an interesting way to look at history. But when you see these vintage advertisements, the past seems a lot stranger than you thought.

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Girl on left: "What day is it?"
Girl on right: "Beats me. I'm on my period."

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PT Barnum bought Jumbo from the London Zoo in 1882 and earned back the money he spent in three weeks of exhibiting Jumbo in Madison Square Garden. Jumbo was hit and killed by a train in 1885, so Barnum had him stuffed and continued to exhibit him.

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 Looing a little wimpy riding a Vespa? Manspread!

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Atomic radiation can cause genetic mutations and your baby has three heads.

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"Protection for everybody against robbers, criminals, morons..."

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"Black-Daylite" was a promotional term used to describe the development of a darker color screen phosphor.

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It was once a rite of passage for farm boys to receive a rifle on their 13th or 14th birthday or for Christmas.

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Yes, you too can afford a vacation, but only if you travel by bus.

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Eye-catching or eye...sore.

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The Ludwig Drum Company was established in Chicago in 1909 by William F. & Theobald Ludwig. By 1923, Ludwig was the largest drum manufacturer in the world. Sales doubled in 1964 when The Beatles appeared on the Ed Sullivan Show with Ringo playing Ludwig Drums.

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"Electronics! Excitement! Giant Cannon launches flying jet plane! Target appears on TV screen! Radar antenna rotates, picks up beep signals, gives warning! "Aircraft spotter" talks to "Radar operator" over intercom! Also has telegraph key for code."

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In 1875, Lydia Pinkham developed an immensely popular, if questionably effective, herbal remedy for “female complaints.” It is still being sold today.

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The Reliant Regal was a small three-wheeled car manufactured from 1953 to 1973 by the Reliant Motor Company in Tamworth, England. Because they were three-wheelers, you only needed a motorcycle license to drive one, and the taxes were much cheaper.

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Candy was one of the very first processed foods and many people treated it with suspicion, fearing it could be tainted in some way.

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Wearing rubber to sweat off your blubber was just one of many ways that people tried lose weight in the early 20th century.

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Sensenbrenner's Cigar store was located in San Diego between Schwarzenberg the Architect and Stenheiser the Printer. By 1890, an estimated 2.8 million German-born immigrants lived in the United States.

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When the Japanese conquered the Philippines in the early months of 1942, the United States lost a major source of sugar imports. Cooks learned to be creative, using saccharine, corn syrup, and even packets of flavored gelatin as sugar substitutes.

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Your grown children don't want to kiss you because it means certain death by halitosis.

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A common advertising theme in the early 20th Century was the claim that the product was so easy to use that even a woman could do it.

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Topsy was a character in Harriet Beecher Stowe's novel Uncle Tom's Cabin (1852) and later became a pickaninny stereotype in minstrel shows and advertising.

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In the 1960s they combined the worst aspects of a panty and a girdle to come up with the Pantie Girdle.

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 The Scott Electric Hair Brush contained no electricity, but did have slightly magnetized iron rods in its handle. A 1" diameter compass was included with each brush so the customer could be amazed that a supposedly non metallic brush would cause the needle to move.

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The Buescher Band Instrument Company was a manufacturer of musical instruments in Elkhart, Indiana, from 1894 to 1963. Louis Armstrong recorded with a Buescher Truetone Trumpet in the late 1920s.

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In the 1960s, Honda grew its market share dramatically by changing the image of motorcycle riders from gang members to average Americans.

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Charles Elmer Hires debuted a commercial version of root beer at the Philadelphia Centennial Exposition in 1876. Hires was a teetotaler who wanted to call the beverage "root tea" but he realized that Pennsylvania miners wouldn't be interested in a "soft" drink, so he called it Root Beer.

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The cardboard hat says "Nurse, Atmosphere Station." Even in the 1950s that made no sense.

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HERO Jr. was sold by Heathkit during the 1980s, cost about $600 and came as a kit; you had to mount and solder every component onto the circuit boards and install the motors, speakers, and sensors. His features included a security guard mode, alarm clock, reciting poetry, singing, and the ability to explore around the house.

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Marmola was made with desiccated thyroid and a lot of laxatives. In 1931, the Federal Trade Commission tried to stop them from making false claims and the case went all the way to the Supreme Court, which ultimately ruled in the FTC's favor.

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Chi-Chesters Pills contained pennyroyal, an old herbal remedy for seasickness, headaches, coughs and colds -- not to mention pregnancy, which no one was allowed to mention at the time. Pennyroyal can induce an abortion but it can also kill the mother or cause her irreversible kidney and liver damage.

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"Not just now sonny. But you just wait!"
There will be another war soon enough.

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