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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"The secret's in the circle!"
Henry Plehn launched the Peter Pan line of brassieres in the 1930s, patenting a method of creating softer bra cups with stitched support.
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Wait! Is this a multiple choice question?
WW1 VD posters were not particularly effective.
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A clever way to sell a concoction that was basically disappearing ink. 🔻🔻🔻🔻🔻🔻🔻🔻🔻🔻🔻🔻🔻🔻
Morphine addiction in the US began during the Civil War (1861-1865) when it was widely used as a painkiller. In 1905, when this ad was posted, heroin was being used to get people off of morphine.
🔻🔻🔻🔻🔻🔻🔻🔻🔻🔻🔻🔻🔻🔻Originally produced by Pillsbury-Washburn Flour Mills Co. Ltd. of Minneapolis, Minnesota in 1897, Vitos Wheat Food became Pillsbury's most popular wheat cereal by 1908. 🔻🔻🔻🔻🔻🔻🔻🔻🔻🔻🔻🔻🔻🔻
Psychiana was a spiritual denomination created in 1928 by Frank Bruce Robinson (1886–1948), with headquarters in Moscow, Idaho. It began and largely remained a mail-order enterprise, recruiting people through advertising in popular magazines and through direct mail solicitations.
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With its "Twin-Stick Floor Shift" and some racing gloves, you can make believe your 1963 Rambler is a sports car. 🔻🔻🔻🔻🔻🔻🔻🔻🔻🔻🔻🔻🔻🔻
"Reducing Soap" doesn't work and as long as you keep pointing to your double chin people are gonna notice.
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The Sir Vival was a concept car created by Walter C. Jerome of Worcester, Massachusetts in 1958. While never produced commercially, the Sir Vival featured many innovative car safety concepts that would later become standard such as seat belts, a roll cage, sliding side doors, rubber bumpers, and side lights. 🔻🔻🔻🔻🔻🔻🔻🔻🔻🔻🔻🔻🔻🔻
In the 1960s, kids collected pop bottles and returned them for the deposit, but most adults thought recycling was more trouble than it was worth.
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Medicinal preparations of cannabis became available in American pharmacies in the 1850s and as early as 1853, recreational cannabis was considered a "fashionable narcotic." By the early 1900s the US government and many states were passing laws to heavily regulate its medical use, but it wasn't until 1970 that cannabis was assigned a Schedule 1 classification; meaning it had a high potential for abuse and no accepted medical use. Today, cannabis remains a Schedule 1 drug as far as the Federal government is concerned, even though it has been legalized for recreational use in many states and medical use in many more. 🔻🔻🔻🔻🔻🔻🔻🔻🔻🔻🔻🔻🔻🔻
The first VHS player was released to the U.S. masses in the mid-1970s. Long before Netflix was even a blip on home entertainment’s radar, before Blue-ray brought us into the realm of HD, even prior to the reign of DVDs, the VHS player was home theater king.
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Really? Aren't you overstating it just a little bit?
Fear has always been an effective sales strategy, but this one is way over the line. 🔻🔻🔻🔻🔻🔻🔻🔻🔻🔻🔻🔻🔻🔻
"This lovelier way to avoid offending" -- be naked.
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Decaffeinated coffee was developed in 1903 by a team of researchers led by Ludwig Roselius in Bremen, Germany. In France, the brand name became Sanka, derived from the French words sans caféine ("without caffeine"). 🔻🔻🔻🔻🔻🔻🔻🔻🔻🔻🔻🔻🔻🔻
These fear tactics seem totally made up, but folliculitis is an inflammation of the hair follicles that is usually caused by staph bacteria and it can cause hair loss.
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Hey, if your husband loses interest it's your fault for looking old! 🔻🔻🔻🔻🔻🔻🔻🔻🔻🔻🔻🔻🔻🔻
The X-15 tricycle from Mattel in the early 60s was named after a famous test aircraft. There was a "vroom" sound effect when the front wheel turned, and the trike was steered by a joystick that changed the angle of the rear wheels.
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"As your Dentist" I recommend smoking because gum disease is quite profitable...for me! 🔻🔻🔻🔻🔻🔻🔻🔻🔻🔻🔻🔻🔻🔻
During the 1940s, many vegetable crate labels progressed from being totally racist to only slightly racist.
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The name REO originated from the initials of a man named Ransom Eli Olds, who founded the Olds Motor Works (1897) and REO Motors (1905). REO started a lawn mower Division in 1946 with a 21-inch engine-powered reel-type mower. By 1950 REO had become the largest manufacturer of power mowers in the world with sales of almost 10 million dollars. 🔻🔻🔻🔻🔻🔻🔻🔻🔻🔻🔻🔻🔻🔻
Exquisite Form was founded in 1945 in New York City by designer Lillian Hunau, who also had a special wiring and bust shaping patent. Also in 1945, Exquisite Form became one of the first major brassiere companies to advertise in Ebony Magazine.
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In the 1960s, lunch counters at Woolworth's department stores across the US were an American institution. Sadly, the good times didn't last for them. The last Woolworth's Department Store in the US closed in 1977. 🔻🔻🔻🔻🔻🔻🔻🔻🔻🔻🔻🔻🔻🔻This 1958 holiday advertisement for Christmas toys at Hollander's Home and Auto Supplies is an early example of a Black Friday ad.
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The TV show "Julia" in 1968 was the first series with an African-American lead character since the stereotyped "Beulah" and "Amos and Andy" from the early 1950s. The series failed to gain an audience and that may explain why during the 1970's, stereotypical "coons and mammies" were again featured in shows such as Sanford and Son, The Jeffersons, Good Times, What's Happening and Diff'rent Strokes. 🔻🔻🔻🔻🔻🔻🔻🔻🔻🔻🔻🔻🔻🔻
Frederick's of Hollywood was started in 1947 by Frederick Mellinger, inventor of the push-up bra.
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Make-believe police detectives were virtually untouchable back in 1947 when armed with this Dick Tracy Rapid Fire Tommy Gun. Measuring 21" in length, this rare, pressed-steel toy gun featured a white canvas strap and a full-color Tracy decal logo on its.stock.
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This advert is a clear example of benevolent sexism, showing a woman as helpless, submissive, and incompetent (unlike the superior man who is an excellent driver) and feeding the stereotype that women are bad drivers.
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Harley-Davidson provided motorcycles to the Army during World War I and for earlier excursions against Mexican revolutionaries such as Pancho Villa.
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AT&T’s Picturephone, introduced as a futuristic demonstration at the 1964 New York World’s Fair, and then commercially in Pittsburgh and Chicago in 1970, was withdrawn as a commercial failure a few years later.
A clever way to sell a concoction that was basically disappearing ink. 
Originally produced by Pillsbury-Washburn Flour Mills Co. Ltd. of Minneapolis, Minnesota in 1897, Vitos Wheat Food became Pillsbury's most popular wheat cereal by 1908. 
With its "Twin-Stick Floor Shift" and some racing gloves, you can make believe your 1963 Rambler is a sports car. 
The first VHS player was released to the U.S. masses in the mid-1970s. Long before Netflix was even a blip on home entertainment’s radar, before Blue-ray brought us into the realm of HD, even prior to the reign of DVDs, the VHS player was home theater king. 
Decaffeinated coffee was developed in 1903 by a team of researchers led by Ludwig Roselius in Bremen, Germany. In France, the brand name became Sanka, derived from the French words sans caféine ("without caffeine"). 
This 1958 holiday advertisement for Christmas toys at Hollander's Home and Auto Supplies is an early example of a Black Friday ad. 
AT&T’s Picturephone, introduced as a futuristic demonstration at the 1964 New York World’s Fair, and then commercially in Pittsburgh and Chicago in 1970, was withdrawn as a commercial failure a few years later.
