Lucky Strike Advertisement, “Reach for a Lucky Instead of a Sweet” Campaign

These vintage Lucky Strike cigarette ads tell both women and men that they can lose weight if they reach for a smoke instead of a sweet.

Launched in 1928, this highly successful campaign targeting women was eventually derailed by threats of litigation from the candy industry. The tobacco industry later promoted candy cigarettes. The firm which marketed Lydia Pinkham’s Vegetable Compound was a pioneer in marketing to women. They coined such unforgettable slogans as a baby in every bottle. The 1891 Pinkham slogan “Reach for a Vegetable Instead of a Sweet” has been cited as the inspiration for the Hill/Lasker 1928 slogan “Reach for a Lucky Instead of a Sweet.”

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Us Tareyton Smokers Would Rather Fight Than Switch!

“Us Tareyton smokers would rather fight than switch!” is the enduring slogan that appeared in magazine, newspaper, and television advertisements for Tareyton cigarettes from 1963 until 1981. It was the American Tobacco Company’s most visible advertising campaign in the 1960s and 1970s.

The slogan was created by James Jordan of the BBDO advertising agency. The first print advertisement appeared in Life magazine on October 11, 1963. The advertisements would appear solely in print between 1963 and 1966. In 1966, the first television advertisements with the slogan aired.

The target of the campaign was to create a sense of loyalty amongst Tareyton smokers. That led to the “rather fight than switch” campaign, in which the makeup the models wore made it seem as if they were sporting black eyes, presumably earned in battles with smokers of other cigarettes. The slogan received grammar criticism from some quarters, which claimed correct usage should be “we” as the subject pronoun rather than “us”, normally an object pronoun.

Each commercial would begin in a predictable manner; the protagonist would do something that would be considered defiant. In each commercial, the protagonist would say “Us Tareyton smokers would rather fight than switch!”, usually only showing their side profile to the camera. After uttering the slogan, viewers would see the smoker's face, which had a noticeable “black eye” (in reality makeup), proving their willingness to fight for what they believed in, whether it be their tough decision of the day, or their choice to smoke Tareyton cigarettes.

In 1971, radio and television advertisements for tobacco products were banned from American broadcasting stations, and Tareyton’s television jingles ended. However, after the ban, the slogan continued to be used in magazines and newspapers, due to the slogan and the name recognition the brand received. In 1975, the slogan was used to advertise for the Tareyton “100”.

In 1976, the American Tobacco Company, which made Tareyton cigarettes, introduced Tareyton Light cigarettes. In the new advertisements, men and women sported “white eyes,” with an updated slogan: “Us Tareyton smokers would rather light than fight!” The two slogans would be used to sell the two separate variations until 1981, when market value declined.

This slogan was notable in that it was the final slogan used for the Tareyton brand. Declining sales led to an end of advertising the brand.

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This Ad to Spend Your Valentine’s Day Planning Your Funeral

“Give her the perfect gift, make pre-arrangements as a couple with the affordable funeral home.”

Because this Valentine’s Day, there’s nothing more romantic than letting her know that you’re more than prepared for her to die.

Granted, according to the above ad the services would be provided to both parties as a couple, which we guess is sort of romantic? While we don’t doubt that, as the advertisement assures us, “compassion” is the funeral home’s “passion,” perhaps tying this service into the most romantic day of the year was a bit much.

Handguns for Women – Savage Arms Co. Ad for the Savage Automatic (1914)

Here’s a vintage gun ad that shows an era in which things have changed for the better, for women and guns. Women are one of the fastest-growing demographics in the sporting community and there are lots of highly skilled female shooters out there.

There are many great self-defense handguns for women today, many of which are specifically built and marketed for women. Can you imagine the reaction women shooters would have if a gun company made an advertisement for a gun marketed for them that referred to women as helpless, dangerous, or hysterical?

Again, let’s take a closer look at the hyperbolic, chauvinistic copy:

Is Your Wife Helpless or Dangerous –– in these times when more idlers make more brutes and thugs?

These times make more idlers. More idlers mean more brutes and thugs. Brutes and thugs break your house; shock your wife into permanent hysteria and mark your children with a horrible fear for life.

Give your wife the solid assurance of a Savage Protector that she knows she can aim as easy as pointing her finger. That shoots lighting quick at each crook of her finger. That checks the vicious degenerate and heartless criminal.

Fathers, it is your serious duty in these times to arm your home by day and by night with a Savage Automatic –– the one arm which every brute and thug fears. They fear its ten lightning shots vs. the 6 or 8 of other makes; they fear the novice’s power to aim it as easy as pointing your finger. Therefore take pains that you get the Savage –– the one the brutes and thugs fear.

As harmless as a kitten around the house, because it is the only automatic that tells by glance or touch whether loaded or empty.

Take home a Savage today. Or at least send us your information.

Arthur William Savage of Utica, New York, first established The Savage Arms Company in 1894. Savage is perhaps most notorious for his 1897 invention of the lever action rifle, the Savage Model 99. This particular gun remained in production until 1999. Savage also invented the removable box magazine in 1908, as an improvement to the Model 99 firearm. This detachable box magazine is used in most military firearms, though it did not hit the firearm industry’s mainstream until the patent expired in 1942.

Additionally, Savage also invented the rotary magazine, which allowed shooters to see how many cartridges remained. He also invented the first mass-manufactured hammerless rifle, which used a firing pin rather than a hammer. Such firing pins were included on the Model 95 and Model 99 guns. The firing pin was a vast improvement in the firearms industry because they accelerated much faster, thus prohibiting any tremors of the shooter to affect the point of aim.

Savage Arms Company produced more than 200,000 copies of the diminutive Savage Automatic Pistol – a.k.a. Model 1907 – between 1908 and 1920.

Lewis machine guns, used in World War I, the Model 24 combination gun, Thompson submachine guns, which was used in World War II, the Model 24 .22/.410 combo guns and the Model 94 single barrel shotgun were all noteworthy guns produced by Savage Arms. Most recently the company developed the AccuTrigger and Accustock.

What Every Young Girl Should Know, 1960

Boys like girls who make Seven-Up “Floats”

What every young girl should know is this: Nobody can resist a 7-Up “Float”! Want to see? Put a scoop of his favorite ice cream of sherbet in a tall glass. Tilt the glass, and pour chilled, sparking 7-Up gently down the side. The fresh, clean taste of 7-Up works a special magic with ice cream. And don’t forget a 7-Up “Float” for yourself! P.S. Boys like 7-Up — girls like 7-Up — for regular thirst-quenching, too. Take home a case of 7-Up so you’ll have plenty on hand. You like…it likes you!

Copyright 1960 by the Seven-Up Company.

When Boredom and Emotional Fatigue Bring on “Housewife Headache”

Why is Anacin the most purchased aspirin by men?

“Making beds, getting meals, acting as family chauffeur — having to do the same dull, tiresome work day after day — is a mild form of torture. These boring yet necessary tasks can bring on nervous tension, fatigue and what is now known as ‘housewife headache.’

For this kind of headache you need strong yet safe relief. So take Anacin®. Anacin is a special fortified formula. It gives you twice as much of the strong pain-reliever doctors recommend most — as the other leading extra strength tablet.

Minutes after taking Anacin your headache goes, so do its nervous tension and fatigue. Despite its strength Anacin is safe, taken as directed. It doesn’t leave you depressed or groggy. See if you don’t feel better all over with a brighter outlook after taking 2 Anacin Tablets.”

This is the first in a brief series of LIFE ads touting Anacin as the cure for “Housewife Headache,” and one of two that characterize housework as “a mild form of torture” — from which there’s no respite, only a tablet that offers temporary relief from pain. Note the tactful reassurance about Anacin: “It doesn’t leave you depressed or groggy.” In other words, it’s not a tranquilizer. The active ingredients if you’re wondering: aspirin and caffeine.

Anacin is the trade name of several analgesics manufactured by Insight Pharmaceuticals. It was invented by William Milton Knight and was first to be used circa 1916 as stated in the patent. Anacin is one of the oldest brands of pain relievers in the United States, first being sold in the 1930s.

Anacin is one of the earliest and best examples of a concerted television marketing campaign, created for them in the late 1950s by Rosser Reeves of the Ted Bates ad agency. Many people remember the commercials advertising “tension producing” situations, and the “hammers in the head” advertisement with the slogan “Tension. Pressure. Pain.”

The medication was mentioned in the book “The Shining” by Stephen king. Anacin had a large advertisement behind the center field fence of Yankee Stadium from the 1950s through 1973, until the stadium’s 1974-75 renovation.

1919 Ad Postcard for “Le Cochon Prodigue”, a Brand of Auvergne Sausage

While the Fairbanks postcard draws attention to the death of the pig as a necessary step to obtain meat products, a 1919 chromo promoting Good sausages from the PRODIGAL PIG features a very alive pig slashing himself into neat sausage rounds, like a streamlined version of the earlier Machine-Cochon. The vivid colors, bright illumination, caricatural mode, and snappy advertising copy all suggest forced light-heartedness in an attempt to obscure grisly subject matter with humor.

On mange avec plaisir et . . . sans fatigue: les “bons saucissons du COCHON PRODIGUE”! (“We eat with pleasure and . . . without fatigue: Good Sausages from THE PRODIGAL PIG”!)

This advertisement for mass-produced sausage from Auvergne, with its familiar claim of “purity” to allay fears about processed meat content, offers a tellingly obfuscatory vision of industrial meat production. In contrast to rationalized slaughter’s ruthless logic, the image defies the laws of physics and biology: the bisected pig remains standing; it performs deft knife work without hands; like the three small sausage rounds, the heavy blade seems suspended in midair; and the large platform-like disks have no explicable provenance.

Rather than real blood and innards displayed in tue-cochon cards, the sausage rounds and pig’s insides are made of the same composite material, a bright, festive shade of red interspersed with gold and silver flecks, like a colorful confetti mix. All the slicing is done, as if by magic, without bloodshed or apparent pain or suffering for the animal.

The image’s graphic qualities, particularly its dark outlines, recall Japanese prints so influential in French art circles over the preceding half century, and the pig’s self-immolation is reminiscent of Japanese seppuku (also known informally as hara-kiri), a custom that already fascinated western observers at the time. As the jolly pig becomes a brave samurai, we glimpse two emblematically divergent perspectives: his death gets redeemed as an honorable, meaningful one, with seppuku standing in for the sacrificial ritual of the tue-cochon; or his exotic cultural practice casts him as a foreigner, undoing the period’s pervasive identification of pigs with Frenchman, and figuring instead the growing alienation of the French from the pigs they ate, as from the ways the meat was processed.

Pigs abounded on French postcards in the medium’s golden age, ca. 1900–1914. Pig postcards are a remarkably lively, compelling, but largely forgotten feature of the Belle Époque’s richly varied, rapidly evolving visual culture. These cards offer up for study a fortuitous and suggestive conjunction: the commonest of farm animals with a long history as an indispensable food source, represented massively on a new medium that became ubiquitous and influential, precisely at a time when the pig’s role in French culture and agriculture was starting to shift significantly. Scrutinizing pig postcards can thus reveal a good deal not only about the surprising scope and impact of visual media during this period, but also about changes in pork production that were characteristic not only of the French but also of the broader Western food system’s incipient modernization.

“You’ve Come A Long Way, Baby” – 40 Virginia Slims Cigarette Ads From the Early 1970s

If you were alive and in America in 1968, you might remember the phrase “You’ve Come A Long Way, Baby.” It was an advertising slogan for a brand of cigarettes, known as Virginia Slims, which, at 100mm in length and 23mm in circumference, were longer and thinner than cigarettes from competing brands.

Just as the feminist movement was gaining in strength and popularity, the Phillip Morris Company teamed up with the famed Leo Burnett Agency to capitalize on shifting attitudes. The campaign was for their new brand of ultra-smooth Virginia Slims cigarettes. It specifically and unabashedly targeted women, which was itself a new phenomenon. Every ad in the campaign put a woman front and center, equating smoking Virginia Slims with being independent, stylish, confident and liberated.

The slogan itself spoke directly about the progress women all over America were fighting for: “You’ve come a long way, baby.” Women have indeed come a long way since the ads first crashed onto the scene, evolving past the surface traits of 1960s-era independence. “You’ve come a long way, baby” remains one of the most famous advertising campaign lines in U.S. history.

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Controversial Springmaid Fabrics Ads From the 1940s and 1950s

Springs Cotton Mill traces its beginnings to the organization of the fort Mill Manufacturing Company when it opened a plant in Fort Mill, South Carolina in 1888. The Springmaid Fabrics line was introduced by owner Elliott White Springs (1896–1959) and he used sex appeal to advertise the line during the 1940s and 1950s. This collection includes several of the racy illustrated advertisements that made liberal uses of double entendres.

The Springmaid ads, clearly influenced by pin-up art, made use of double entendre and liberal doses of voyeurism. The illustrations generally fell into one of two categories, with some exceptions: looking up a woman’s skirt or seeing her panties fall down around her ankles. That’s about it. Most of the ads came with a short tagline such as “Defy Diaphoresis,” “Protect Yourself,” “Perfume and Parabolics,” or “We Put the ‘Broad’ in Broadcloth!”

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An Ad for Iver Johnson Revolvers From 1904 Claimed to Be Safe Enough to Be Near Babies

The gun culture has deep roots in American history, dating to our colonial beginnings. By the turn of the 20th century, it was not uncommon to find guns in the homes of otherwise peaceable citizens. Gun ownership was promoted as respectable and sensible.

“Papa says it won’t hurt us.”
“Accidental discharge impossible.”

This advertisement for Iver Johnson revolvers, circa 1904, made no bones about the deadliness of the weapons, but claimed its “hammerless automatic” model was safe enough to be used as a child’s toy.

The $6 price tag sounds cheap. but that price would be about $175 in today’s money.

Incidentally, Iver Johnson handguns were used to assassinate President William McKinley in 1901 and Robert F. Kennedy in 1968.

Some Beautiful Love Cosmetics Ads From the Early 1970s

Love Cosmetics was introduced by Menley & James Laboratories on March 1, 1969. By the summer of 1970, the company was marketing and promoting Fresh Lemon bath products and Soft Eyes items to beautify the eyes. Advertising was coordinated by Wells, Rich, Greene advertising agency (1967 - 1990), a company founded by Mary Wells Lawrence. Love’s advertising budget surpassed $7 million. There was an emphasis on a long-term building operation, with advertisements on television and in women's magazines.

The ideal customer on which marketing focused was a young woman, 20 to 25. She might be a young businesswoman, co-ed, or young married. She was likely a trend setter and a heavy cosmetics user. Love Cosmetics’ first line of items included Love’s Fresh Lemon Cleanser, Lovelids eyeshadow, and Eau De Love. In all, there were eleven products, and with the inclusion of shades, they numbered forty-three.

Loveshines was the fun stick to contour and color your eyes, face, all your other kissable little curves and hollows. Lipsticks were called Lovesticks. The remainder of the line was Love’s Basic Moisture, Love’s A Little Color, Love’s Transparent Powder, Love’s A Little Cover, Love’s Liner, Love’s Mascara, and Lovelids. The latter was an eyeshadow with a container in the shape of a plastic eyeball. The company believed that eyeshadows for the day should be in neutral shades, specifically taupe, russet, heather, or olive green. Nighttime was more suited for deeper, yet not brighter colors, especially purple, plum, or teal. In early 1976, Love Cosmetics started marketing Purple Sage, Tumbleweed, and Prairie Dawn eyeshadow shades.

In April 1974, Love Cosmetics began to make a line of Baby Soft products meant for adults. The items were scented with an innocent fragrance most often associated with babies. There was a Baby soft talc, a body lotion, and a foam bath. A marketing slogan read sexy in a very special way. Baby Soft products were priced from $2 to $2.75. 1975 was a busy year in the cosmetics industry with the introduction of many fragrances by competing firms. Love Cosmetics' new scent was called Daisy L.

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Vintage Family Matching Christmas Pajamas From the 1970s

Sears and J.C. Penney offered this holiday attire in their Christmas catalogs year after year for over a decade in the 1970s. If you have a family Christmas pajama tradition, you know how fun it is to receive a new pair of cozy PJs each year. If your family doesn’t wear matching pajamas, this might be the year to start.

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Potato Chip Distributor Wearing 2-Pound Container Tin Barrel at National Potato Chip Institute Convention, 1949

Potato Chip distributor wearing two pound container and arriving for National Potato Chip Institute convention at the Edgewater Beach Hotel.

(Photo by George Skadding/The LIFE Picture Collection via Getty Images)

For the 1949 National Potato Chip Convention in Chicago, Jays Foods Inc. advertised its product by having a local branch manager parade around wearing the company’s iconic 2-pound tin barrel and little else. The arresting gimmick was one of many the 453 attendees enjoyed, including the show's potato chip queen clad in a brassiere constructed of the crunchy snack.

Invented around the 1850s, potato chips had grown by the time of the convention to a $300 million a year business. Today the worldwide market is around $28 billion, with flavors including cappuccino, caviar, and even Cajun squirrel.

“Wash Away Fat and Years of Age!” – Hilarious Fat Reducing Soap Ads for Weight Loss From the 1920s

The 1920s had a boom in fat-reducing soaps, which promised women that they didn’t have to work out or diet to minimize their dress size. All you had to do was take a bath and lather up with the soap, and you would shrink in size.

La Mar Reducing Soap was a coconut-oil soap tinged with potassium iodide and sassafras that claimed to melt away fat while shrinking skin so that there would be no excess skin after the weight was lost. It sold at 50 cents per bar, and customers hoping to become thin could purchase the accompanying Slenmar Reducing Brush for an additional $3.

“The new discovery. results quick and amazing,” ads for the so-called Reducing Soap said. “No dieting or exercising. Be as slim as you wish. Acts like magic in reducing double chin, abdomen, ungainly ankle, unbecoming wrists, arms and shoulders, large busts, or any superfluous fat on body.”

As these print ads for La-Mar Reducing Soap reveal, lathering up used to be marketed as a workout replacement, offering a “magic” solution to unwanted double chins and tummy fat. Another popular cellulite-reducing soap was the aptly named Fatoff, but alas—the ingredients in these so-called body-fat-busters were nothing more than potassium chloride and other useless impurities.

According to Mental Floss, at its height, the company sold 200 to 300 soaps per day, though it reportedly spent $120,000 advertising the product against just $150,000 in annual receipts. The head of the AMA’s investigative wing called the product “unadulterated hokum,” and in 1926, it was declared a fraud by the U.S. Postmaster General and the company was barred from advertising or processing sales through the mail.

Racist Soap Adverts Have Been Around for Hundreds of Years, Here Are Some Vintage Ads Depict African Americans as Dirty

Thomas J. Barratt is often referred to as ‘the father of modern advertising’ for his revolutionary advertising campaigns for Pears’ soap. But unfortunately his ads included horrendous racist stereotypes that were existed throughout the British Empire for hundreds of years to sustain discrimination against black people. For example, a Pears’ soap ad that appeared in McClure’s Magazine in 1899 stated:

“The first step towards lightening THE WHITE MAN’S BURDEN is through teaching the virtues of cleanliness. PEARS’ SOAP is a potent factor in brightening the dark corners of the earth as civilization advances, while amongst the cultured of all nations it holds the highest place – it is the ideal toilet soap.”

It’s pretty clear what the terms ‘…THE WHITE MAN’S BURDEN…’ and ‘…the dark corners of the earth…’ represent: black and ethnic minorities and their cultures across the world.

Adverts like this for Pear’s soap, exploiting the differences between Black and White, are seen as explicitly racist today. They reinforce the stereotype of Black skin as dark and undesirable, while White is superior and pure. These ads date from the 19th century to early 20th century.

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