Does Your Brand of Gasoline Make the Entire Family This Happy?

In this 1954 ad for Ethyl gasoline we see a young Ernest Borgnine taking his family on holiday. Obviously this was back in the days before child carseats and mandatory seatbelt laws. Does anyone remember it really being like this? I seem to have vague semi-repressed memories of the man getting lost and refusing to stop and ask directions, so the woman is griping at him, and the kid is whining for a potty break along with the ubiquitous "are we there, yet?" To which, the parents reply in unison and increasing volume..."Not Yet!" At least this car isn't filled with noxious tobacco fumes from both parents chain-smoking Kents with all the windows up. There's just no better way to enjoy that smooth Carolina flavour than from the only premium brand that comes with the micronite filter...and the sponsor of "the Dick Van Dyke Show". Little do they know that the atmosperic lead poisoning from the TEL additive in the Ethyl gasoline is so bad that the soil beside major highways will actually become contaminated. Happy motoring!

Why Didn't Anyone Think of This, Before?

Unfortunately, the Glide-O-Bike Company of Dallas, Texas was forced into bankruptcy when they learned that the cost of materials, postage-and-handling combined with the litigation expenses for injuries and false advertising far surpassed their listed retail price of $0.25 per unit sold.

This proved to be the most catastrophically ill-conceived business venture in history, until 1999 with the launching of "bigheavysafe.com", whose shipping costs on their first online order bankrupted the company.

It's Spanking Time For A Naughty-Naughty Girl

Ha ha ha...Look! He's beating his wife for using the wrong brand of coffee. Isn't that funny? Next, he'll slash her with a broken Pabst Blue Ribbon bottle, because his shirts have ring-around-the collar. That should be hilarious. Guess he showed her who's the boss around here.

See? Spousal abuse was fun and whimsical back in the postwar consumer-products economic boom of the 1950s.

It wasn't at all like Stanley Kowalski beating his pregnant wife, Stella, then raping her sister, Blanche. Everyone knows that Tennessee Williams wrote fiction, anyway.

Wonder what hubby is gonna do if he ever catches her screwing the milkman?

Look! It's the Same Guy That's In the Previous Ad!

After completing his contract with the Jantzen swimsuit company, Chet Slapbody embarked on the next phase of his male modeling career by being the testimonial pitchman for the Viking Corporation of Chicago. Here we see him in Viking's 1953 ad endorsing the wholesome goodness of skinless peeled frankfurters, and how they stay moist and firm, yet tender.

Evidently, some advertising executives of the time were very proficient in indentifying solutions for nonexistent problems; as if there were a large number of people who thought that regular hotdogs were just too tough. Or as in the ad posted below; scores of gorgeous shapely young women were experiencing trouble keeping their boyfriends' attention, because the guys kept slipping off with that darned poolboy.

If You Thought That Was Gay, Then Check This Out!

Alright, lady...if your primary motivation for looking hot is to prevent your boyfriend from sneaking-off to the cabana for a little mano y mano action with the poolboy, then just maybe the brand of swimsuit that you are wearing should not be your main concern.

How about being a tad more selective about who you date? For instance; those little criss-cross peekaboo thigh cutouts on Chet's swim trunks are a dead give-away that he would rather be cavorting with hairy men in Spartan costumes at the nearest bathhouse than lounging poolside with you.

Now, THAT'S Gay!

In fact, Gaytop counters are guaranteed to make your home just as gay as it can possibly be. The only way that it could be any gayer would be for Liberace to unexpectedly drop-in to share a pint of Creme de Menthe whilst out walking his pink poodle then have Freddie Mercury lead a pride parade through your living room only to oil-up with the Village People for nude Greco-Roman wrestling in the rumpus room.

Besides, that guy in the ad appears to be enjoying his little home improvement project way too much.

BLOOD ORGY! (Another Disturbing Ad from Yesteryear)

Ahh, the good old days, when animal cruelty was considered to be good clean family humour. For your consideration, just examine this nightmarish tidbit from the early years of the twentieth century. After disfiguring her doll, this twisted spawn of the underworld is amusing herself by torturing a helpless kitten in some ritualistic blood sacrifice to Ba'al. The bloodsoaked chiffon dress and her maniacal facial expression captures the marked contrast between childhood innocence and hellish brutality. This kid obviously has some loose wiring in her hideously misshapened skull. Whoever penned this ad centainly had some unresolved issues of their own. And how, pray tell, was this supposed to inspire potential customers to purchase their product? Very few people would enjoy having permanent red dye stains on their floors, carpet, walls, and the family pet. If anything, this ad makes a good case for completely avoiding their brand of bottled mayhem, and for retailers to remove it from their shelves.
This picture would have been better employed as the book cover for a Lizzy Borden biography.