Yellow Fever 1 of 3

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In one of the stories I wrote, yellow fever played a key role; specifically, the yellow fever epidemics of the 1870s, which nearly wiped Memphis, Tennessee off the map.  It wasn't until nearly the end of the 19th century that anyone even knew how it was transmitted, or that mosquitos were the vector, so it was truly a hideous plague.  I highly recommend The American Plague by Molly Caldwell Crosby. 

Early ads promised all sorts of things as curatives, like this one from 1880:

Warner's Safe* Cure, 1880  
 


*safe, here, refers to the metal safe in which they kept the cures - you didn't think ad doublespeak was a recent invention, did you?  Read more about Warner's HERE.

A further ad for a quack blood oxygenator device I've posted about before:

Yellow Fever, 2 of 3

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The causal connection of mosquitos/yellow fever was established by army medical doctor Walter Reed (for whom the medical center is named) and his Cuban associate Carlos Finlay only in 1900, by means of experiments on soldiers dying of the disease in Cuba (and Panama, where the canal project claimed an incredible number of lives.

Squibb was riding on those coattails when it printed this somewhat racist ad about the "cleansing of the tropics", featuring Dr. Reed front and center, but the satisfaction in having proved it was mosquito-borne and curable was at this point only 25 years old.

Squibb, 1928  (now Bristol Myers Squibb)


from periodpaper.com

Yellow Fever, 3 of 3

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My previous Yellow Fever posts bring me to this point: Epidemic disease to sell vodka?  Not so awesome, Smirnoff.  :S

Smirnoff, 1971



Very contagious.  -_-

UTA Union Aeromaritime de Transport

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Jean Colin Illustration

More Brahma Beer! (1910's)

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1918



1910



1910's

Clark's Teaberry Gum asks "How Good Is Your Taste?"

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This is an odd series of ads, purporting to test your (artistic) taste level while subtly plugging a book by the same name.  You'll have to read upside down to see the answers!  Good luck - I hope you have good taste...

Clark's Teaberry Gum, 1948

Which of these three gowns will do the most for you?


Did you pass?  ;)  Below the cut, you can test your taste level on sculpture, vases, paintings, and even dogs!  Follow me...


( How Good IS Your Taste? )

ONE MORE Clark's Fruit Punch Gum ad at Vintage Ads Dreamwidth!

White Magic!

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White Magic Bleach, 1953, from the flickr pages of CapricornOneVintage



Four more at Vintage Ads Dreamwidth!

German ads- Rondoform

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Rondoform breast enhancing crème, 1967

from HERE


A too-small bust becomes bigger and a flabby one becomes firm
when you lightly massage in some of the new Special-RONDOFORM-Crème daily.

In this way your bust rounds itself, fills out, arches (swells) and firms itself, and it stands out enticingly and attractively: envied, admired (wondered at) and coveted.

Beautiful Breast-form through Rondoform
Treatment with the quite special RONDOFORM-Crème enlarges the undeveloped and tightens the saggy bosom.

*nowhere does it say what's in this stuff