Category: Adverts

Cadbury’s “99”, 1936

Post author By Estelle
Post date October 2, 2016

Hartlepool Northern Daily Mail, 8th July 1936

Today’s post began through a fit of annoyance that literally every flavour of Ben and Jerry’s ice cream contains eggs, thereby making a trip to the cinema with my egg-allergic little girl an ice-cream free zone. And it ended with a minor dairy-based historical discovery and an ultimately unfulfilled quest.

So, I was looking up which ice creams contained eggs when I stumbled on the website for The Ice Cream Alliance, and an interesting little section on the wonder that is the Cadbury’s “99”. The “99” being a delicacy that Wikipedia tells me is enjoyed not only in Britain, but also Ireland, South Africa and Australia, and, I need hardly say for British readers, consists of a cone of soft-serve ice-cream, garnished with a specially-sized flake chocolate bar.

I was forced to go to the park and buy one for illustrative purposes at this point.

Yes, it was nice, thank you — Yes, it was very nice, thank you

Here’s the facts, as we know them. Why is a “99” called a “99”? Good question. It’s a Cadbury’s trademark to describe “a scoop or swirl of soft serve ice cream with a Cadbury chocolate flake in it,” yet no one is clear about the original meaning of the name, including, apparently, Cadbury’s.

What’s that? A tiny historical mystery, you say? I’m on the case!

The Ice Cream Alliance says Cadbury’s is cagey about the origins of the “99”. Wikipedia at least gives some dates, stating that the “99” as we know it now, cone, ice cream and Flake and all, has been served since 1922.

Although, come on, the Screwball isn’t really a “99” in a plastic cone. There’s a crucial ball of bubblegum at the bottom, and definitely sauce and/or sherbet involved.

An aside – red sauce on a “99”, Wikipedia tells me, is called “monkey blood” in some regions, which is exciting. This is my reference point for sauce on an ice-cream though – “I didn’t ask for sauce.” “I didn’t give you sauce.”

Anyway. Both Wikipedia and Cadbury’s own website date the origin of the Flake itself from 1920, when a Cadbury’s employee shrewdly noted how excess chocolate fell off the moulds in a drizzly, thin, flakey layer. Unfortunately I can find no evidence of adverts in any archives until the 1930s and even Cadbury’s website illustrates the invention of the Flake with a 1960s ad.

What I did find, though, was this. Brand new information – to me at least, and also apparently to Wikipedia and the Ice Cream Alliance, seeing as there’s no mention of it anywhere else I’ve seen. From the British Newspaper Archive, a fairly extensive campaign in 1936 advertising the new invention of the “99”, within adverts for Flake.

It’s obviously a newish thing in 1936 because the hook line is “Have you tried a 99?” Importantly, though, this 99 is not a 99! It’s an ice cream wafer sandwich with two strips of ice cream and a Flake in the middle. Your confectioner will be happy to provide.

Now it seems unlikely to me that in 1922 the “99” came into being, fully formed as we know it today, only to be replaced by something different in 1936, presented as new, and then reverted back at some unspecified point. PLUS, there wasn’t even soft-serve ice cream in the UK until the 1940s, hence this 1936 concoction consisting of ice cream blocks. Depending on who you believe, Maggie Thatcher may or may not have had a hand in developing soft serve for the British market. Which has put me off it a bit.

Still, though, I can’t find mention of this anywhere else, and, you know, maybe Cadbury’s has even forgotten it themselves. I still haven’t got to the bottom of it, but if any readers have any memories of “99” which are different to today, please let me know.

Sussex Agricultural Express, 3rd July 1936

Tags 1936, advert, Cadbury's 99, Food and drink

1900-1949 Adverts Food & Drink

Barclay’s Lager, 1926

Post author By Estelle
Post date August 29, 2016

It’s been a strange kind of summer in a strange kind of year. The approach of September usually gives me a feeling of normality being restored – working for a university I still feel tied to the academic calendar, and September always feels more like new year to me than January ever does. After the uproar of the Brexit result, the weird hiatus while our new Prime Minister promptly went on holiday for five weeks has made the referendum result seem like a strange dream while real life was on hold. With the government reconvening (and why was the referendum decided to coincide with that political period when it feels like no one is in charge?) Brexit’s on the real life agenda again and normality is very much not restored in September this year.

I’ve been having a bit of a holiday from the blog too – a huge queue of scanning materials have been building up and I hope to actually get on with it shortly. In the meantime, here’s an advert for Barclay’s British Lager from 1926. Averse as I currently feel to anything overtly flying the flag for British nationalism, I like this advert.

A seaman’s thirst is quenched by British Lager, Barclay’s being one of the British pioneers in brewing lager. They took advantage of world events – Germany and Austria were the prime source of lager prior to the First World War, but such imports became impossible during the war and Barclay’s set to experimenting with their own brews. They brewed it at 5%, stronger than most beers at the time. After the war they developed a successful export trade in it too – Germany and Austria’s trade being incapacitated and the other big lager producer, the USA, being hobbled by the era of prohibition.

In 1921, the Brewer’s Journal reported on Barclay’s lager in this way (from this link):

“Doubtless they do not imagine that any large trade in this type of beer can at present be looked for from the working classes. The potentiality of trade lies with the middle and upper classes, and with that floating population from the ends of the earth which the Metropolis always embraces.”

Turns out they were wrong about the popularity of lager with the working classes. And the reference to London accepting, “embracing“, people from all “ends of the earth” brings me depressingly back to a time when it feels like the march of history has got a bit lost and is going back on itself, in well-trodden footsteps that lead to nowhere you really want to go.

Tags advert, alcohol, Barclay's lager, Brexit

Adverts Victorian

Oddities, 1841

Post author By Estelle
Post date July 28, 2016

I love picking a newspaper at random from the British Newspaper Archive and reading it all – or nearly all, tiny print in the older papers is tough on the eyes, even with some zooming in.

Living in Liverpool, local papers are the most interesting of course, filling in gaps in local history and locating long-gone establishments, as well as hopefully finding interesting titbits and odd, forgotten stories. There’s mysteries never to be solved – like one note I spotted (but can’t find again) imploring a specific young lady to come to a certain address, “where she might find something to her advantage.”

I’ve been looking at and wondering about a few random things from the Liverpool Mercury in 1841. Like this advert for a talk at the Liverpool Royal Institution (a learned society for science, literature and the arts, which existed until 1948), with the none-more-Victorian title of “Customs, Habits, Dress, Implements, &c., &c. of the less civilised Nations.”

What particularly interests me are the entry costs – for gentlemen, ladies and “strangers“. I’m presuming this may mean non-members of the Institution, but it doesn’t explain.

Talk of a potential discussion on “The White and Black Race” is interesting as it would plan to go into detail on “our argument in support of the position that mind is of no particular colour or climate.”

But this is my favourite bit. I’m an avid reader of the Victorian problem page, usually called “Correspondence“‘, and which draw a veil over the actual questions asked, only printing the answers for the sender’s benefit. Many times the question is obvious in the answer, sometimes the questioner’s handwriting is also critiqued, but, on occasion, you get an unfathomable beauty like this. I can only imagine what inspired the advice of “There is no other course but emigration to adopt under the circumstances presumed by W.S. in his communication…”

Liverpool Mercury, 12th March 1841

Tags 1841, Liverpool, The British Newspaper Archive, Victorian problem page

1900-1949 Adverts Pharmaceuticals Victorian

Girl Goes Silly, 1923

Post author By Estelle
Post date June 8, 2016

Cannabis was made illegal in the UK in 1928 for general use, although you could grow your own marijuana plants until 1964, and doctors were still able to prescribe cannabis for medical purposes until 1971. That year The Misuse of Drugs Act brought in the classification of dangerous drugs as either A, B or C – cannabis was class B, then briefly class C between 2004 and 2009, only to bounce back to B from 2009 onwards.

In the nineteenth century, though, it was a different story. You could find many pharmaceutical adverts for cannabis-containing remedies, such as Grimault’s cannabis cigarettes for asthma. Strange as the idea of smoking to help asthma may seem, this isn’t a medical treatment relegated to the past. The benefits or otherwise of using cannabis as a way of relieving asthma are being debated vociferously right now across the Internet, with official medical sites advising that smoking cannabis is a Bad Idea, versus vast numbers of cannabis-friendly blogs stating the exact opposite.

Then there was cannabis to help cure corns.

And a recipe to make your own at home. The other main ingredient was salicylic acid, still used in corn remedies now, minus the marijuana.

In 1923 The Motherwell Times reported on an interesting story which had been written up in the British Medical Journal. Under the wonderful headline of GIRL GOES “SILLY”, it tells the tale of a young man who induced two teenage Shrewsbury sisters to “sniff up the dusty tobacco at the bottom of his pouch”. This was “a foolish joke” on his part.

The older sister was sick, while the younger one became “frankly intoxicated. She was taking incoherently, and giggling in a fatuous manner.” The reason for this became clearer when analysis revealed that cannabis was mixed in with the tobacco dust. Its inclusion is presented in an almost inconsequential way, however, with the doctor’s conclusion being only that tobacco must have a much stronger effect when it was snorted rather than smoked. The fatuous laughing though, well, I think maybe that wasn’t entirely the tobacco’s fault.

One thing which startles me is that the girl is reportedly oblivious to her surroundings “unless well shaken“, which makes me imagine the whole scene as basically this:

Tags asthma, Cannabis, corns, illegal drugs

1900-1949 Adverts

Gaiter and Shoe in One, 1927

Post author By Estelle
Post date May 23, 2016

19th November 1927, Hastings and St Leonard's Observer

I’m a bit of a sucker for those items of clothing that cunningly combine two items together to look like you’re more smartly dressed than you actually are. I think it started with Graeme Garden’s one piece suit in the Goodies, where I think he pretty much invented the onesie.

Recently, I tried to buy the Top Shop top that Clara Oswald wore to Face the Raven in Doctor Who. It had sadly sold out by the time the episode went out, but I discovered that Top Shop called it a “hybrid top”, a top designed to look like a shirt under a jumper. I was pleased to see that it was actually a unmentioned costume department in-joke, seeing as the over-arching hook for the series was the puzzle over what something called the “hybrid” was actually referring to.

Clara Oswald's hybrid top — Clara Oswald’s hybrid top

So here’s the earliest example I’ve seen, although I’m sure the invention-crazy Victorians were all over this too. From 1927, the gaiter and shoe in one. A kind of welly designed to look like a ladies court shoe and stocking. Predictably, I want them.

Tags 1927, Clara Oswald, doctor who, Hybrid, The Goodies

1900-1949 Adverts

This is What Keeps You Thin, Weak and Unfit, 1921

Post author By Estelle
Post date May 20, 2016
1 Comment on This is What Keeps You Thin, Weak and Unfit, 1921

Portsmouth Evening News, 12th January, 1921

There is little that distinguishes the advertising of yesteryear from today so much as those products designed to fatten up the unbecomingly thin person. Enter Sargol, which claimed to overcome the “faulty food assimilation” keeping you thin, weak and unfit.

The British Medical Association’s “More Secret Remedies…” from 1912 reveals that the actual contents of Sargol pills differed widely from batch to batch, but mainly contained sugar, albumen and calcium.

Interestingly, Sargol was successfully taken to trial for fraud in the USA in 1917 on account of not doing what it claimed – although this evidently hadn’t deterred them four years later in the UK. However, the American version differed in that it mainly contained Saw Palmetto, a plant found in the south west of the US.

A thin person’s body is like a bone-dry sponge – eager and hungry for the fatty materials of which it is being robbed by the failure of the assimilative apparatus to take them from the food.

“There are thousands of men and women today distressed by excessive thinness, weak nerves and feeble stomachs, who, having tried no end of flesh-makers, foodfads, tonics, physical culture stunts, resign themselves to life-long skinniness, and imagine that nothing can ever give them flesh and strength.

Excessive thinness, often attended by nervous indigestion, is simply due to “mal-assimilation” in the vast majority of cases. Even if you feel comparatively swell, you cannot get fat if your digestive apparatus fails to “assimilate” the food you eat – food that now passes through your system as a waste, like unburned coal through an open fire-grate.

What thin folks require is a means of gently urging the assimilative functions of the stomach and intestines to extract the oils and fats from the regular daily food that is eaten, and pass them into the blood, where they can reach the starved, broken-down tissue cells and build them up.

You know that the human body is built of tissue cells and you must know that the only right way to gain flesh and strength is by replenishing the depleted tissue cells with more nourishing, fat-making elements. Is there anything better than the food Nature provides for that purpose?

A thin person’s body is like a bone-dry sponge – eager and hungry for the fatty materials of which it is being robbed by the failure of the assimilative apparatus to take them from the food.

The best way to overcome this sinful waste of flesh-building elements and to stop the leakage of fats is to use Sargol, the recently discovered regenerative force that is recommended so highly here and abroad. Take a little Sargol tablet with every meal and notice how quickly your food will make your cheeks fill out, and rolls of firm, healthy flesh are deposited over your body, covering each bony and projecting point.

All good chemists recommend and sell Sargol. Try it. It is inexpensive, easy to take, highly efficient and perfectly harmless.”

Tags 1921, advert, Sargol

1900-1949 Adverts Food & Drink

Barr’s Iron Brew, 1906

Post author By Estelle
Post date May 1, 2016

Before Irn Bru was Irn Bru, it was Iron Brew. Up until 1946 when a new law declared that drinks couldn’t be described as a “brew” if they weren’t actually brewed, and so the spelling, if not the pronunciation, was changed to keep within the letter of the law.

The basic Scottish hardness of Iron Brew’s advertising strategy is already in place in 1906, with the drink being endorsed here by champion wrestler and cable tosser Alex Munro, and all-round champion athlete of the world Donald Dinnie.

Here’s an illustrated advert to show what they actually looked like.

Oh, for the days when you could be the all-round champion of the world and look like Donald Dinnie. He was a big celebrity of the day and well hard to boot. He’s been called “The Nineteenth Century’s Greatest Athlete”, and had the honour of heavy artillery shells used in the First World War being called “Donald Dinnie’s” in recognition of just how rock he was. To be fair, he was 69 in 1906, if this is when this illustration of him was made.

Here’s Alex Munro, who excellently won bronze at the 1908 Olympics and silver at the 1912 Olympics in the Tug of War event. Oh, how I wish they still had Tug of War, but sadly that ended as an event in 1920. It reminds me of all those strong man programmes you used to get on TV in the 80s, around the time World of Sport was on.

Here Iron Brew was apparently an essential part of the recuperation of “The Fasting Man” Mons. Beaute, who held the world record for fasting at the time. 40 days with only Barr’s Soda Water as sustenance, and recovering afterwards with a heady mix of Iron Brew and Bovril.

Tags 1906, advert, Barr's Iron Brew, Food and drink, Irn Bru, Iron Brew

1900-1949 Adverts War Women

A Eugene Wave will make you brave, 1939

Post author By Estelle
Post date April 29, 2016

Manchester Evening News, 25th October, 1939

Britain had been preparing for conflict long before the actual declaration of war on 3rd September 1939. The government had started building warships from 1938, but a lot of thought was also given to how life would best work on the home front. It was clear that this war would be all-consuming, and so things like how food would be rationed, and whether evacuations from the larger cities would be needed were all considered. Right from the start, bombardment by the Luftwaffe was considered to be a threat which could begin at any time, and the Blitz of the UK began a year after the war started, in September 1940.

What’s interesting about this advert, for a “Eugene Wave” home perm, from only a few weeks into the war, is that it references the “midnight alarms” that were anticipated, as well as women’s “war-time jobs” that were immediately called for. The Eugene Wave was marketed as a way to continue your preparations for war on a personal appearance level.

“Midnight alarms are apt to catch you unawares and the wan light of dawn has no mercy. The rush and fatigue of your war-time job calls for special attention to your beauty. Now is the time to treat yourself to a Eugene Permanent Wave, the really permanent wave, which keeps its charming natural “shape” under the most difficult conditions.”

Tags 1939, advert, Eugene Wave, Second World War

1900-1949 Adverts

Mark Twain on Tobacco, 1909

Post author By Estelle
Post date April 26, 2016

Nottingham Evening Post, 24th November 1909

Mark Twain (or Samuel Clemens as he was sans pen name) was about as big a fan of smoking as it’s possible to be. Starting his cigar habit at the startling age of 8, he once said that “If smoking is not allowed in heaven, I shall not go.” He is said to have smoked incessantly, anything from 22 to 40 cigars per day, although he also declared that “I smoke in moderation. Only one cigar at a time.”

On one of his attempts to give up, he wrote,

“I pledged myself to smoke but one cigar a day. I kept the cigar waiting until bedtime, then I had a luxurious time with it. But desire persecuted me every day and all day long. I found myself hunting for larger cigars…within the month my cigar had grown to such proportions that I could have used it as a crutch.”

Which brings to mind the Camberwell Carrot of cigars.

The Camberwell Carrot, from Withnail and I

So, this endorsement from Mark Twain for Players Navy Cut tobacco (in pipe form, this time) seems like it could be plausible. And yet….despite the fact that the man was hardly ever pictured not smoking, this didn’t sound quite right to me.

So I did a big of digging and I found that this advert was actually the subject of a threatened lawsuit from Clemens. It seems his private secretary Ralph Ashcroft, mentioned in the advert, arranged this campaign without his knowledge. Clemens wrote to his friend Elizabeth Wallace about this:

“In England Ashcroft committed a forgery in the second degree on me, and sold for £25 my name (and words which I would not have uttered for a hundred times the money.) Sh-! say nothing about it – we hope to catch him and shut him up in a British jail.”

Ashcroft managed the financial affairs for Clemens, cannily trademarking the name “Mark Twain” and setting up the Mark Twain Company. He was married to Isabel Lyons, Clemens’ secretary, but Clemens evidently ended up loathing them both. The spectre of this loathing has recently arose again with the publication of volumes 1-3 of his autobiography. Written in his final years, he decreed that it should not be published until 100 years after his death, and so in 2010 the first volume was released. Volume 3, published in 2015, contained what is known as the ”Ashcroft-Lyon Manuscript”, denouncing both for what he considered to be their treachery. More here, and it’s just spurred me on to get going on his autobiog.

Tags advert, Mark Twain, Samuel Clemens, smoking

1900-1949 Adverts Pharmaceuticals

Phyllosan Fortifies the Over-Forties, 1946

Post author By Estelle
Post date April 22, 2016
1 Comment on Phyllosan Fortifies the Over-Forties, 1946

As one of the “over-forties” myself, here’s a reminder that this age used to be considered as pretty much the start of your dotage. Special tablets were required to keep up your energy, and Phyllosan marketed itself directly to this demographic.

Phyllosan contained ferrous fumarate to help increase your iron intake, and vitamins B1, B2 and C. It appears to still be available (perhaps on prescription?) as I found an information leaflet for the drug online, dated 2011.

Tags 1946, pharmaceuticals, Phyllosan