A 1941 advert from Kellogg’s Cornflakes today – literally demonstrating their blitz spirit.
It’s apologising for the shortage of Cornflakes in the shops, while giving themselves a hell of a (deserved) pat on the back for keeping the armed forces and blitzed areas supplied with breakfast.
More of the old pharmaceuticals today. I find these old fashioned remedies fascinating, although it seems they were mostly snake oils to varying degrees. Anything described as a “tonic” is probably not up to much, and so it seems with this, “Phosferine Tonic”, seen here in an advert from 1940.
In line with standard “cure-all” advertising, Phosferine is claimed to help with a list of ailments as long as your arm – depression, headache, indigestion, brain fag, neuralgia, sleeplessness, influenza, rheumatism, sciatica, anaemia, debility and neurasthenia. Because all those things have the same treatment, of course. I thought “Brain fag” was one of those diagnoses that didn’t exist anymore, like hysteria and brain fever, but apparently it’s a thing in Nigeria now, suffered by overworked students.
Here’s an advert especially interesting to me as it includes a testimonial from a man living in Hall Carr, Rawtenstall, which is the place where my mum grew up.
The British Medical Journal was on the case of anything calling itself a “secret remedy”, and was looking at the composition of this and other tonics back in 1911. It analysed it and found it to be mainly water, alcohol, quinine and phosphoric acid. And a bit of sulphuric acid thrown in as well – I’m not a chemist, but that’s not good as an ingredient, is it?
I also like the damning nature of the rather sensible 1917 issue of the Seventh Day Adventist publication Herald of Health – The Indian Health Magazine, which states that “the quantities are quite insufficient to be of any use as a tonic.”
Herald of Health also has much to say on the subject of tobacco, even in 1917 – it’s the “greatest of all curses of modern times.”
Here’s a curious advert I stumbled across in The British Newspaper Archive – it’s for Mercer’s Meat Stout. “Tastes good, does you good.” Now, I’ve heard of milk stout (Ena Sharples springs to mind), but…..meat stout?
Is it me, or does this look exactly like a mock advert from Viz? Meat and beer, together at last.
This wasn’t just a quirky name, it was stout that actually included meat extract in some form. It was sold (as every food-and-drink-stuff was, even chocolate) as being good for you. It was also advertised as a nourishing drink for invalids. Invalid cookery and care was a big deal pre-NHS and a special invalid recipe section was in nearly every cookbook up until around 1950. I’ve got some recipes here if you’re feeling a bit peaky.
The Zythophile blog has more information on Meat Stout. It turns out it might have had some offal chucked in during the brewing process. Mmmm. Well, one of the aforementioned invalid recipes was raw beef tea – raw mince steeped in lukewarm water – so I guess it might not have seemed so strange at the time.
If a person wearing advertising boards (or a “human advertising medium”) front and back is a “Sandwich” then what other food-based item are they called if the boards enclose them on all four sides? A “Toad in the hole”, of course!