Our first color ad comes from 1950 and, as the big day is very near, I thought I'd go with a beverage that will be consumed in quantity between the green and checkered flags - beer.
Blatz, Milwaukee’s first
bottled beer…not its best, not even the middle of the road, but put in a glass container
first. Myron Fohr, the gentleman wearing the grease, never led a lap in the one Indy 500 in which he raced.
Looking at him he has the appearance of a guy who drives a bar stool, not a race car. He
probably fit into the cockpit a little like the cork in the fifth of thunderbird he
kept tucked under the seat for emergencies. And take a quick look at those nails…apparently the folks at the ad agency spent some time caking crud under Myron’s nails (or gave up on
removing it out and decided to go with
the dowdy grease ball look).
The small ad in the lower left is for NBC’s
television adaptation of the radio show Duffy’s
Tavern. The series centered around an Irish tavern in New York and the
misadventures and get-rich-quick schemes of Archie, its manager. The show
opening featured a rendition of When Irish
Eyes are Smiling played on a tinny piano. The music always was interrupted by the ring of a telephone and Archie spinning the catch
phrase “Hello, Duffy's Tavern, where the elite meet to eat. Archie the manager
speakin'. Duffy ain't here—oh, hello, Duffy..." Here's a bit of the radio show.
And
here's some of the television show.
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