A Can o' Meat for the 4th

The Fourth of July is one of those times Americans get outside and enjoy a burger that's blackened in all the wrong ways. There's nothing like the flavor of lighter fluid and charcoal briquettes to celebrate our Independence! Well, maybe you can add to a can o' meat to the festivities, I mean it does come with its own sack o' sauce.

Oscar Mayer put this ad in the August 1950 issue of Life Magazine and I really don't know how it played. It has the look of 50's food ads - indescribably unappetizing. First off let me say, a can of wieners? Really? And regular wieners weren't enough, Oscar Mayer went for cocktail wieners too.

Note the line at the bottom of the page, "Ask for Oscar Mayer "Yellow Brand" liver, sausage, pork sausage, and sliced bacon at the fresh meat counter!" Yellow Brand refers to the yellow label that you still will find on Oscar Mayer products. According to the Oscar Mayer website:

"In 1929, Oscar F. Mayer began wrapping his products with a branded yellow paper band. In a time when the meat industry was inconsistent and untrusted, this strip of yellow was a beacon of quality and consistency."

I'm really not sure how a can of wieners qualifies as a beacon of quality, but there you have it.