So, is this the brother of the soda jerk at Woolworths? It's certainly NOT Eddie Fisher, though people these days wouldn't know that. You have to be of a certain age to know Eddie Fisher and young people today would assume Eddie was a bowler who had a weekly show and drank Coke in table cloth shirts.
Click on image to see it larger. (SOURCE: National Geographic, April 1954)
I'd say this is by the same illustrator as yesterday's and again I have no clue who it was. I'd say they worked from photos which means somewhere out there are people who posed for these illustrations or perhaps their relatives who cherish these images.
This is on the back cover of the April 1954 National Geographic. National Geographic is a gold mine, I tell you. A GOLD MINE!
Unfortunately the next year, 1955, the Coke ads are photographs, no illustration, though I haven't yet found the December issue.
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I was mistaken about the Coke glass. I went to a business here locally (a Confectionery) that's been in the same location since 1922. They have a soda fountain. They also have six ounce glasses (just like the ones in the ad of yesterday), although they no longer have the Coca-Cola logo on them. They once did. The six ounce glass was the 'small' or regular portion, and according to one of the soda jerks (a lady older than myself who would know such things), they can no longer obtain the glasses in any size with the Coca-Cola logo on them. And I myself would like to know who illustrated those ads, but I suspect that whomever it was also did the famous Santa Claus ads for Coke as well. The style looks much the same.
ReplyDeleteYou know, I think it's that we're so used to everything being super-sized that little glasses look to be an anomaly. Get a small glass of water and I think "What the heck?"
ReplyDeleteAs to the illustrator, I asked Leif Peng at http://todaysinspiration.blogspot.com/
and he wrote me the following:
"I'm sorry to say I can't ID the artwork you're asking about. The first one... the kid bowling - is done in too literal a style to make it obvious. It could be Douglass Crockwell or Earl Mayan, two very literal realists who did a lot of work for the ad industry on big national accounts, but I really couldn't say for sure.
The second one has touches of Haddon Sundblom's influence to it and since he did tons of Coke ads I wouldn't be shocked to learn it had been done by somebody in his studio (he always had a stable of assistance who could mimic his style closely). Unfortunately, again, its too indistinct to say for sure who it was."
So this gives us a few names to go with. When I get some time I'll do a bit of sleuthing and see if anything comes up with any of these names and these ads. I looked around last night for Coke illustrators and only Sundblom shows up.
I have a favor to ask - I've just posted a piece of National Biscuit Company paper dated 1909, but of course the date is rubber stamped - very lightly at that - in the date field.
ReplyDeleteI have another piece from the same year, which also has B.(Barnum's) Animal Crackers as a line item. I have a current box of the Nabisco Animal Crackers, but I would like to obtain a high-res scan (300 dpi or better) of a circa 1909 package that I could use for the image on this second piece of paper. Any possibility you could point me in the direction of someone who could help me out with that? I'm willing to compensate, do not necessarily need the box but either side of the box would get the sender a nice piece of mail art Thank You and whatever is asked.
I'll post this in hopes someone may hear your call.
ReplyDeleteI have never seen one of these early boxes. All I have are the really big boxes they came out with in the late 1980s measuring 10.25" x 5.5".
I'll tell you, right now you've got me craving a glass of milk and a few lions. I haven't had animal crackers in years.
Here's one for sale on ebay from 1914:
ReplyDeletehttp://tinyurl.com/ya3nc3s
We used to watch The Eddie Fisher Show and that is definitely NOT Eddie Fisher! How did they make every illustrated model look so homogenic? It's a wonder anybody ever bought anything!
ReplyDeleteWe also watched Dinah Shore, Perry Como, Pat Boone, Tennessee Ernie Ford, Danny Thomas shows and more, I'm sure. Were there any shows on TV besides singing/variety ones? lol
Nice generic looking white people in all the ads. Really is odd to look through old magazines and see that everyone looks like a character from Mad Men.
ReplyDeleteYup, Dinah, Perry, Pat, Tennessee Ernie, Danny.
And then the westerns: Maverick, Cheyene, Sugarfoot, Bat Masterson, Broken Arrow, Dead or Alive, Bonanza, Gunsmoke and so many more. They loomed large in my life.