Tag Archives: Advertising

Movie Advertising From The New York Daily News 1974

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What’s Playing At The Movies – Ads From The Daily News 1974

That’s Entertainment Alongside Porn

Because I own some old newspapers that report historic events, I was looking at the New York Daily News of August 27, 1974 announcing the death of Charles Lindbergh on the front page. Turning the pages my attention was drawn to the movie advertisements.

The ads are simple, frequently without captivating graphics and  usually lacking even brief summaries of the plot of the movies. Besides giving the theatres and times they were playing at, these ads were supposed to attract potential viewers with the title, the stars or a reviewers blurb.

The disarray of the motion picture industry in the seventies is evident in the variety of films playing at theaters.

Adjacently advertised next to one another are Deep Throat; The Devil In Miss Jones; The Longest Yard and Bring Me The Head Of Alfredo Garcia. Two X-rated and two R-rated films.

Deep Throat (1973) was the first “mainstream” pornographic film. It was Continue reading →

A List Of New York City Hotels In 1877

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Visitors Could Stay At These New York City Hotels In 1877

We’ve provided lists like this twice before for New York’s hotels in 1882 and 1964.

This is useful to someone researching or wondering about where the New York City hotels of 1877 were located.

This compilation  comes from The Practical Guide To New York City and Brooklyn by Henry Morford; Union News Company and Lee, Shephard and Dillingham( 1877).

The advertisement for Stevens House from the book shows a rate of $1.00 per day for a single room. Double occupancy at most hotels ran between $1.00 to $2.00.

One thing to take note of is that 38 Continue reading →

Old New York In Photos #189 – The Recently Completed Flatiron Building 1902

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The Innovative Flatiron Skyscraper – Available To Rent 1902

Our photograph is from American Art Views, a view book published September 15, 1903 showing contemporary New York City.

To the right, with a flag on its roof is the six-story Fifth Avenue Hotel (1859-1908). The clock in front of the hotel remains standing today, though the hotel is long gone. On the corner of 24th Street we can glimpse the sign for for “Maillard’s.”

Maillard’s restaurant and confectionery shop was on the ground floor of The Fifth Avenue Hotel.  Continue reading →

Classic Hollywood #177 – Rita Hayworth And Penguin – 1937

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Rita Hayworth And A Smoking Penguin

Sometimes we run across photographs with no logical explanation. When there is no news slug we are left to speculate – what is going on here? This is one of those cases.

Besides being identified on the rear as Rita Hayworth and a United Press International photo, there was nothing else written identifying the action or location.

Fortunately entering “Rita Hayworth” and Penguin in a search engine can solve a mystery. Continue reading →

The Nearly Indestructible Pay Phone

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 Even Being Indestructible Did Not Stop The Pay Phone’s Extinction

There are certainly people who have never seen a pay phone before. And people who are familiar with pay phones may have only seen them with push buttons. Rotary dial phones were replaced in the 1970s by push buttons. Whereas pay phones managed to remain ubiquitous until the 1990s.

Pay phones were once everywhere. You could find them in hotels restaurants, gas stations, drug stores, transportation facilities, office and public buildings and on street corners,

The ad above ran in the September 11, 1971 New Yorker magazine.

In 1970 vandals cost American Telephone and Telegraph $12 million Continue reading →

Women’s Corsets, Bras, Underwear, Silk Petticoats And Bodices -1919

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Undergarments For Women From James McCreery & Co. 1919

The two illustrations seen here are excerpts from a full page ad. This advertisement comes from the April 27, 1919 New York Sun daily newspaper. Shown is an array of intimates of the late teens that a fashionable woman would wear beneath their clothes.

The uptown location of James McCreery & Co. at Fifth Avenue and 34th Street Continue reading →

Old New York In Photos #178 – Elevated At Eighth Avenue & 110th St

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View Of Eighth Avenue At 110th Street – 1906

Our Detroit Publishing Co. photograph is from 1906 and shows Eighth Avenue looking north.  It is at this juncture the Ninth Avenue elevated completes its turn from Ninth avenue to Eighth Avenue at 110th Street and proceeds uptown.

As usual there was a postcard issued that almost certainly came from this photograph. The advertising and perspective are exactly the same, but the postcard contains many alterations.

For dramatic effect Continue reading →

Dr. Cole Helps Men To Stop “Wrecking Your Manhood” -1903

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NIGHT LOSSES THAT DULL THE MIND, WEAKEN THE BODY, DESTROY THE SEXUAL STRENGTH AND CHANGE THE MAN ARE UNHEALTHY AND SHOULD BE CURED

In this advertisement from The St. Paul Globe of July 18, 1903, Dr. Alfred L. Cole does not explicitly say what condition he is treating in “night losses”, but it sounds extremely perilous.

The mores and morals of the time would not permit the condition to be talked about in polite society.

But, reading between the lines, Dr. Cole proposes to stop men from having wet dreams. Continue reading →

The Sexy Women’s Lingerie, Corsets, Nightwear & Undergarments Of The Early 20th Century

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What The Early 20th Century Woman Wore Under Her Clothes

Sexy Lingerie, Corsets & Other Flattering Clothing

Gimbel Brothers Department Store Catalog 1910

What was considered sexy 100 years ago might not draw the same conclusions today.

To look her best, the woman of the late 19th and early 20th century was stuffed into a variety of tight fitting and often times restrictive undergarments.

Much like today with online shopping, store catalogs offered goods of all sorts to the public without the need to first try on the merchandise.

Gimbel Brothers Department Store Catalog 1910

From nightgowns to corsets to petticoats to chemises to reducing garments, women could buy a wide variety of underclothing, never setting foot in a store. Continue reading →

National Lampoon’s 1970s Funky Advertisers

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In The 1970s, National Lampoon Magazine Took Any & All Advertisers

Model demonstrating the proper facial use of a vibrator. From National Lampoon, January 1977

Matty Simmons the CEO of National Lampoon and author of If You Don’t Buy This Book We’ll Kill This Dog (Barricade Books), describes in his 1994 memoir the challenges of getting traditional advertisers during National Lampoon magazine’s first decade. Continue reading →