It’s That Guy Again!

It’s been a while since I posted another one of my discoveries of Ed, the Ed Tomko Chrysler Jeep Dodge mascot appearing in the pages of vintage Lorain Journals. You remember him – he was the little “everyman" who was obviously part of some kind of clip art package that the Journal owned and used from the early 1950s right into the 1970s.

In the Tomko ads, he is shown in a perpetual, toothless holler, as seen at right. Usually these ads depict him in various humorous scenarios by plunking his head on another body for zany effect.

Here on my blog, I’ve already documented five or six of his appearances in vintage ads for just about everything, including TV repair, painting contractors, new houses, furniture, and of course, new cars.

Well, here are two more examples of him quietly working to promote something. Below is a 1967 ad for the Antlers Hotel cocktail lounge promoting “Gene,” who regularly played the organ and piano there. Ed gives his thumbs-up approval. The ad ran around St. Patrick’s Day that year.

And here’s another one from ten years earlier. This ad promotes the well-remembered "Family Weekly" magazine that was part of the Journal on Saturday for so many years and was apparently a new addition locally in early April 1957.

April 4, 1957 Lorain Journal ad

Could that be Ed’s wife in the ad?

Anyway, to learn more about the history of Family Weekly and other "Sunday magazines," click here.

July 1957 Family Weekly (courtesy Ebay)