Regular readers of this blog know that – like Reddy Kilowatt – Old Dutch Beer will show up sooner or later on a post.
And here's a huge ad for my parents' favorite beer that ran in the Journal back on May 17, 1963.
The brewery in Findlay, Ohio had merged with International Breweries of Detroit around 1957. The merger resulted in the decision to redesign the classic Old Dutch label featuring the elderly German couple to bring it under the International banner. The result was a rather bland design with none of the charm or heritage of the original label.
Fortunately, in 1966 the corporate owners realized their mistake and restored Old Dutch's original label design (which I wrote about on this post).
Anyway, the 1963 ad is interesting because it stresses quantity over quality, with the introduction of an 8-pack. The copy is a little offbeat, referring to the new "handiest, dandiest" way to enjoy Old Dutch in those "shorty, sporty, space-saving bottles."
Talk about lame, tame, copy.
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Elsewhere on the page, as usual, there's plenty of fun stuff: an ad for Putt-R-Golf on Oberlin Avenue; an ad for Cloverleaf Speedway where Dennis Thompson was no doubt tearing up the track; and an ad for Welch's Sport Shop on Broadway, specializing in fishing tackle, rod & reel repairs, Coleman camping equipment, guns, ammo, and archery supplies.
Isn't it great to be reminded of the days where the Journal printed all of the bowling and golf league scores? Lorain was a real community back then. It's also neat to see all of the racetrack results; it makes me imagine a bunch of Damon Runyon characters on Broadway, crowded around a pay phone, waiting to call their bookies.
And at the top of the page is Jack Nicklaus' "Tip a Day" sports feature. Those are some pretty good illustrations of the Golden Bear. I saw him on TV a few weeks ago, with Lee Trevino (one of my Dad's favorites) and Annika Sorenstam, who I used to love watching play. It made me feel good to see them all.
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| That's Lee Trevino at left, then Annika, Gary Player, and Nicklaus |
That "Mel-O-Dry To Satisfy" reminds me of something that Don Draper from Mad Men would come up with.Dylan Mulvaney need not apply.
ReplyDeleteCoors original "banquet" beer still sells their 12 packs in the "sporty, shorty, space saving" bottles. I'd have to say, they take up more room in the fridge though! Strange marketing by Old Dutch. I think "the good beer" is all they needed for their slogan.
ReplyDeleteBeer's too slow. Or, it was.
ReplyDeleteI met Lee Trevino once at the Champions luncheon for the FedEx St. Jude Classic, where he was our guest speaker. He was very entertaining and very friendly. One of the best ball strikers of all time.
ReplyDeleteIn Pennsyltucky, I saw lots of folks from the Cleaverland area drinking Old Dutch.
ReplyDeleteJust like I saw lots of people from the Picksburg area drinking Iron City.
Except undertakers. No matter where they were from, their go-to was Pabst Blue Ribbon.
In cans.
A bit too early for me to be racing, Dan, I was a Junior at Marion L Steele High School in 1963. In general I didn't race on oval tracks but there were a few local sports car clubs that set up autocrosses on oval tracks. We added slaloms on the straightaway to make it more of a sports car course.
ReplyDeleteFirelands Sports Car Club held them at Sandusky Speedway and my club, Erie Shores Sports Car Club from Elyria conducted one race at Lorain County Speedway. My favorite oval was in Powell, Ohio. It was a large 1/2 mile oval and a 1/4 mile oval inside with a common straightaway. It was actually a NASCAR track for a couple of races in the 1950s. I never lost a race there.
I ran one time at Cloverleaf. One of the Corvette clubs set up autocrosses there on Saturday evenings. My friend Ron Faller and I were headed for the SCCA National Championships in Salina, Kansas. I fabricated a double decker trailer to hold both cars, my Tojiero formula car and his Sunbeam Tiger. We wanted to try it out so we went to Cloverleaf. That's when I discovered that my lightweight, powerful car did not do well on slippery tracks! I don't know what kind of tire the regular oval racers use but I didn't have them!!
Ron became the A Prepared national winner and I settled for third place in A Modified.
It's nice to see that Art Crow had his best round of golf at Willow Creek. I knew Art from is business Crow Lumber in Vermillion when I used to call on him as his Rep at The Journal. I remember very well the box score pages of the "old" Journal. As a kid you would wait to see if your name was in the paper for Little League or CYO basketball, if it was that was a BIG deal! It was the Sports pages and comics that drew me into being a newspaper reader. What a shame that today's youth are missing out on that community. Todd
ReplyDeleteOld Dutch was the first beer I ever drank. 15 years old at the time.
ReplyDelete(Shhhhh, don't tell my mom.)