Do people still join Christmas Clubs like they used to?
I ask that every time I post vintage Christmas Clubs ads from the local banks. Yes, they're still offered at many banking institutions, but I doubt if the participation level is anywhere near what it used to be in the 1950s and 60s. Plus so many people are living paycheck to paycheck that it's probably unthinkable to imagine putting aside money for use a year later.
Anyway, it's always interesting to look back and see how the Clubs were marketed in the old days. Below you see an ample sample of Christmas Club ads from Christmas 1954 that ran in the Lorain Journal.
Citizens Home & Savings Association ran a lot of ads for their Club, all with jolly artwork.
Nov. 15, 1954
Dec. 15, 1954
Dec. 29, 1954
This full-page ad for the Central Bank Co. should probably include a Recycled logo. But being full-page, at least the artwork is clearer.
Nov. 25, 1954
This ad for Lorain Banking Company gives me a sense of deja vu as well. The ad copy is true; only the Santa Claus has been changed to protect the innocent.
Nov. 25, 1954
At least the ad for National Bank of Lorain is unique. Like the Central Bank ad, a rendering of the bank building is helpfully provided.
Dec. 3, 1954
The City Bank had a unique approach as well. It kicks off its campaign with a happy ad before sliding down into a grim, humorless abyss.
Nov. 25, 1954
Dec. 1, 1954
Dec. 15, 1954
The Lorain County Savings & Trust Co. followed the not-so-jolly approach as well with this bare-bones ad. The suits there probably reviewed the ad artwork and shrugged, "Ah, it's good enough for Lorain!"
Dec. 15, 1954
****
Please join Reddy in wishing longtime blog contributor and good guy Alan Hopewell a very Happy Birthday! Have a great day, Alan!!
If not, perhaps you're still stuck on what to buy. Not to worry; our old pal Reddy Kilowatt, your trusty electric servant, is here with some gift suggestions circa late 1940s – early 1950s to put a spark in your holiday shopping effort.
All of the ads below ran in the Lorain Journal. Note that Reddy was kind of lamp-happy the first few years. But when he moved up to major appliances, Reddy was always ready to switch brands if need be.
Hills Department Store has been a regular topic on this blog for years. The store out on Route 57 in South Lorain was a favorite shopping destination for Baby Boomers. Many of us have fond memories of shopping there as kids, and capping off a visit to the store with a treat such as a Frozen Coke or freshly popped popcorn.
One of the things that made the Hills chain so memorable was its strong visual identity. The Hills logo – a black oval with a script 'Hills' reversed out of it – was distinctive and modern. (A similar example from today would be the Target chain.)
Perhaps the most unique thing about Hills advertising was its use of illustrations to set a mood in its newspaper ads, rather than show a lot of sale items. The ads featured graphics that were seasonal and attention-getting, and the message was usually simple and effective.
Christmas-themed ads followed these same guidelines. Hills ran a lot of them beginning in November, almost every day in fact (which I'm sure made the Journal happy). Here's an ample sample from Christmas 1964. Enjoy!
Are there still stag nights and stag parties? Or have those terms dropped out of popular usage?
That's what I was wondering when I saw this ad for Ted Jacobs, which ran in the Dec. 13, 1954 Lorain Journal, promoting its special "For Men Only" shopping event. It's a great idea.
According to an online dictionary, a 'stag night' or 'stag party' is any party attended by men only. But in many other countries (such as Britain or Canada) it means a celebration held for a man shortly before his wedding and attended by his male friends. And we all know those can get, well, a little raunchy.
I had to chuckle at the layout of this page. Right above the Ted Jacobs ad is one for Eldred's featuring a grinning reindeer. And a male deer is commonly known as – what else? – a stag!
The ads reminded me of a scene from a Bugs Bunny cartoon called What's Cooking' Doc? in which the wise-guy rabbit is lobbying for an Academy Award. To convince the Academy voters that he deserves one, he tosses some film canisters of "some of his best scenes" to Smokey the projectionist and tells him to "roll'em." Unfortunately, that's not what starts spooling through the projector.
Which reminds me of a funny story.
It was late in my high school days when a few of my buddies invited me to accompany them to some kind of fund-raising event/party held at some local hall. Along with a raffle, there was going to be a buffet and a cash bar. It sounded fairly innocuous when I described it to my parents.
At the actual event, I remember that it was very smoky. It was mostly older guys, drinking, talking, etc. As a high school kid, I felt fairly uncomfortable, and it all seemed like a bad episode of Happy Days, one with the inevitable humiliation in store for hapless Richie Cunningham and his pals.
While sitting there, my buddies and I noticed a rather hard-looking, older woman walk in accompanied by some sleazy-looking guy carrying a boom box. I wondered: who were they? But they sat down at a nearby table and helped themselves to the buffet (which was mainly fried chicken), so I didn't pay any further attention to them.
That is, until later when the lights dimmed and she turned out to be a stripper. Her partner manned the portable sound system and provided music to bump and grind by.
The whole thing was kinda seedy, although nobody seemed to mind. I kept waiting for Lorain's Finest to come storming in and yell, "This is a raid!"
Shortly after her performance ended, someone set up a movie screen and we were treated to a grainy stag film. I'll leave it at that. In fact, I did leave after a few minutes, and drove home in slack-jawed shock.
It was a night best forgotten. I told my parents it was a boring party and that not much happened.
But a few days later, I was in the basement doing something, and Dad happened to be down there too. Right in the middle of some small talk, Dad matter-of-factly said, "I heard she ate a lot of chicken."
I looked at him and said, "Who?"
Then I saw Dad break into a huge grin. "The other night. At the party."
Gulp! I swallowed hard and started to stutter some kind of reply, when Dad just started laughing. "Was she pretty?" he asked.
"No, not really," I replied. "She was kind of tired-looking."
Dad saw that I looked a little anxious, and just kind of chuckled. "Don't worry about it," he reassured me. "Just don't tell your mother."
And that was the end of it.
How did he find out? Apparently someone he worked with at BF Goodrich was there, and recognized me – and ratted me out. But Dad was a good sport, and got a kick out of ribbing me. It was the first of many little bonding moments we would share over the next few decades.
A sure sign that Christmas is coming is the presence of the huge Santa Claus in front of Hot Dog Heaven in Amherst. It just wouldn't be Christmas in Amherst without it.
How long has this tradition been going on?
Although I've researched him before, I know now that Santa's first appearance in front of the popular restaurant was Christmas 1982.
Dec. 9, 1982
The following year, Journal ads for Hot Dog Heaven running in December included a mention of its special Santa as the perfect backdrop for a holiday photo.
Dec. 2, 1983
Dec. 8, 1984
A few years after Santa's initial appearance at Hot Dog Heaven, the Journal again dispatched a shutterbug to capture the jolly old elf's installation.
Dec. 19, 1985
With its Santa Claus well-known and visitors coming from miles around to see and photograph him, it really wasn't necessary to plug him in newspaper ads all the time. After all, everyone knows where to find Santa now – he's right on Cleveland Avenue in Amherst.
I don't eat a lot of hot dogs these days (they're not exactly health food), but after preparing this post, I think I have a hankering for a Hot Dog Heaven chili dog.
Friday's post featured a 1954 Gray Drug ad with an offbeat Santa Claus. Here's another Journal ad for the Cleveland-based chain with an unusual St. Nick. This ad ran six years later on Dec. 19, 1960. (Note how the name is now Gray Drug Stores as opposed to Gray's Drug Stores as seen in the earlier ad.)
"Gifts For The Smoker" is the ad theme, so Santa's puffing on his own cheroot. While a similar ad would probably be unthinkable today, it very likely didn't raise too many eyebrows in the 1960s.
It's kind of interesting seeing the different brands of cigars, such as R.G. Dun, Kings Club, Perfectos and Wolf Bros. Crooks. The cigarette brands are interesting too: Old Gold, Viceroy, Winston, Lucky Strike (Don Draper's client on Mad Men), Camels, Belair and Philip Morris.
What, no Salem (Dad's favorite)?
Dad hardly ever smoked. It was something he started while in the Army during World War II. If you smoked, you got a break – so naturally he took it up as a habit. But as for Dad smoking while I was growing up, it was only done in secret, such as when he took my brothers and me fishing. He wasn't fooling Mom though; the peppermints more or less gave him away. In later years, he probably smoked one cigarette a day, and not even the whole thing. And when he no longer drove, I was his enabler – buying him his Salems. One pack lasted him forever.
But let's get back to the ad.
I had to chuckle at Viceroy being one of the brands listed. I still remember the Wacky Package version: Vicejoy.
"Vicejoy's got the taste that rots" is the Wacky version of "Viceroy's got the taste that's right."
The rest of the Gray Drug ad comprises various pipe tobacco brands (such as Sir Walter Raleigh), the pipes themselves and various accessories, including pipe racks and humidors.
Grandpa Bumke (my Mom's dad) was a smoker. He smoked pipes, cigars (we ended up with a few of his cool cigar boxes) and cigarettes. He used one of those long cigarette holders like the Pink Panther.
Grandpa even had an ashtray stand in his living room that we used to fiddle with. (We had to entertain ourselves somehow when we visited.)
I guess it's not surprising that Grandpa was smoking when he sat for this portrait. It's how I remember him.
But smoking eventually contributed to his early demise at 64. It's odd knowing that I've already outlived him.
****
I posted part of this Gray Drug ad before, waaaaay back in 2009.
You might not. There weren't very many of them in our area. The first one was located in the O'Neil - Sheffield Center when it opened in 1954. Eventually there was one at Oakwood Shopping Center, and finally, at Midway Mall. In the late 1980s, the chain was sold to Rite Aid (my least favorite drug store).
One thing's for sure: Gray Drug had some offbeat Santa Claus characters in its newspaper ads.
Here's one, from the Lorain Journal of December 13, 1954 – 70 years ago today.
Santa's got those pie-eyes that the early Mickey Mouse had. Speaking of the famous rodent, the Walt Disney Target Set is one of the toys shown in the ad. Since the package graphics are hard to decipher in the ad, at first I thought the Disney characters (specifically Donald Duck) were the target. But a look at a target set currently on eBay shows the beloved characters as merely spectators at target practice.
A close look at the cartoon menagerie reveals that Mickey brought along his "nephews" of unknown parentage. However, he should be paying more attention to poor Pluto Pup, who is in the line of fire (and in danger of ending up like Old Yeller).
The toy buyer for Gray Drug must have been thinking green, because there's two different frog toys in the ad – Peeper the Frog from Rempel, and Jolly Jumper pull-toy. Both are on eBay right now.
And if you weren't in the mood for froggie fun, there was Mr. Potato Head "in his own li'l house." The famous spud's cardboard domicile is on eBay as well.
Driving around town to see Christmas lights has always been one of the most special activities of the holiday season.
We did it just every year when I was growing up in the 1960s, mainly sticking to the West Side neighborhoods. It seems like everyone put up some kind of lights.
We had our favorite houses during our drive. There was a house near Masson School (at the intersection of Edgewood Dr. and W. 40th) that put a big Santa Claus figure in their picture window each year. We always watched for it. (It was not unlike watching for the big Pink Panther doll in the window of a vacation house that was on the tram tour of Put-in-Bay, described by the tour guide as a "big Hollywood star living in the island.")
Even as an adult, I still enjoy seeing the Christmas lights as part of my holiday fun, especially the display at Finwood Estate on Abbe Road.
Although checking out Christmas light displays might seem like something from the modern era, it's been going on for a long time. Case in point: the small blurb below from the "Log of Lorain" column of the Lorain Journal of December 28, 1940.
I wish I had a photo of it because it sounds nice, especially since it was created by the residents of the Erie Apartments. I still like to see homemade decorations (such as big, painted wooden cutouts) since they were made to make kids happy and have a lot of heart.
Speaking of the Erie Apartments, I've driven by them thousands of times, since I lived along that stretch of Route 6 for almost thirty years.
I always thought the building had a lot of charm, and was just the right size, with only four apartments there. I even considered trying to get an apartment there a couple years ago before I bought my condo. But I ended up in the Overlook Apartments instead (which I wrote about in a four part series starting here, and continuing with parts 2, 3 and 4).
Oddly enough, both the Erie Apartments and the Overlook Apartments were advertising in the March 10, 1928 Lorain Journal – in the same ad.
