I did a bit of research and found out that Mrs Heminway was a real person. I found her husband's obituary here. This woman was his second wife, as you will see. Her obit is here. She lived a lot of years after that Camel ad. I wonder when or if she ever quit.
My father smoked Camels. I guess because of that I figured it was mostly men who smoked them, but clearly not so. Or maybe they were trying to get more women to smoke them.
This ad was on the back of a magazine called The American Home, which I bought at a retro diner the other day. I also bought another one dated January 1942, when we were officially in the War. It is quite likely I'll post more pictures of the covers and ads. There is more about the magazine here. I find old magazines fascinating. I wish I had begun collecting them ages ago.
Ohhhhhh… Who is that lovable yellow Lab in your header photo? Is he/she yours? Oh, my heart melts....Reminds me of my beautiful Anastasia from years past. She was quite a dog, so much so that we switched to lovable, more OBEDIENT, more trainable Goldens after our darling, ever so friendly ANA passed. But I loved her so much. Labs are so great!!!
ReplyDeleteLucy! We've had her since 2015. More here: https://lettersfromahillfarm.blogspot.com/2015/06/introducing-lucy-labrador.html
DeleteWe're thinking of getting a second Labrador at some point.
Nan,
DeleteThanks so much for the link. And I will vicariously enjoy any and all plans and adventures you have of getting a second Labbie.
What saves us in terms of a Labrador's energy is that we have use of our son-in-law's four wheeler, and every day Tom takes her up the hill and into the woods. That calms her right down! And in the house, if she is overly-excited we put a harness on her and for some reason it mellows her right out. Before Lucy, we had a stray who was part Lab, and a dog that was our daughter's who was part Rotty and part Lab. We are wowed by the kindness of the breed. The utter love Lucy has for everyone. With little grandchildren around, this is just what we wanted in a dog.
DeleteOld magazines are great sources of social history, aren't they - adverts do really mirror the spirit of a certain country in a certain period of time. My Grandma used to store rows of old "Readers Digest" magazines in her garden cottage; we loved browsing them as children. Some of them were then maybe 20-30 years old, and those were the most interesting for us.
ReplyDeleteMy Dad smoked Camel for a long time and then switched to Gauloises. When he nearly died last year and was in ICU and in hospital for a few weeks last October, he had no way of smoking - and thankfully, has not yet started again - we hope he never will again!
Was his illness related to smoking? I always wanted to try Gauloises. They were always mentioned in books and movies. Readers Digest was big when I was a kid.
DeleteImagine having a "potrait" paid for by a cigarette company!! How times change. I was a smoker myself from 18 - 40 when I gave up. When I think back to how I must have smelled, how the house smelled, how my office smelled...... yes, how times change! And I love the fact that the ad says "28% less nicotine" but nothing about the tar.
ReplyDeleteOld publications are always a wonderful glimpse at how were were, aren't they? Thanks Nan.
In the days when most everyone smoked, the houses, etc. didn't "smell" because they all smelled the same! I have no memories of my house smelling bad. Both my parents smoked.
DeleteI see the "Shell Seekers" my favorite book, could not put it down and now may read again. So fortunate none of my children smoke, parents did. Enjoy your sharing so very much and your comments to me and your recipes.
ReplyDelete80 degrees here predicted. Miss my little Callie, daughter Jamie has her, cannot trip over her :(.
I am thoroughly enjoying this second reading. It has been decades since I read it. Very different feeling for me reading it now.
DeleteThank you for your kind, thoughtful words.
I also love old magazines. When I was doing research for my dissertation, I would sometimes go to the Columbia University library and spend some time going through their collection of Life, Look, Good Housekeeping, and a few others. My favorite ads were the WWII Coca-Cola ads. They were always so positive at such a dark time.
ReplyDeleteI see you are reading The Shell Seekers. I just loved that book when I read it. Did you see the movie with Angela Lansbury?
What a treat for you to do that. Ads are so evocative of the time and place.
DeleteI did see the movie, and I liked the ending better! haha. But the actors don't look like their descriptions in the book. I must write about the book sometime. It is affecting me in different ways this second reading.
Another interest we share. My mother ordered National Geographic magazines for the month of our births ... don't know if you can still do that! ... and it is so delightful to page through them and see what the Ad were about.
ReplyDeleteWhat a wonderful thing for her to do!! I did buy a Life Magazine once that was my actual birth day, but I don't have it anymore. Not sure what happened to it.
DeleteAnother thing about magazines ... for years and years I subscribed to and collected issues of Architectual Digest. At the time of this move to New Mexico I had to downsize my library and advertised the AD for free to be picked up and moved. A charming young woman was thrilled to get them as a gift for her mother. So I was comforted knowing they were still bringing joy in another home.
ReplyDeleteWhat a nice outcome! Thank you for coming back to tell me!
DeleteMy dad smoked camels when I was a child. hard to imagine now, but I honestly remember how I loved the smoky smell that meant he was home from work. ... I have several times searched out old magazines with peoples birth week or month ....they make nice gifts for the “big” birthdays .... what the world was like when you were born. I even scored a Life with the exact date for one special 50th Birthday.
DeleteWe had a "butt'ry" when I was a kid and on the shelf were cartons of Camels and L&Ms. His and hers. They both died at around 60, but who knows. I just heard about an English man who smoked 100 a day and died at 96!
DeleteI love the photo for the Camel ad. My dad smoked Camels as a young man, I remember them well. I liked the way the cigarette smoke mingled with his after shave when I got close to him--times do change. Now I can hardly stand to smell cigarettes. I loved Look and Life magazines when I was a child even though some of the current event photographs alarmed me, e.g., photos of the aftermath of WWII. Mother got McCalls magazine, and my sisters and I all loved Betsy McCall paper dolls.
ReplyDeleteI love what you told me about the mix of smells. What a dear memory.
DeleteI loved Betsy McCall! I played and played and always looked forward to the new magazines. Hard to imagine kids now taking the time to cut and fold the tabs on the dolls. But they were sure big when I was a girl.
It is another world now, and from the smoking point of view, a better one, though still many teenagers are beginning to smoke. I used to smoke but quit 38 years ago, thank heaven. I have a lot of old magazines from the 20s and early 30s and a few even older. They are fun to look through every few years or decades...Do you remember the old tv ads about smoking? I saw one recently when I looked up an old Jack Benny tv show on YouTube. I wanted to find the one which had dancers whose tops were cigarette packs. It fascinated me as a child. Old Gold. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Mrh3x8I0E-s
ReplyDeleteI think more people smoke than we know. I know quite a few in their 30s who smoke, and they say that e-cigarettes are very appealing to teens. And you see all those workers huddled outdoors smoking.
DeleteMy uncle Bob, a dairy farmer smoked Old Golds. I'll check out the video. Thanks for the link.
I love that old stuff too. It makes you feel like you're traveling back in time. It's great the way you can look up odd things using google. I'm always doing that to find information about random topics.
ReplyDelete