Tipping my virtual hat to the magazine illustrations suggested by this week's
Sepia Saturday, today I feature excerpts from LIFE magazine from April 12, 1954. This date happens to be the day that Bill Haley's "Rock Around the Clock" 45 RPM record was released, heralding the birth of what was soon to be called "rock and roll" -- auspiciously followed a mere three days later by my own birth.
Amazing what 20 cents got you 61 years ago.
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| "Sub-teens," not "pre-teens," mind you. Note ye olde seams in the stockings. How is that bass remaining upright? |
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| While the sub-teens do-si-do, mom puts on her evening attire and fetishizes her modern kitchen supplies. |
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| However, beyond the horizon, trouble brews. Gotta keep ahead of those Russkies. |
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| Duck and cover, or evacuate in an orderly manner by carpool! |
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| But until the day of reckoning, don't forget to butter up the boss and his wife. And don't skimp on the freedom beer! |
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| American Capitalism and High Tech roll on! |
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| Join the march toward modern mechanization! |
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| That's not science fiction, it's Industry! |
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| Speaking of which, don't forget, we really need to keep technologically vigilant against those durn Russkies. |
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| Even if we are ignoring the fact that Bayer was, uh, the manufacturer of Zyklon-B. |
What wonderful ads, Sean! Carried me right back to those days (I was eight years old in 1954) -- my family got Life Magazine every week; I loved it!
ReplyDeleteWhen I was in high school we used to drive past a store selling square dance outfits and I always wanted one, like the girls in the first picture are wearing. We never even stopped there, just drove past on our way out of Detroit. In 1954 I was also 8.
ReplyDeleteWonderful....and shall I get some aspirin? Where they on their way out and she was suddenly overcome with neuralgia or coming back having over-indulged?
ReplyDeleteI contend she was out with her husband to one of his boring but attendance-required company dinners trying to hear the inane conversation at their own table over the low roar of the crowd around them - pierced occasionally by some woman's high squealing laughter. That would give anyone a headache!
ReplyDeleteLawn mowers haven't changed much, have they.
ReplyDeleteGreat medley! I like the happy lawnmower people marching off two by two. A few years ago I picked up an ancient Burroughs adding machine that was abandoned on the street. It weighs 30+ pounds and is a marvel of intricate gears, levers, and springs for a machine that can only add and subtract.
ReplyDeleteGood to see that Briggs & Stratton weren't sexist. No way are those girls sub-teens :-)
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ReplyDelete1954 was a banner year. I was 12 and a sub-teen wearing a crinoline under my flaring skirts. I do not every remember wearing nylons with a seam...but I guess we did.
ReplyDelete1954 was a banner year. I was 12 and a sub-teen wearing a crinoline under my flaring skirts. I do not every remember wearing nylons with a seam...but I guess we did.
ReplyDeleteI really like seeing all those adds. The adding machine really dated the whole group as they were getting excited about it. I was four years old and the time and being sheltered in southern Iowa not know what was going on except that of the farm activities.
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