Tuesday’s ad is entitled Friends Over For Tennis, and the illustration was done in 1949 by Douglass Crockwell. It’s #31 in a series entitled “Home Life in America,” also known as the Beer Belongs series of ads that the United States Brewers Foundation ran from 1945 to 1956. In this ad, a group of apparently well-to-do people invited some “friends over for tennis.” I can’t imagine that even in 1949 that many people had their own tennis courts, so I ‘m not sure who this ad was directed at or why they though people might be able to relate to this situation. I suspect it may have been aspirational, since everyone thinks they’ll be wealthy enough to one day, though it’s probably only the 1% now who might, much less in the 1940s when wealth wasn’t nearly as consolidated.
Archives for May 3, 2016
Patent No. 2116006A: Hop And Stem Separator
Today in 1938, US Patent 2116006 A was issued, an invention of Edouard Thys, for his “Hop and Stem Separator.” There’s no Abstract, although in the description it includes this summary:
The object of the present invention is generally to improve and simplify the construction and operation of separators; to provide a separator which is particularly intended for separating stems from hops; and more specifically stated, to provide an inclined endless conveyor having trough-shaped members extending crosswise thereof, said troughs being divided into small pockets and said pockets being so shaped that the hops when deposited on the conveyor will settle in the bottom portion of the pockets while the stems will stand endwise and project upwardly from the pockets or lie on the surface thereof in a position where they can be readily removed by a revolving brush under which the vation of the hop and stem separating machine.