Saturday’s ad is entitled Meeting Her Parents, and the illustration was done in 1949 by Douglass Crockwell. It’s #28 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 young man is apparently meeting his girlfriend’s parents for the first time. He’s thoughtfully helping her move a table so her mother can set down a tray of beers on it. Once they’re married that will stop, of course, as dear old Dad just sits there while everyone else serves him. There’s only three beer bottles on that tray. I wonder who’s getting stiffed? Also, look closely at the magazine in Dad’s lap. It’s open to a page showing the same ad we’re looking at. How meta.
