Thursday’s ad is for Budweiser, from 1943. In this ad, featuring the Bald Eagle soaring with U.S. war planes in a nakedly patriotic ad (it was mid-WW2 after all), you’ll be surprised to learn what the ad is actually about. Despite the all-American imagery, the ad is about refrigeration, and gliders, and how A-B converted their refrigeration division to make gliders for the military to help the war effort. And if you look at the bottom, A-B was doing a lot for the war effort, and wasn’t shy about letting people now, probably still smarting from the prohibition years and trying to get back in their customers’ and especially the teetotalers good graces.
