Brookston Beer Bulletin

Jay R. Brooks on Beer

  • Home
  • About
  • Editorial
  • Birthdays
  • Art & Beer

Socialize

  • Dribbble
  • Email
  • Facebook
  • Flickr
  • GitHub
  • Google+
  • Instagram
  • LinkedIn
  • Pinterest
  • RSS
  • StumbleUpon
  • Twitter
  • YouTube
Powered by Head Quarters Built on WordPress
You are here: Home / Art & Beer / Norman Rockwell’s Beer

Norman Rockwell’s Beer

February 3, 2016 By Jay Brooks 3 Comments

art-beer
Today is the birthday of American illustrator and painter Norman Rockwell (February 3, 1894-November 8, 1978) one of the 20th centuries most famous artists. Known for his wholesome depictions of everyday American life, his paintings appeared on the covers of the Saturday Evening Post for almost fifty years, and he frequently did work involving the Boy Scouts, Boys’ Life and such patriotic subjects as “The Four Freedoms.” For a long time, I had assumed his conspicuous absence from the “Beer Belongs” series of ads that the brewing industry did from the 1940s through the 1960s employing some of the best known illustrators of the day, was because he wanted to maintain his wholesome image. But I later found out that he had done quite a bit of advertising work, including for at least one beer company, the Jacob Schmidt Brewing Co.

There’s also “Man with Sandwich and Glass of Beer,” which I believe was painted for an unspecified beer ad, between 1947 and 1950. I far as I can tell, it was never used, as I’ve been unable to turn up the illustration in any actual advertisement. If someone as famous as Rockwell had done the ad, it would be highly collectible and would turn up somewhere.

rockwell-beer-and-sandwich

But several years earlier, in 1930, he did do an illustration for the Jacob Schmidt Brewing Co., and specifically for their brand, Schmidt’s City Club Beer, which they started brewing in the 1920s as a non-alcoholic beer, though after 1933 it became a golden lager.

Schmidts-City-Club-Beer--Labels-Jacob-Schmidt-Brewing-Company
The City Club Beer label in 1933.

It looks like they continued to use the image, and who can blame them, for years afterwards, both in other ads and merchandising. For example, they used the artwork as the back of a deck of promotional playing cards for the brewery in 1954.

Schmidts-City-Club-Beer-Blotters-Jacob-Schmidt-Brewing-Company_6272-1

I’d seen the ad before, and searched in vain for a decent size image of it, finding only small ones. But then over the summer, “thrifting” (which is what my son calls going to yard sales and thrift shops), I found a coffee table book of Norman Rockwell’s advertising work published in 1985. And lo and behold, there was the beer ad. So I picked up the book, scanned the ad, and here it is below in all of its glory. One of the few beer ads by one of the best known illustrators in America. It includes all his trademark folksy charm, and it still relatively subtle for an advertisement, which the wooden case of beer being the most prominent sign of the brand. The bottles have the City Club labels on them, but they’re hard to see sitting on the table. A very cool ad and definitely one of my favorites.

Schmidt's-norman-rockwell-1930
Click here to see the artwork full size.

Filed Under: Art & Beer, Birthdays, Just For Fun Tagged With: Advertising, Birthdays



Comments

  1. Jim Christenson says

    March 27, 2016 at 1:26 pm

    I have the full size poster of this picture minus the outer cardboard frame, it had a fold cardboard stands so it could stand by itself. I have had this poster for about 50 + yrs.
    I would say the picture is in good condition but needs cleaning, suggestions on how to restore.

    Reply
  2. David porter says

    May 25, 2016 at 11:25 pm

    I have one it is yellowed but can still read it and looks ok wood like to get a better one is that possible the one I have has a foe wood cardboard frame with and inscribe at the bottom of it jacob schmidts brewing co.minn

    Reply
  3. Stephanie says

    December 1, 2016 at 10:07 pm

    My dad (91 years old) has the Norman Rockwell poster of the gentlemen playing cards with the cardboard frame. He grew up in the middle on Montana and got this as a kid from a local saloon. Condition is somewhere between good and very good (I’m picky though). If anyone is interested in pictures, let me know.

    Reply

Leave a Reply Cancel reply

Your email address will not be published. Required fields are marked *

Northern California Breweries

Please consider purchasing my latest book, California Breweries North, available from Amazon, or ask for it at your local bookstore.

The Sessions

session_logo_all_text_1500

Next Session: Dec. 7, 2018
#142: One More for the Road
Previous Sessions
  • #141: Future of Beer Blogging
  • #140: Pivo
  • #139: Beer & the Good Life
  • #138: The Good in Wood
  • #137: German Wheat
Archive, History & Hosting

Enter your email address:

Typology Tuesday

Typology-png
Next Typology:
On or Before March 29, 2016
#3: Irish-Style Dry Stout
Previous Typologies
  • #2: Bock Feb. 2016
  • #1: Barley Wine Jan. 2016
Archive & History

Recent Posts

  • Beer In Ads #4093: Miss Rheingold 1948 Meets The Chief May 21, 2022
  • Historic Beer Birthday: Frederick Kirschner May 21, 2022
  • Beer Birthday: Nick Matt May 21, 2022
  • Beer In Ads #4092: Miss Rheingold 1948 With Valentine’s Day Parakeets May 20, 2022
  • Historic Beer Birthday: Oliver Hughes May 20, 2022

RSS Brookston Beer in Art

  • Roof PintRichard Skipworthc. 2020
    Roof PintRichard Skipworthc. 2020

Recent Comments

  • Angeline Ungerer on Historic Beer Birthday: M.K. Goetz
  • Dick DeShon on Historic Beer Birthday: M.K. Goetz
  • John hughes on Beer In Ads Special Edition: John Ireland’s The Gentle Art of Making Guinness
  • John hughesy on Beer In Ads Special Edition: John Ireland’s The Gentle Art of Making Guinness
  • Moe Peppers on Beer In Ads: #2859: A Clear Commitment
May 2022
S M T W T F S
1234567
891011121314
15161718192021
22232425262728
293031  
« Apr    

Find Something

Tag Cloud

Advertising Anheuser-Busch Announcements Bay Area Belgium Brewers Association Brewing Equipment Budweiser Business California Christmas Europe France Germany Guinness Health & Beer History Holidays Hops Humor Infographics Kegs Law Mainstream Coverage Miller Brewing Northern California Pabst Packaging Patent Pennsylvania Press Release Prohibitionists Rheingold San Francisco Schlitz Science Science of Brewing Sports Statistics The Netherlands UK Uncategorized United States Video Washington