Wednesday’s ad is for Ballantine, from 1950. In this ad, part of a series progressing from one, to two, to three rings, this one shows the multi-colored northern lights with a native Inuit man (which they would have undoubtedly called an Eskimo when the ad originally ran) in the snow next to a giant bottle and glass of Ballantine Ale.
Tuesday’s ad is for Ballantine, from 1959. In this ad, another simple one, a full glass of Ballantine Beer hovers above a beautiful ocean with a man fishing from a rock below. I’m not quite sure why that makes it “the largest-selling beer in the East” or why it’s “the crisp refresher,” but I am inexplicably thirsty.
Monday’s ad is for Ballantine, from 1962. In this ad, a cold bottle and full glass of Ballantine Beer is beautifully rendered in front of a field being harvested. Pretty simple, pretty cool.
For our 123rd Session, our host will be Josh Weikert, who writes Beer Simple. For his topic, he’s chosen CyberBrew — Is the Internet Helping or Hurting Craft Beer? Thankfully, he elaborates on his thinking:
This month, we’re taking on the internet and craft beer: is it a help, a hinderance, an annoyance, or all of the above? How is beer drinking/brewing different in the internet age, and how is the internet changing the way brewers and craft beer drinkers do business?
Topics might include:
- Marketing beer in the internet age
- The astounding influence of beer bloggers to make or break breweries (just kidding, but seriously, what’s the effect of all of this quasi-journalistic beer commentary on the drinking and brewing public?)
- How are beer reviews (expert and mass-market) affecting what gets brewed and drank?
- Are beer apps for tracking and rating overly-“gamifying” beer (or does that make drinkers more adventurous)?
- Just how fast do aleholes on message boards and elsewhere turn off prospective craft beer enthusiasts?
And, of course, I’m sure that you’re all more creative than me and there’s a lot I’m missing.
To participate in the May Session, on or before Friday, May 5, 2017 — which is this Friday, just a few days away — write a post about your views about beer online, what Josh refers to as CyberBrew. “Leave a comment with a link to your post in the comment section” of the original post, “preferably by May 5th (the first Friday of the month, also known as ‘next Friday’). Even if you’re running a little late, leave your comment and I’ll catch it. The roundup will publish in mid-late May (I’d say that the 15th is a likely target), and we’ll see what everyone came up with.” Easy as 1-2-3.
Sunday’s ad is for Schlitz, from 1903. In the first decade of the 20th century, Schlitz Brewing, then one of the largest breweries in the U.S. after the industry had shrunk from over 4,000 to around 1,500 in just 25 or so years, did a series of primarily text ads, with various themes. In this ad, Schlitz is explaining that the reason they brew “Over a Million Barrels a Year” is — you probably guessed — their “absolute purity.” That’s also why they “doubled the necessary cost of our brewing to have Schlitz Beer right.”
Saturday’s ad is for Schlitz, from 1904. In the first decade of the 20th century, Schlitz Brewing, then one of the largest breweries in the U.S. after the industry had shrunk from over 4,000 to around 1,500 in just 25 or so years, did a series of primarily text ads, with various themes. In this ad, Schlitz recounts how you need to drink “ten glasses of fluid per day,” and that most people don’t drink enough. So what, you may be asking yourself. But not enough fluids means “too little to flush the body of its waste. The result is bad blood, nervousness, disease.” That’s why “the doctor says ‘Drink more.”
Friday’s ad is for Schlitz, from 1902. In the first decade of the 20th century, Schlitz Brewing, then one of the largest breweries in the U.S. after the industry had shrunk from over 4,000 to around 1,500 in just 25 or so years, did a series of primarily text ads, with various themes. In this ad, one of the earliest in the series, Schlitz is already talking about their purity, and what it means. In a nutshell, they’re saying they spend more on their process to insure it’s pure but sell it for the same price. What nice people to take a cut in their profits. “Not a beverage known to man is more healthful than beer, if it’s pure.”
Thursday’s ad is for Schlitz, from 1903. In the first decade of the 20th century, Schlitz Brewing, then one of the largest breweries in the U.S. after the industry had shrunk from over 4,000 to around 1,500 in just 25 or so years, did a series of primarily text ads, with various themes. In this ad, Schlitz details why each ingredient in their beer is so expensive or why their brewing and bottling process is similarly so expensive. For example, “Every bottle is cleaned by machinery four times before using,” which seems pretty inefficient. Why not just buy the machine that cleans the bottles properly the first time?
Wednesday’s ad is for Schlitz, from 1903. In the first decade of the 20th century, Schlitz Brewing, then one of the largest breweries in the U.S. after the industry had shrunk from over 4,000 to around 1,500 in just 25 or so years, did a series of primarily text ads, with various themes. In this ad, Schlitz finally explains what they mean by “purity,” a word they’ve been using seemingly non-stop. Whew.
Between 1951 and 1953, P. Ballantine and Sons Brewing Company, or simply Ballentine Beer, created a series of ads with at least thirteen different writers. They asked each one “How would you put a glass of Ballantine Ale into words?” Each author wrote a page that included reference to their beer, and in most cases not subtly. One of them was Anita Loos, who was an American author, best known for her popular book “Gentlemen Prefer Blondes,” was she adapted into a successful film, along with several other well-known screenplays.
Today is the birthday of Anita Loos (April 26, 1889–August 18, 1981), who was “was an American screenwriter, playwright and author, best known for her blockbuster comic novel, Gentlemen Prefer Blondes. She wrote film scripts from 1912, and became arguably the first-ever staff scriptwriter, when D.W. Griffith put her on the payroll at Triangle Film Corporation. She went on to write many of the Douglas Fairbanks films, as well as the stage adaptation of Colette’s Gigi.”
Her 1953 piece for Ballantine was done in the form of a short story about dropping a bottle of beer out her hotel window, somewhere with a cold climate:
It took an elevator man and a snowbank to show me how much I really appreciate Ballantine Ale.
One wintry evening I set a bottle of Ballantine on my hotel window ledge to chill. My only bottle — wouldn’t you know it? — toppled off into a snowbank on the rood next door. Immediately the thought occurred to me that the elevator man could climb out of a downstairs window and retrieve it.
But would he wade through the snow for a bottle of ale? My maid, Gladys, who evidently shares Lorelei Lee’s belief that diamonds are indeed a girl’s best friend, solved the problem by telling him I dropped a diamond bracelet, and he never learned the truth until he was standing in the snowbank with the bottle. At that, he seemed to think more of the ale than a bracelet!
I might add that I like Ballantine Ale because it refreshes me. And because it’s so light, it never takes the edge off my appetite. But most of all I like it because it has a flavor all its own that’s beyond anything else I have ever tasted.
