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Beer In Ads #99: Ballantine Ale Begins Where Other Brews Leave Off

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Friday’s ad is for Ballantine Ale from — I’m just guessing — the 1950s, and is attempting to show the beer as high class, upscale even with the cocktail dress and morning coat. The slogan, “Ballantine Ale begins where other brews leave off … in flavor … in satisfaction!,” is one they used frequently. There’s another one, down below that’s pretty interesting. Just above the bottle and can, it reads. “The LIGHT ale that’s strong on flavor.” Obviously, that was before low-calorie light beers. It most likely was to combat competition from lighter color lagers.

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Beer In Ads #98: Acme’s Dietetically Non-Fattening

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Thursday’s ad is from the 1930s and is part of a series of pin-ups done for San Francisco’s Acme Brewing by one of the most famous pin-up artists ever. George Petty is probably one of a handful of well-known pin-up artists who also made the transition to commercial and mainstream work. Some of his most famous work was done for Esquire magazine, where he worked from 1933 to 1956. The women he painted had a look that was dubbed “the Petty Girl.” You can see more examples at the Pin-Up Page, BPIB and the Pin-Up Files.

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Today’s Petty ad was part of the Dietetically Non-Fattening series, which Brewery Gems describes.

In the mid ’30s Acme came up with a brilliant marketing concept directed at an untapped market – women. It advertised its beer as “Dietetically Non-Fattening,” and following the asterisks, the fine print says: “Relatively so, compared with other foods.”

This caused the Federal Trade Commission, who was devoted to fair practices in advertising, to move against Acme Breweries. However, it took until 1951 for the Commission’s decision that the words “Acme beer contains no fattening substances and will not increase consumer’s weight” was still considered a “deceptive nutritional claim,” so Acme dropped the advertising campaign, but by then they had doubled their capacity and captured nearly 50% of the California beer market.

Petty apparently painted three works for Acme Beer, the other two are below.

Petty’s Cowgirl.
Cowgirl by Petty

Petty’s Reclining Lady.
Redhead by Petty

California Hop Growers Protest Telegram From 1917

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The document of the day at the National Archives in Washington, DC is an interesting piece of history for beer lovers. It’s a night telegram, or lettergram, sent by the California Hop Growers Association, in protest of a proposed wartime ban on brewing beer. It was received on April 28, 1917 by John E. Raker, who at the time was a member of the U.S. House of Representatives from California’s 2nd congressional district. The telegram is also part of a larger program at the Archives entitled “Teaching With Documents: The Volstead Act and Related Prohibition Documents.”

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Click here to see a larger version of the telegram.

Beer In Ads #95: Bretzels Singer

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Monday’s ad is one I don’t know much about, but chose it because it’s National Pretzel Day. The French translates as something like “pretzel singer with beer and wine.” I’m not even sure it’s for a brewery, it seems like it may be for a bar or restaurant instead. It’s most likely from 1920s France.

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Beer In Ads #94: National Bohemian’s Wet, Cold & Delicious

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Friday’s ad closes strange glances week with a 1957 ad for National Bohemian. The ad’s tagline is “Wet, Cold and Delicious … just the way you want your beer.” The woman in the bathing cap, popping up out of the water at the side of the pool is likewise certainly wet, possibly cold though I’m touching that last one. Still, I think it’s fair to assume that it was their unspoken plan to suggest that connection. Then there’s that hilariously odd sideways glance as she eyes the beer bottle.

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If you want to see a larger size ad, there is one here, though the text is cropped.

Beer In Ads #93: Budweiser’s Hammer Time

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Thursday’s ad during strange glances week also a 1958 ad, this time for Budweiser, under their campaign “Where there’s life .. there’s Bud.” Mr fix-it watches intently as his wife pours his beer from a can into a pilsner glass. What I can’t quite understand is how use fix a telephone with a hammer. There’s also an odd bit of text there, right next to the hammer.

THE KING’S CREDENTIALS: The King of Beers prints its ingredients right on the label. Know of any other beer that does?

Was that really such a bold claim in 1958? I think I was under the impression that most, if not all, beer labels contain at least the primary ingredients on them, but perhaps that’s a more recent development. Since there are only four, I wouldn’t think that would be a point of differentiation. But maybe then most people didn’t know what the ingredients were, or that they were virtually identical from beer to beer.

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Beer In Ads #92: Snappa Cappa Red Cap

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Wednesday’s ad keeps the week’s accidental theme of strange glances going. It’s a 1958 ad for Carling’s Red Cap beer, “the true Canadian ale” — at least according to the ad. The primary sidewards glance in this ad is looking up at someone looking to have their not-yet-empty glass filled. That’s odd enough, but notice the full glass just to his left (our right). Above that glass is another strange sight. Just what exactly is that out-of-focus man holding on to, and looking up at? A light saber? No, it was nearly twenty years before Star Wars debuted. A RC remote? A red fishing rod? At any rate, that makes two odd looks in one ad, two for the price of one.

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