Cigarettes were a staple for Depression-weary and later war-torn
Americans. Yet despite the claim of weight control, they offered no viable
health inducements. Even tobacco manufacturers acknowledged that
frequent product usage resulted in coughing, throat irritation, and raspy
sounding voices. The last was, however, promoted as sexy. To deflect public
attention away from what the industry viewed as minor physical ailments,
cigarette advertising exploited certain perceived health benefits, including
increased vigor and stamina. Camels asserted that “Smokers everywhere are
turning to Camels for their delightful ‘energizing effect’...Camels never
get on your nerves... .” Lucky Strike took the homeopathic route with
their motto “It’s toasted.” A typical ad read “Everyone knows that sunshine
mellows—that’s why the ‘toasting’ process includes the use of Ultra
Violet Rays... Everyone knows that heat purifies and so ‘toasting’—that
extra secret process—removes harmful irritants that cause throat irritation
and coughing.” By the late 1930 s Lucky Strike had added the following tag
line to its motto, “sunshine mellows—heat purifies.”
Men played a role in cigarette advertising for women. They ran
the agencies, produced the images, and wrote the copy that created the
commercially correct woman. But in men’s club fashion they also made fun
of their own ludicrous stereotypes. In “Shanghaied by a Silly Salt?... Light
an Old Gold” the Esquiremagazine pinup artist Petty’s voluptuous gal is
hit upon by a licentious old gent, but the copy positions Old Gold as her
saving grace: “When a retired skipper proves he is anything but retiring by
dropping anchor alongside of you... don’t let him scuttle your whole
evening. Offer him an Old Gold... he’ll welcome it like a breeze in the
doldrums... while you breeze gracefully away.”
Movie stars and starlets frequently appeared as spokespersons. In a
1943 advertisement, Betty Grable, star of the moviePinup Girl, is shown in
a soldier’s barracks, reinforcing the idea that Chesterfield is overseas “With
the boys... .” In the same spirit, Joan Bennett, dressed in her Women’s
Volunteer Army uniform, lit up “His cigarette and mine,” another in a
series of Chesterfield testimonials. To soldiers, cigarettes were as valuable as
rations; to the tobacco industry the war was a boon. Ads invoked the image
of American boys, exploited the image of American girls, and portrayed
cigarettes to be as American as apple pie. After the war, men became active
role models in ads targeted to women.
The cigarette ads created during the Great Depression and World
War II targeted women with one purpose: to seduce by appealing to their
patriotism and sense of fashion. While the stylistic manner of this
seduction has changed since these ads were first printed, the method is still
the same: appeal to weakness, bolster myth, and massage fantasy.
tuis.
(Tuis.)
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