User blog comment:Raidra/Creepy Craft for Children/@comment-4849011-20141213012652

I was going to put this as a separate blog, but why bother when the topic is so similar? At a library sale earlier this year I bought a book called ''Hey Skinny! Great Advertisements from the Golden Age of Comic Books'' by Miles Beller and Jerry Leibowitz (with a preface by Jay Chiat). It reprinted comic book ads from the 1940s and 1950s, and each entry noted the year the ad had been originally published. There’s a variety. Some items are whimsical (an ashtray that looks like a brick barbeque, an item for turning a table lamp into a Christmas tree), some are practical (sticks of perfume and deodorant, a guide to writing love letters, pimple remedies, and a pill to stop bed-wetting), some are a little more serious while still being interesting (a guidebook to war planes), some could never be sold nowadays (a realistic toy gun), and some (a collection of ten Adolf Hitler stamps) simply say, “Hey, we won the war!” One ad from 1946 brags, “Boys Look! A New Toy! Genuine OCD Toy Gas Masks. War Surplus – Just Released by U.S. Govt.” The ad showed a picture of the mask, and the included canvas bag, as well as a drawing with masked boys with toy guns playing soldier (At least, I hope that’s what it’s showing. I hope it’s not showing juvenile delinquents with guns all set to rob a liquor store). The ad continues to hype the features and notes that it was the greatest “toy” sensation in years (the quotation marks are theirs), that you could use it in all your games (even Parcheesi?), and that you could be the first among your playmates to have one. The price was $1 for one and $1.98 for two (Whee, save all of two cents!), and shipping and handling was just fifteen cents.

I have so many thoughts about this, and the introduction didn’t help. It noted, “And as the unfriendly atom threatened to fracture the future, a comics ad announced ‘a new sensational offer to readers’ wherein they could procure a ‘war surplus’ gas mask, ‘released by the U.S, government’.” I thought, “Wait, were they not really war surplus?” If they’re just toys, then, man, that’s some kinda false advertising! On the other hand, if they really are World War II surplus, then that’s dangerous because, as anyone who’s watched enough Pawn Stars knows, protective masks from that era have asbestos in the filters. Mmm-hmm! As a girl who enjoyed playing with baby dolls, Legos, and her older brother’s toy cars growing up (especially the toy Winnebago. Man, is that thing sweet!), I’m a little offended by this being marketed just to boys (though intellectually I have some understanding why). I started reading the ad to my mother, but partway through it I told her, “You know what? This is just too disturbing.”

That’s not the only such entry in the book. An ad from 1943 offers a junior air raid warden kit “with a Helmet, First Aid Kit, Bright Metal Badge, Shrill Siren-like Whistle, Junior Arm Band, Identification Cards, Report Sheets, Pencil and Note Book, Gas Mask, and Splints.” It also came with a carrying case, and the whole shebang cost $1.69 plus postage. For those of you who haven’t seen as many classic MGM cartons as I have, an Air Raid Warden was a person in charge of making sure people complied with air raid drills. People were afraid of being bombed by Axis warplanes because 1) Germany and Great Britain had been attacking each other that way and 2) there had already been the attack on Pearl Harbor. Because of this communities would have air raid drills, sort of like the Emergency Broadcast System tests on television and radio. When the air raid siren sounded, you were supposed to turn off any lights that were on so enemy planes wouldn’t see them and realize that the area was populated. The air raid warden made sure people complied, so if you watch an old carton and a character (usually wearing a uniform with a metal helmet) yells, “PUT OUT THAT LIGHT!” he’s supposed to be an air raid warden. For those wondering, “Why would a child want to pretend to be an air raid warden?” keep in mind that they were important positions in that era. It really would be no different than pretending to be a police officer or a fire fighter. The ad even noted, “You no longer need envy your Dad or neighbor when you see them strut the streets with their air raid warden outfits, whistles, bands, hats. etc.” That just puts a funny image in my mind. The book disturbeth, and the book humoreth again.