During the late 1800's, early 1900's several products touted cocaine as an important ingredient. Two of these were dandruff cures and Vin Mariani Coca Wine. Today, the dandruff ads. Tomorrow, more about the Coca Wine.

Did cocaine cure dandruff? Or did you just imbibe your cure and not care that you had dandruff? Several manufacturers distributed this cure:

From 1898 issues of  Munsey magazine:

Bremmer:

Burnett:

Those of who collect vintage and antique advertising are always interested in talking to others who share our passion. I ran across this site and cannot believe it's been around for 14 years. I am signing up for everything, want to advertise on their site and go to the convention next year. I missed this years, darn it.

Go visit, you'll see what I mean:

 Antique Advertising Association

Nothing cheers me up like seeing babies in ads.  They are always so happy! With all the fee increases and friends closing stores on eBay, I decided to list some baby ads. And to make Bill and Meg happy, they are core listings.  Some of them, anyway.  To my good friends leaving eBay, good luck and may you prosper!  We may follow someday so leave breadcrumbs.

These are from 1941 and well, I hope they make you smile:

A nice break in my day today is my Rotary meeting.  Here is a shout-out to other Rotarians in the eBay community.

My rotary meets at a restaurant here in Kenedy called Barth's. Great buffets everyday, guaranteed to help you gain the 25 pounds you lost when you first left your small town and discovered salad bars and gyms. Most of the time, it's Fried Chicken.

But, back to Rotary. I work on the Dictionary Committee formally but participate in numerous other activities throughout the year. We just finished Bluebonnet Days here and had a pancake breakfast with a fly in.  Yes, Kenedy has a small airport (so a small plane fly-in).  I do like fly-ins and hope to get to Oshkosh some time.

Our club number is 1908 and we are in district 5840. Our site is www.rotary5840.org

To anyone else going to Rotary this week, my question:  Where is your Rotary and what is your Service area?

I would rather spend my time preparing the auctions then shipping. Right now our shipping person is on vacation. For the next two weeks I do the shipping. So for the past 4 1/2 hours this is what I have been doing:

Check emails for payments and which of our websites got the sale.

Print out the packing slip and enclose our free shipping/ 20% off coupon for their next purchase.

Find the ad among the archives.

Move all of the above to the shipping table. Place ad in the poly sleeve. Grap Apec Envelope:

Tape invoice/coupon to first cardboard insert. Tape ad to second cardboard insert. Then tape the inserts together. Place in envelope, tape the back. Apply appropriate stickers (ie., Airmail, Do Not Bend, etc).

Print postage using Endicia (I love it). Apply postage.

REPEAT....

All I can say is THANK YOU to all my customers. I may not like packaging the best, but I like it better than the alternative...no sales!

So, my question today?  What part of your job is your least favorite?

As promised, the typewriter (not the miniskirt) will be the topic of today's blog.

Christopher Latham Sholes and his colleagues, Carlos Glidden and Samuel Soulé, invented the first commerical typewriting machine in 1866. Called the Sholes & Glidden Type Writer it was manufactured by E. Remington & sons, Ilion NY. 

Fun Typewriter Facts:

1. The first English Typewriter Patent was granted to Henry Mill in 1714
2. The first American Typewriter Patent was granted to William A Burt, Detroit. It was called the typographer.
3. The invention of at least 112 such machines preceded the successful Remington typewriter.

My question of the day and then ads to illustrate early typewriters:

Who was the First author to submit a typewriten manuscript?

My earliest typewriter ad right now is an 1884 Hall machine:

This from an 1896 Harper's Magazine.

From an 1899 Century magazine, an example of Remington marketing.

And the Blickensderfer. I just love the name and so many of their ads never showed the machine, just fantastic graphics. This from an 1898 Munsey:

What was it like to be Thomas Edison? Ideas always generating products and the products never perfect enough for Mr. Edison.  Two products that I think he never stopped improving were the phonograph and the mimeograph.  A good site to learn more about Mr. Edison is http://www.thomasedison.com/

Here is an ad for his phonograph.

And one of my favorites for the mimeograph:

What is your favorite invention? I will try to find some history and an ad to highlight it in my next blog.

I would imagine that everyone that buys or sells vintage advertising has a favorite ad. Mine is a Williams' Shaving Stick ad that is an Art Nouveau style. I don't know the date of the ad or the artist, but the detail work is absolutely fabulous. If you can identify the artist, please let me know.

My question is: What is your favorite old ad and why?