Tag: books

“Here Are Your Reading For Meaning Stand-Up Figures” Circa 1966

From the Houghton Mifflin Company, glossy, colored, cardboard die-cut stand-up figures of Janet, Penny, Betty, Jack, Bill, Tip & Mitten — companions to the school text series Reading For Meaning, Fourth Edition, Pre-reading – Grade 6.

I’ve got the set up at eBay, so if your teacher never let you touch these as a kid, now’s your chance to get your hands on ’em!

Here’s the rest of the vintage educational ephemera from the original mailing envelope and info on the ephemera…

Also included, the little light blue flyer titled “A Vital Role?” which tells teachers how to use the figures.

Envelope number I-40234, litho in USA, DN40M366. Flyer, also a litho in USA; RFM/SUE, DN40M466.

No date; circa 1966.

Selling Schlitz Beer In Japan At The Turn Of The Century

I’ve posted lots of ads and information from this antique Japan travel guide, but I had to share this pair of advertisements from Pope & Co., who don’t want you to go hungry! I guess their solution is for you to be good and drunk on trips to the interior. I guess numb will keep you dumb to your hunger, so drink up the champagne, the whiskey and the beer! And cigars; smoke ’em if you got ’em — and if you don’t have them, buy them from Pope & Co.

Modern Woman Mondays: Gelatin Edition

After WWII and continuing through the 1960s, an emphasis on kitschy culinary arts kept little women busy in their places: the kitchen. How else do you explain the Joys Of Jell-O?

Perhaps the best thing about the miracle of gelatin based foods was the fact that, other than boiling water, one didn’t ruin their makeup in the heat. No, I don’t think the best thing was food stuff themselves… So bright, yet so wrong. Vegetables? Waldorf Salad? Shrimp?! Even the photos of the desserts make my teeth hurt. …Although that Jell-O and ice cream gum-drop number might be worth it. For more on the miracle of gelatin foods, check out Retro Mimi (my interview with her here) and my Things Your Grandmother Knew blog.

Vintage Ephemera Requesting Sergeant’s Dog Book

An old postcard of the 12th Green Drumlins “Pay As You Play” Golf Course, Syracuse, N.Y. used to send in for the FREE 40-page illustrated Dog Book from Sergeant’s Dog Medicines. As I said, it kind of makes you wonder if Theodore ever got his book, doesn’t it?

GE Kitchens Are Next To Godliness

The cover of God In My Kitchen: Fifty-Two Thoughts For Homemakers, by Dorothy C. Haskin. (I’m giving one away in this contest! Or you can find it on Amazon.)

In the acknowledgements:

The kitchen shown on the cover was designed by Home Guide Inc., using General Electric appliances. We are indebted to these organizations for the picture.

Personally, I never got over that documentary we were shown in collage. Ever since then, whenever someone says “GE” or “General Electric,” I scream, “Babies born without skulls!” …I guess that’s one type of atomic kitchen.

Vintage Conan (The Barbarian, Not The Comedian – But There Is Orange)

From the Conan book world, vintage books for auction at Heritage Auctions:

Robert E. Howard and L. Sprague de Camp. Tales of Conan. New York: Gnome Press, [1955]. First edition. Octavo. Publisher’s binding and dust jacket. Currey’s (E) binding. Book has light rubbing to extremities and light soiling to front board. Bookplate. Mild foxing to page edges and endpapers. Jacket is lightly edge worn with a few chips and tears. Overall foxing and toning. Very good. Estimate: $1 – up.

Robert E. Howard. Conan the Conqueror. New York: Gnome, [1950]. First edition, first printing. Octavo. 255 pages. Publisher’s binding and dust jacket. Mild rubbing to cloth extremities with a small area of soiling to front board. Bookplate. Faint foxing to page edges. Jacket is lightly rubbed and edge worn with several small chips and tears, and sunning to spine. Very good. Estimate: $1 – up.

Modern Woman Monday: The Airplane Exercise

A purely gratuitous photo of three women doing the airplane exercise pose in. Just too classic to ignore.

(Found in 1962’s Royal Canadian Air Force Exercise Plans for Physical Fitness; more images there.)