Quix Concentrated Suds - Blame the messenger?

Today we have another mysterious artifact from The Ancient Land. It's an ad for Quix Concentrated Suds, which apparently was a brand of dish soap you could buy in a distant land ever such a long time ago!

You can tell this ad came from England, even though it doesn't make any mention of their nutty currency in one of dozens of denominations of coins, each of  which has five different names. For one thing, you can tell because they say "washing-up" instead of "doing the dishes". Then there's their use of the word "crockery". Psst - That means "the dishes". So now you know.

The shrewd observer may notice that in this little cartoon, the implication is that the woman does the dishes and the man approves her work. Don't be mad at advertising. The ad business always just does it's best to reflect the state of popular culture. It never drives it or dictates cultural morays, despite it's ardent wish to do just that. Advertising is like the pathetic loser kid that does whatever he thinks will make him "cool". He's doing his best to be liked by everyone. The lady in this ad is a housewife because this was 1951 and, well, you know... 1951. Actually, I'm guessing that, in '51, the English were still pretty happy to not get bombed by the Germans every night. Gender equality could wait a few more years.

How bout some strange clip art to start your week off right? These illustration, taken out of context, become strangely specific, yet vague. They're the kind of thing that's not very useful until you absolutely need it for the perfect party invitation or love note, you know?

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