Esquire Holiday Buying Guide, 1959

Holiday shoppers, I bet you're stuck for an idea what to shop for your friends and family this Pointy Tree Day. Well, don't worry, because the December 1959 issue of Esquire (the journal of the great American douchebag, as you know), can tell you what to shop. Shop these things! Holiday complete!

This is a toilet. A cup that you dump in. Or possibly just pee. It's got a fur rim. As for how you clean it, or keep from catching dysentery from it when it's been used more than none times, you'll have to ask Lincoln Products. 

You're probably one of those guys who's identity and confidence is completely wrapped up in
his "Guns", right? You know, like that guy on the chopper show that looks like a walrus? The guy who tears the sleeves off of every garment he owns for fear that someone may not know he's got huge arms? Yeah, we could tell. You know how your bath robe is so confining that you can hardly sip your coffee or throw a table at your son without discomfort? You poor thing. Well, this robe has no sleeves. Also, it's got side vents, so everyone can also tell you've got huge sides, apparently.

There's nothing a lady loves more than a gift that implies that her
hands look like a lumberjack's. Buy her this finger dremel tool
and you'll get all the rewards you deserve.

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Give the gift of music! Or, give the gift of this thing! Let's see... $39.95 in 1959 dollars adjusted for inflation equals, uuh, carry the one, and that comes out to...

Ho-lee shit.

Science and Mechanics - A single page. So much joy.

The small ads at the back of  old "men's interest" magazines are where the publishers accidentally tell you who they think you are. This is, of course, the way it is with all advertising. By trying to sell you something, advertisers are inadvertently telling you what they think you're like. Their sales pitch is, ostensibly, an attempt to relate to you. But at the same time, the ad reveals their estimation of your motivations and vulnerabilities. Most often, the message is something like "you are frightened, insecure, paranoid, ignorant, gullible, and mostly dumb".

This single page of ads from the June, 1955 issue of Science and Mechanics is a treasure trove of amazing ads made by, umm, "unskilled" advertisers who weren't so good at concealing their judgment of the reader.

You believe that pirates raided the oceans of the world in search of the most treasured stamps.

You see yourself as a perpetually downtrodden victim, and fantasize in graphic detail about crippling your perceived enemies. 

You dream of being Richard Kiel. Or, you wish to eat any creature, so long as it wears dentures.

You dream of being a world explorer, and desire "helps" on "every subject", including "personality aids". I think my old boss suffered from Personality Aids.

Your ambitions of adventure, violence, and excitement are hampered by your continuing hernia problem.

Your ambitions of violent adventure are hampered by your continuing hernia problem, and you have difficulty getting into your truss due to your continuing arthritis problem.

You not only believe in magical powers, but wish to use them to subjugate others to your demented little will, and mustn't, under any circumstances, be allowed to have any authority over anyone.

Couple more vintage motorsport shirts.

Trolling through an old Car and Driver from 1965, we found some little ads for slightly obscure companies closely tied with the super-cool sixties racing scene. Why not have the Phil Are Go! Graphic Blandishment and Photoshoppery Brigade whip up a few shirts? Why not, indeed.

Here's a link to the Halda shirt on our Spreadshirt shop. You can mess with the colors of the shirt and logo on this one. Usually, you can just change the shirt color, but this one uploaded in a better format, so you can change the colors of the blue and white logo all you want before you order.

Isky's logo has a cool grumpy parrot in it! Here's a link to this shirt in the Spreadshirt shop. 

Lastly, here's a Stewart-Warner shirt, if gauges are your thing... or possibly your dad's thing.

See you tomorrow!

Little Ads, Esquire 1969 - Get creeped.

It's Halloween, creatures! You know how you think that nothing scares you more than this particular election cycle? Slightly incorrect! Observe these little ads from the back pages of the March, 1969 issue of Esquire Magazine. The following program may not be appropriate for younger or more sensitive viewers!

At the very least, we can hope that's a bullet hole in the chest of the man wearing the nylon-tricot jumper with the fitted hip-hugger boxer underbriefs, but it's probably just a printing inclusion.

What's so creepy about the TENSOLATOR? Not much, apart from the fact that it's almost definitely  just a springy thingy that doesn't do anything that pushups and situps can't do for you. But, you will be the creep of the crypt when you use Fitness Boy's face as your profile pic. You're welcome! P.S. Who wears a combover at the age of 25?

Click for 1000 px jpeg.

You can probably think of two or three people who can get away with wearing rubber clothes. However, this photo was taken in 1969, and that's probably someone's grandmother in that picture. She kinda looks like she may have already been one when this photo was taken. Booooooo!!!! Also, "REAL RUBBER CLOTHING!, not cheap fake rubber! Boooo! Also also, "SENSIBLE PRICES" on rubber clothing! BooooooooOOOOO!!!

Little Ads - Groovy clothes, 1971. Hey, you're not uptight are you?

If you're holding a magazine, and you want to see who the publishers think you are and what you're into, flip to the back and look at the little cheapo ads you find there.

This morning, a bright-faced intern dropped this Esquire Magazine from 1971 on my desk. Flipping through the pages now, I think I need to send him an email reminding him to do a few laps in our special Esquire Magazine Olympic-sized pool of Purel, and then take about fifty Silkwood showers. As for me, I'm gingerly turning the pages using my special Esquire Magazine salad tongs.

Berwyn Community Theater presents Space Hamlet.

With reassuring "front pelvis ass pockets" to make people think you're always walking
away from them.

Berwyn Community Theater presents Space Hamlet with Genitals Pretty Much Made out of Herpes Sores.

Fashion researchers in The Seventies annually spent millions in public funds trying to rigidly define the boundaries of "almost too much." It proved elusive.

CRITICAL UPDATE!!! Alert Reader John (last name withheld because he didn't specifically say it was okay to spew his full name all over the Ultranet) has done some nice, clean Photoshoppery and provided us - and the world - with a PNG of Jumpsuit Man, with and without head. Now you and your heirs can all stick each others' heads on Jumpsuit Man. Observe...

Jumpsuit man. Each sold separately.

Most of Jumpsuit Man, ready to receive your head.

LBJ in a jumpsuit, provided by John as a serving suggestion. I like the way he chose not to match the tint of the two not-quite-black-and-white images. Makes it better, dontchaknow. That's some nice work, John! You're a true patriot.

Little ads - Status symbols for '68.

Best of all, you will probably maybe never find yourself explaining this to a judge, or the DCFS.

Maybe because he has finally found the most perfect long-term solution to his problem, maybe because
the product has the most reassuring name possible, the pictured boy truly does look very satisfied that
his embarrassment has been finally and permanently prevented.

Why spend hours polishing out those cracks in your legs' clear coat with an orbital buffer? Cover-Up also conceals wayward Sharpie marks. 

Lionel Union Pacific Streamline - Neither skimpy, nor dinky (sic).

In 1934, if you could afford to buy your kid an electric train set, you were doing pret-ty well, sir. It was a year of decent economic recovery after the Great Depression, but it was still a time when a super cool train set was very much a luxury item... just ask ten year old Alec Baldwin!

No, not really. For starters, if this kid were Alec, he'd be about eighty years old now. But this kid sure does look like him. Regardless of this boy's chronological age, in this photo, he's becoming a man. How? He's having his first train boner. Look at him, man. And well might he. Any kid could be expected to have a bit of premature masculation when being given a badass tran set like this one. And Alec's dad would have a little boner of his own if he knew what the thing would be worth, just half a century later.

Of course, this Lionel Union-Pacific Streamliner is a brand-new, never-played-with example, and the kind of kids that never open their toys in the hope of auctioning them off in fifty years are A) virtually nonexistent and B) when they do exist, they're probably freakazoids.

Not our little Alec, though. you can tell by the look on his face that he's definitely going to play with his train.

Little Alec has more work to do. What kind of work? That's up to you, because we've made him into a Graphic Gift. He's dot patterned.  He's got an alpha background. He's got the energy. He's come all the way from 1934 to find a home on whatever poster, email or graphic you think needs some enthusiasm. Give a big hand to Train Boner Alec! More importantly, let's give him a place on your hard drive. You're welcome!

Click for 10000 px.

What? You want more? Fine. Here's Train Boner Alec as a 1000 px avatar, to be used as your avatar on your chat platform of choice. Happy now? You're still welcome!

Click for 1000 px.

Little ads, 1968 - Great things for the perfect lifestyle of brilliant people who aren't useless idiots at all.

Be sure to wear goggles or risk looking very weird. Lamps included with lamp.

Note: Only bipedal basset hounds will immediately wilt and die upon contact.

Paper piece of shit is endorsed by up to three disembodied floating heads. No obligation.

Once gloves receive $2.98, they are, in fact, technically professionals at being gloves.

Conversation serving suggestion: "Why would you want a fake Prussian helmet on your mantel? Did the Burgermeister Meisterburger leave in a hurry?"

Some light child abuse and sexism.

From Better Homes and Gardens, 1968...

For just $1.50, you can have this humorous melee weapon mounted on the wall in your child's bedroom, to remind them that you're a great parent for beating them where it doesn't leave a mark that the police might otherwise notice.

According to this ad, no man ever prepared his own meal until well after 1968. As you may recall from the many investigative journalism pieces over the years, gender stereotypes were common at the time, all the way to government's top level: the Raisin Advisory Board.

Little Ads - Groovy Coolies

Today, we're checking in with our favorite decade that always seems to always have an itching rash on it's crotch, and will never shut up about getting a picture of Gandalf airbrushed on it's van: The Seventies.

Hi, The Seventies! How's that G.E.D. summer study class coming? Uh huh. Uh huh. Fascinating. Okay, shut up for a second.  Here in The Future, all we have to wear is our space helmets and spandex jump suits. Won't you please show us how to be groovy again? We'll just sit over here and try to learn a little bit about looking groovy and cool.

With sleeves like this, no one will question whether or not you can play Incense and Peppermints on your mom's Lowrey organ. The elastic at the elbows keeps the balloon sleeves from getting too crazy, so everyone will still take you seriously, down at the Jack in the Box. You're better than "elegant". You're "eleganza".

New Look leather hip-high jacket pairs groovily with your choice of pajama bottoms. Why be caught looking ungroovy in bed? Aaaayyyyyyy.

You know how all the kids at the recreation center are talking about bailiffs and how cool they are? Make them all look like jive turkeys in your bailiff's vest. Writing descriptions like this will become way easier, once we think of a name for that fabric that jeans are made from. "blue-jean fabric" and "wheat jean" might confuse people whose jeans are made from velour.

For only the equivalent of $225, this suit is 15% flax, 85% polyester, and one thousand percent vest! Sleeves could not contain the boldness and bravadoness, so they just blew off. Radio astronomers can still detect the echoes of that bold bravadosplosion in the background radiation of the universe, and this lucky peasant girl can still hear all that bravado too, by listening closely to this man's pants. What other secrets will his pants reveal? Hairbulb is by Mister Sicily, of Brockton Hair Experience, Brockton, Mass.

Click for big avatar version.

Click for big avatar version.