The space-suit.

Joke #1 - "You look great! Yes, my son designed it in preschool. It was so good, the teacher put it up in the hall. Launch is in eight minutes."

Joke #2 - Air Force Chief of Staff General Thomas D. White examines a suit the Air Force says will enable man to go anywhere in space, so long as space has at least one atmosphere of pressure, isn't too chilly, and looks mostly like the planets on Lost in Space.

Joke #3 - After his final prep and briefing, Captain Clev Rhintfarb was now ready to eat at Chipotle.

Joke #4 - Air Force Chief of Staff General Thomas D. White examines glamorous new suit of the shimmeriest silver lamé with contrasting gloves and booties, gloriously set off with anodized hose fittings, which will enable man to go to the most fabulous reaches of space with confidence and sass.

Joke #5 - A tired worker, seen just before decontamination, after putting in a twelve hour shift in the tinsel mines of northern Lapland.

Joke #6 - Air Force Chief of Staff General Thomas D. White examines a suit the Air Force says will enable astronauts to go anywhere in space while the pounds simply melt away.

Cyclotronboy sent us this Joke #7, with an atomic weight of hilarious! Thanks, CTB! - Sure, sure, space and astronauts! Whatever you say, Lieutenant. As long as that thing out there on the tower can launch nuclear bombs like those eggheads promised, I don't care what nonsense you're up to!

[Commenter jokes will be added to the post.   -Mgmt.]

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Coca-Cola - Another Sundblom Santa.

People will try to tell you that Coke created the modern image of Santa Claus, but that's a myth. Our concept of what Santa looked like had been evolving for a long time, and had pretty much been in place long before Coke decided to use him for marketing their soda during the otherwise-dreary-for-the-soda-market holiday season.

That said, we found this terrific full page ad in the Dec 11th, 1950 issue of LIFE. Even though it's uncredited, it's definitely painted by Haddon Sundblom, which we've spotted before in his natural habitat of a Coke ad.

This ad shows two happy kids stocking their fridge in preparation to have a stranger break into their house and eat all their food. Surely, a dream come true. Psst! Kids! He's right behind your refrigerator and he's thirty feet tall.

Sundblom was on the Coke payroll from the 1930s on into the 1960s, so that's why we can be sur ethis is one of his. Also, his style is often imitated, but never well.

Here's a fun bit of trivia. Ever wonder who's doing all the Coke Santa paintings now? Nobody. Sundblom's Santa paintings are still used for Coke's advertising. I would have thought they'd have hired a new artist to copy his style when he died in 1976, but they're just using the same art. The huge billboard of Santa you drive past on your commute? Still Haddon Sunblom. Cool, huh? I'd be interested to see the facility where they store all of Sundblom's original paintings. That would be a hell of a tour.

Paintings like this were routinely heavily referenced. That means the artist would organize a photo shoot with a model, and use the resulting picture(s) to do the painting. Sorry to shatter any illusions, but paintings like this aren't just conjured out of the artists imagination... especially when there's a deadline.

So, wondering what Sundblom looked like, the P.A.G! Research and Googling Squad found a picture of him. There's our boy! Hey, wait a second...

 If I had to guess, I'd say that's Sundblom's face on Santa. White hair with strangely dark eyebrows? Check. Prominent, slightly shiny lower lip? Check. Smile lines at the corners of the eyes? Check. Shape of the nose.?Check. Sure, he fattened himself up a bit, but that's Haddon himself!

But back to the idea of Coke having "created" our image of Santa. Here's a bit from Snopes on the subject.

...the beloved persona of Santa Claus is somewhat distinctive in that his appearance is neither one that has been solidified through centuries of religious tradition nor one that sprang fully-formed from the imagination of a modern-day writer or artist. Santa Claus is instead a hybrid, a character descended from a religious figure (St. Nicholas) whose physical appearance and backstory were created and shaped by many different hands over the course of years until he finally coalesced into the now familiar (secular) character... 

...However, illustrations of lavishly bearded Santas (and his predecessors), showing figures clothed in red suits and red hats with white fur trimming, held together with broad black belts, were common long before Coca-Cola's first Sundblom-drawn Santa Claus advertisement appeared in 1931. 

There was a period of overlap during which the modern Santa Claus character coexisted with other Christmas figures and other versions of himself, as his now-standard appearance and persona jelled and his character grew in popularity to become the dominant (secular) Christmas figure in the western world. However, that period had ended before Coca-Cola began utilizing Santa for their holiday season advertisements. As noted in a New York Times article published in 1927, four years before the appearance of Sundblom's first Santa-based Coca-Cola ad. 

Coca-Cola's magazine advertisements, billboards, and point-of-sale store displays were for many Americans their primary exposure to the modern Santa Claus image. But at best what Coca-Cola popularized was an image they borrowed, not one they created.

So there's that. Coke didn't invent Santa Claus, but it looks like Sundblom's portrayal of Santa represents the final evolution that's remained basically unchanged for about sixty years now - and an image that's many people's favorite. Why fix what's not broken?

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Paperback Book Cover - When the Green Star Calls.

Today, we feature another great paperback book cover. It's a 1973 novel by Lin Carter called When the Green Star Calls. The cover art is by Luis Dominguez, and I have to say I like Dominguez' paintings more than his drawings. Nuff Said.

This is the book two in Carter's Green Star series. I don't know the series myself, but I know how to search Wikipedia. Here's a link to that article, if you're interested.

Based on my total lack of research on what the story is about, I can tell you that it involves a lucky young man being whisked away on a romantic date with a guy with a teapot on his head, in a golden hoverswan, soaring over the triceratops-infested swaps surrounding an alien dildopolis. Oh, such a time they'll have!

What's that? You say you'd like a special crop of this image with the text removed. Here, let the P.A.G! Graphic Blandishment and Photoshoppery Brigade get that for you. The original version is included too, at maximum-blogger-allowable 1600px height. You're welcome!

Little Ads, 1974 - Christmas shopping so simple, an idiot could do it.

How long has it been since we've heard from our favorite mouth-breathing friend, The Seventies? Way too long! Let's check in with the decade that always needs to borrow-some-cash-to-pay-back-this-one-dude-come-on-bro-I'm-totally-good-for-it. We found these golden gems of gold in the back of Better Homes and Gardens from 1974. Let's see what people who watched Maude were buying! Also, we're converting the prices to modern FutureBucks, adjusting for inflation.

Get any clever phrase printed on one of two kinds of shirt in one of two colors, in your choice of one font (probably). T-shirt $23.88. Sweatshirt $33.53. How much for a sweatshirt that just says "we print anything"? Priceless.

Serving suggestion only. May or may not be compatible with teenage mustache on middle aged man.

Ecology pendant containing rice, macaroni, peppercorns, and dried peas lets everyone know you have a pendant full of rice, macaroni, peppercorns, and dried peas. Only $28.70, adjusted for inflation.

Wooden "etc." wall thing tells all your visitors that you have nothing to say, and feel very strongly about it. Fun to see how many people look right at it and still find a way to still mispronounce "ex-cetera".

New! Lady calculator blows the lid off the boutique calculator racket. Designed specifically for milady. Identical version is also available, designed specifically for men. Comes with matching pouch made from kids. $67.30.

Fireplace log roller easily rolls newspapers into logs for those without hands. Is hand operated. $72.12.

Pet's coat of arms displays your pet's Noble lineage and victories in battle, such as The Great Shitted Blanket Event, and The Battle of Lécher les Fesses. $23.88.

Animal on the Street - The War on Christmas?

Philco Televisions - High deaf gifts?

It's nuts how much television you can get for five hundred dollars. To the unfortunate troglodytes of 1957, twenty-four inches of grayscale was dizzyingly exciting. Know what, though? I'll bet their TVs sounded better than the built-in speakers of our TVs.

Here are two reasons your TV probably doesn't sound as good as these Philcos.

Reason number A) Unless your a pharaoh or a sultan or something, your TV's cabinet is probably made of ABS plastic (acrylonitrile butadiene styrene). It's my favorite plastic. Yeah. I know. Who has a list of favorite plastics? Dorks, that's who. But ABS is great. It's damn strong, but you can easily trim it with a knife. It comes in brilliant colors. It tolerates thermal softening and reshaping without weird results. Also, it doesn't easily discolor over time and isn't very susceptible to sun bleaching. Legos are made of ABS for chrissakes, so shut up.

However, there isn't really any plastic that makes a good acoustic resonator. That hasn't stopped people from making everything from radios to drum kits out of plastic - mostly because it's so easy and great to make it look cool. Know what resonates very nicely with sound? Wood. Even plywood can sound great with a speaker mounted to it. Go rent a plastic cello and see how that sounds.

Yes, there are companies making carbon fiber cellos and stuff, but CFs freaky stiff properties can be manipulated to great effect in an acoustic instrument. Plus, it's a composite material, and not technically "just plastic".

Yes, you can get a tabletop radio made of plastic that sounds amazing, but the manufacturer has engineered into it special subwoofers and labyrinth channels to coerce decent sound out of a plastic radio. With wood, just give it a strong-ish speaker and screw it in nice and tight and you're done. Wood is acoustically wonderful.

Thing B) Almost all TV speakers today are an afterthought. They're only included to tick the box on the product manager's clipboard. "Yep! It's got speakers!" Yes, it will make sound at useable volume, but televisions are all about the picture. You're pretty much expected to buy, at least, a sound bar or use a component surround sound system with your TV.

Then there's the fact that TVs can be so thin nowadays. There's hardly any room for a decent speaker in there anyway. You think they're going to design a hefty cabinet just to make room for nice speakers when they can have a sexy thin cabinet to show off their anorexically thin LCD tech? Pull the other one.Your TVs picture is way better than your TVs sound.

Because all non-portable TVs were made from wood back then (the one that woman is carrying probably wa smetal and plastic), the sound quality was probably pretty great. Plus, nobody assumed you would be hooking up your TV to an external system. That was crazy talk, daddy-o.

Ooo! I just had a brilliant idea!
1 - Source two really old, beat-up cellos somehow. School rummage sale or SomebodysList.com?
2 - Take the guts and electronics out of a pair of nice, but possibly beaten up 12" three-way floor speakers.
3 - Make the cellos into your new speaker cabinets.

I am a genius. You're welcome!

So, let's see what you could expect to pay for these bad looking, good sounding TVs, back in '57.

Let's see. Inflation Calculator says that $279.95 amounts to $2,361.45 in modern day FutureBucks. And that's the starting price for Philco's "Wrap Around Sound" models. Oof! Philco's regular TVs started at $179.95 (or equivalent $1,523.09). Ladies and gentlemen, we are truly spoilt.

Hey! That lady carrying the TV looks familiar! Sure enough, she's basically the same piece of art Philco used in that other ad we posted in August '14. See?

She's obviously a heavily referenced painting of a photograph. They just did a new version with different clothes and slight changes to her face, and added the bow on the TV. It's interesting to look at two different rendering sof the same photo reference. It makes you wonder if the model looked exactly like either painting, or if they were taking creative licence with her face in both cases. I wonder if the model got an extra check for the re-use. Only joking. I don't wonder that at all. Of course she was paid just for the one photo shoot. Random models don't get royalties.

In any case, we posted her as a Graphic Gift back in '14, and of course we must provide her Christmas version now, just for the sake of completion, right? Gotta catch em all! She's a PNG.  She's got a present for you. She's 1600 pixels tall of pure woman, and she's all yours. You're welcome!

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Borden's Promotional Cow Family Christmas plans.

It's been a while since we've checked in with Elmer and Elsie and the hideous Borden cow family. For those with morbid curiosity, use links like this one, this one, this one, or this one to make yourself lactose intolerant.

Today's ad allows us a lucky glimpse into the domestic squabbles of this family of unforgivable human-cow half breeds. They're arguing about how to save money on Christmas shopping. What ever shall they do? Urgently continue reading to find out!

First, we are given to wonder why a family of monstrosities like this are having financial troubles. Elmer claims to be the one that pays the bills in the family. Assuming he works for the Borden company, he must somehow sell his milk to the dairy. In the very same breath, the ad points out that he's a bull, and thereby incapable of producing milk. Soooo, let's just hope that not only has he been unnaturally cross bred with a human, but that he also has been genetically manipulated to have mammary glands. Yes, we will hope for that. The alternative possibility is  even more horrible.

Gender-bending is the least of the Borden family's biological feats. Each family member has a weird neck wiener that the artist was very careful not to overlook, when drawing the comic. They must be important. This revelation raises more questions than it answers, but let's let sleeping wieners lie, shall we?

So, Elmer's upset about finances. This tension is nearly immediately defused by Elsie's Christmas gift-giving plan. She will make all the gifts! "How?", you ask? "Godammit, HOW?" Why, she'll make delicious things to eat with her own bodily fluids and give them to their friends! What would you do?

You're darn right. You would call everybody and tell them to skip the eggnog this year, because you are going to spend Christmas morning driving to everyone's house to give them nog made with juices squirted out of your body.

The ad goes on to give even more helpful Christmas hints. For example, here's a family portrait of ice cream... we hope.

Then there's the very extravagant party idea of serving specially aged Gruyere cheese. Imagine their faces when you point out that the delicious cheese was made from your own fluids and loving aged for a year.

Junior's helping, too! He's wrapping a gift for daddy. It's a festive holiday brick! Let's hope it's just a normal brick, and not one made from his own excretions... although his family's frugal habits tend to imply which way the wind is blowing on that little dilemma.

Near the bottom of the page, Elsie reveals that she and Elmer have a promotional record! This I gotta hear. However, the P.A.G! Research and Googling team was disappointed by The Ultranet. There seems to be no copy of that recording anywhere for us to hear. We'll have to make due with this weird TV commercial instead. The Ultranet owes us an apology, I think.

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