Any bright ideas?

I almost want one of these...

from Avon's Attack on Planet Mars, 1951

"Really scatters the gang"

Exploding army grenade from Honor House

Charlton's Unusual Tales 17 1959

There's no crap like Johnson Smith crap

Dollman Quarterly 45

More toys from back in the day

Woolworth's 1954 Christmas Book -- the ads

I suspect that kids who originally picked this up felt ripped off by the overwhelming number of ads. Almost sixty years later, the ads may be the most interesting part.

Either an early hybrid or a complete scam

I'm not betting on hybrid.

Dollman Quarterly 45, 1953

"How to make the heart grow fonder with LOVE LETTERS

It was 1943 and millions of young men were coming of age a long way from home. Letter writing was a valuable skill and a literate GI could make pretty good money scribbling sweet nothings to be recopied by barrack mates.

From Prize 35

A couple of Golden Age ads

Do you want a success-winning voice?

From Fantastic World's number 5

Friend or Foe?

From Smash 48, 1943

"Uncle Sam has a green thumb"

From the early Fifties, a patriotic PSA:


From Black Diamond Western #24

How correspondence schools create unrealistic expectations

For the Washington School of Art. From Weird Horrors #4, 1952

I too suffer from grasshopper mi

Major Victory number 2

Kids, sock the Axis with this wastepaper punch!

I think I've mentioned this before but whenever I come across one of these ads I'm struck by how strange that sense of common purpose and shared sacrifice seems today.

From Captain Marvel Adventures number 38

Back when butter got its own food group

Marvel Family number 2 (1946)

Air Travel circa 1952

I'm amazed this didn't catch on

It seemed like such a great idea when Jethro did it.

From Ghost Rider #13

Hospitalization for only three cents a day

This ad from a 1950 issue of Airboy shows how much things have changed and how much they haven't.

Friend or Foe? -- insert appropriate metaphor here

Watching the skies in 1943.

Smash Comics number48

This would definitely be worth a Popsicle bag

From Whiz Comics 147