Cigarette advertising has come a long way in the past 60 years. These days, you're more apt to hear why you shouldn't smoke than what you should.
By the 1950s, America was beginning to get the idea that smoking wasn't good for you, and tobacco companies were on the run for the first time. In 1954, they ran ads disputing claims that cancer and other catastrophic illnesses could result from smoking.
They got more bad news in 1964, when the U.S. surgeon general reported findings affirming those links.
In 1970, Congress banned cigarette advertising on television and radio, beginning Jan. 2, 1971. (The last ad was for Virginia Slims — "You've come a long way, Baby" — at 11:59 p.m. on "The Tonight Show.")
So advertising was transferred to magazines, newspapers and indoor and outdoor signs. Even those ads came under public assault, though. The Federal Trade Commission and Congress retired Joe Camel from all ads, as he was deemed a seducer of vulnerable potential young smokers.
It would seem that cigarette manufacturers should be having a hard time finding an outlet for their message, but the FTC claims they still spend billions a year, here and overseas, to peddle their products.
Nevertheless, the American public is far less apt to be inveigled into smoking than years ago. Get a load of the following advertisement that was broadcast Sept. 11, 1949, on "The Jack Benny Show" on radio. It was typical for its time. The deep-throated tones of a pair of pitchmen invited smokers to puff on a Lucky Strike and pretty soon they'd be transported to nirvana:
"Smoke a Lucky to feel your level best. You see, Luckies' fine tobacco picks you up when you're feeling low and calms you down when you're tense. So, to feel and do your level best, it's good to know that Luckies can do this for you.
'It's good to know that fine tobacco can do this for you. That's why it's so important that you select and smoke the cigarette of fine tobacco — Lucky Strike — for, as every smoker knows, LSMFT ... LSMFT ... Lucky Strike means fine tobacco.
"The experts, men who know tobacco best, look to Lucky Strike for their own personal smoking enjoyment. Yes, more experts — auctioneers, buyers and independent warehousemen — smoke Luckies than the next two leading brands combined.
"So smoke a Lucky to feel your level best. That's how to get on the Lucky level — where there's real joy in living, where it's fun to be alive, The Lucky level, where you feel your best and do your best. Smoke a Lucky to feel your level best.
"Get a carton of Luckies and get started today."
In 1949, it was legal and profitable to tell audiences that inhaling cigarette smoke would make them feel better, improve their performance and experience life's most sublime joy.
Millions of anguished deaths later, we now know better.
Opinion
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