Matchbooks collected with a national focus, from a variety of commercial establishments. Contain verbal and visual advertising.
Arrangement:
The collection is arranged into one series and is arranged geographically.
Provenance:
Collection donated by Allan Wolpe and Carolyn Sanger, December 30, 1994.
Restrictions:
Collection is open for research.
Rights:
Collection items available for reproduction, but the Archives Center makes no guarantees concerning copyright restrictions. Other intellectual property rights may apply. Archives Center cost-recovery and use fees may apply when requesting reproductions.
The Alka-Seltzer Oral History and Documentation Project is a result of a one year effort supported, in part, by Miles Laboratories, Incorporated. Twenty-four oral history interviews and a variety of related materials were gathered to document Alka- Seltzer advertising, primarily from the mid-1950s to the 1980s. The project covers "Speedy" Alka-Seltzer, "Oh what a relief it is," "The Blahs," "Alka Seltzer on the rocks," and "I can't believe I ate the whole thing" campaigns
Scope and Contents:
Oral histories with individuals associated with Alka-Seltzer and its advertising campaigns are at the core of the Alka-Seltzer Documenation and Oral History Project. Conducted by Smithsonian Institution staff, the oral histories primarily examine Alka-Seltzer's innovative and memorable print and television commercials. Abstracts exist for each interview.The collection also includes background information, archival materials from Miles Laboratories, Inc., television commercials, storyboards, and company publications.
Arrangement:
The collection is arranged in 8 series.
Series 1: Research Files, circa 1930-1986
Series 2: Interviewee Files, 1986-1987
Series 3: Oral Histories, 1986-1987
Subseries 3.1: Original Interviews
Subseries 3.2: Reference Cassettes
Subseries 3.3: Master Audio Tapes
Series 4: Miles Archives Materials, 1931-1980
Subseries 4.1: Marketing Research and Sales Data
Subseries 4.2: Alka-Seltzer Storyboards and History (Photocopies)
Subseries 4:3: Miles Advertising History and Oral History Program(photocopies)
Series 5: Company Publications, 1960-1986
Series 6: Photographs, circa 1950-1985
Series 7: Alka-Seltzer Posters, 1967-1986
Series 8: Audiovisual Materials
Subseries 8.1: Original Masters
Subseries 8.2: Reference Videos
Biographical / Historical:
The Alka-Seltzer Oral History and Documentation Project is a result of a one year effort supported, in part, by Miles Laboratories, Incorporated Twenty-four oral history interviews and a variety of related materials were gathered to document Alka- Seltzer advertising, primarily from the mid-1950s to the 1980s. The project covers "Speedy" Alka-Seltzer, "Oh what a relief it is," "The Blahs," "Alka Seltzer on the rocks," and "I can't believe I ate the whole thing" campaigns.
Miles Laboratories, Incorporated, the maker of Alka-Seltzer, and Wade Advertising of Chicago established a light-hearted advertising approach with the iconic puppet "Speedy", which had a tablet for a body and a smaller one for a hat. Speedy came to life through stop motion animation, a technique in which each of the puppet's movements was captured on a separate frame of film. The voice of Richard Beals made "Speedy" a distinctive character.
"Speedy" was a mainstay of Alka Seltzer advertising until 1964, when Miles,Incorporated took the account to Jack Tinker & Partners in New York. The agency's work for Alka-Seltzer embodied what came to be called advertising's "creative revolution," replacing the "talking heads" and "hard sell" of earlier advertising with humor, wit, and engaging storylines, even within the limits of a 30 second television spot. In 1969, the Alka Seltzer account went to Doyle, Dane, Bernbach, an agency which changed the look of print advertising during the early years of the "creative revolution." In 1970, Alka-Seltzer moved agencies to Wells, Rich, Greene, where the product's advertising came under the direction of Mary Wells Lawrence. Ms. Lawrence had worked on the Alka Seltzer account while at Tinker and continued Alka Seltzer's reputation for innovative and captivating work. In 1984 they shifted to McCann Erickson.
Provenance:
Collection donated by Miles Laboratories in 1988 and created by the Smithsonian Institution in 1986 and 1987.
Restrictions:
Researchers may use reference copies only. The interview with Charles Chaplin is restricted and may not be copied or quoted until his death.
Rights:
Collection items available for reproduction, but the Archives Center makes no guarantees concerning copyright restrictions. Other intellectual property rights may apply. Archives Center cost-recovery and use fees may apply when requesting reproductions.
Collection consists of records documenting one of the oldest advertising agencies created in Philadelphia. The company then moves to New York and expanses to international markets. During its history NW Ayer & Sons acquires a number of other advertising agencies and is eventually purchased. The largest portion of the collection is print advertisements but also
includes radio and television. NW Ayer is known for some of the slogans created for major American companies.
Scope and Contents:
The collection consists primarily of proof sheets of advertisements created by NW Ayer & Son, Incorporated for their clients. These materials are in series one through thirteen and consist primarily of print advertisements. There are also billboards, radio and television commercials. The advertisements range from consumer to corporate and industrial products. The majority of the advertisements were created for Ayer's New York, Chicago, Los Angeles and international offices. Printed advertisements created by Cunningham & Walsh, Hixson & Jorgensen and Newell-Emmett are also included among these materials. Researchers who are interested in records created by Ayer in the course of operating an advertising agency will find these materials in Series fourteen-nineteen.
Series fourteen consists of advertisements created by NW Ayer & Son to promote their services to potential clients.
Series fifteen are scrapbooks of some of the earliest advertisements created by the company. Series sixteen are publications. Some of the publications were created by Ayer while others were about Ayer or the advertising industry in general. Provides good background materials and puts the company in perspective. Series eighteen are the legal records. Materials relating to employees including photographs, oral histories etc. are found in series nineteen.
Series twenty is one of the smallest amounts of materials and includes information relating to the history of NW Ayer & Son.
The container lists for series one-thirteen are part of a database and are searchable. The list has been printed for the convenience of the researcher and is included in this finding aid. Series fourteen-twenty container lists are also a part of the finding aid but are not in a searchable format.
Series 1, Scrapbooks of Client Advertisements, circa 1870-1920, is arranged into three boxes by chronological date. There are two bound scrapbooks and one box of folders containing loose scrapbook pages. NW Ayer & Son compiled an assortment of their earliest ads and placed them into scrapbooks. Besides the earliest advertisements, the scrapbooks contain requests to run advertisements, reading notices and listings of papers Ayer advertised in. The early advertisements themselves range from medical remedies to jewelry to machines to clothing to education and more. Most of the advertisements in the bound scrapbooks are dated.
Series 2, Proofsheets, circa 1870-1930, NW Ayer was fond of creating scrapbooks containing proofsheets. The series contains proofsheets created between 1892 and 1930, organized into 526 boxes. For convenience of storage, access and arrangement, the scrapbooks were disassembled and the pages placed in original order in flat archival storage boxes. The proofsheets are arranged by book number rather than client name. Usually the boxes contain a listing of the clients and sometimes the dates of the advertisements to be found within the box.
Series 3, Proofsheets, circa 1920-1975, is organized into 532 oversize boxes, and contain proofsheets and tearsheets created between 1920 and 1972. Within this series, materials are arranged alphabetically by company name (occasionally subdivided by brand or product), and thereunder chronologically by date of production. Many major, national advertisers are represented, including American Telephone & Telegraph, Armour Company, Canada Dry, Cannon Mills, Carrier Corporation, Domino Sugar, Caterpillar tractor company, Ford Motor Company, General Electric, Goodyear, Hills Bros. Coffee, Ladies Home Journal, National Dairy, Plymouth (Chrysler Corporation), Steinway, TV Guide, United Airlines and the United States Army. Also contained in this series are three scrapbooks of client advertisements including Canada Dry, Ford Motor, and Victor Talking Machine.
Series 4, 2001 Addendum, circa 1976-2001, is organized into ninety three oversized boxes,one folder and contains proofsheets for select Ayer clients, created between 1975 and 2001. Within this series, materials are arranged alphabetically by client name and there under chronologically by date of production. Major national advertisers represented include American Telephone & Telegraph, Avon, the United States Army, DeBeers Consolidated Diamond Mines, Dupont, TV Guide, Sealtest, Kraft Foods, Gillette, General Motors, Cannon Mills.
Series 5, Billboards, circa 1952-1956, consists of mounted and un-mounted original art/mock-ups. Twenty-two pieces of original art created as mock-ups for Texaco billboards.
Series 6, Film and Video Commercials, 1967-1970,
Series 7, Radio and Television Materials, 1933-1993, undated, is arranged into eight boxes and includes radio scripts, television scripts, and story boards for commercials.
Subseries 7.1, Scripts and storyboards for Radio and Television Commercials, dates Scripts for radio and television commercials includes title, date, length of commercial, advertising agency, client information
NW Ayer's radio and television materials mainly focus on the American Telegraph and Telephone account. Some of Ayer's materials relate to Bell Telephone Hours.
Storyboards are used in television and film to assist the director in working with crew to tell the story. To show the viewer through the use of figures, visual effects and camera angles. When directors first start thinking about their storyboard they create a story in their mind. They think of all the camera angles, visual effects and how the figures will interact in their mind. They try to create an extraordinary story in their head to attract the viewer (YOU) In order for the storyboard to be entirely effective it can't be a passive document. When done properly, a storyboard serves as a central design, meeting the needs of many team members including graphics artists, video personnel and programmers.
Another function of a storyboard is to help the team communicate during the training development process. This communication is very important in working with a large team as in the movie King, produced in 1996. Figures help the director explain to the crew how they are going to record the film and how to present it to the audience. Sometimes the director wants special effects to be added to the film, but his budget might not be that big so the director will have to change the story to fit their budget.
The Visual Effects are an important part in the storyboards it adds a special touch of creativity to your film. Camera angles are an important expects in your film because the camera angles determine where the viewing audience will look. If you want your audience to look at a certain object you must turn their attention to it by focusing on that object and maybe you might try blocking something out. Then you will have your audience's attention and you may do whatever else you have to, it could be scaring them are just surprising them or whatever you do.
Also included is talent information and log sheets relating to the storage of the commercials.
Bell Telephone Hour Program, 1942-[19??], The Bell Telephone Hour, also known as The Telephone Hour, was a five minute musical program which began April 29, 1940 on National Broadcasting Company Radio and was heard on NBC until June 30, 1958. Sponsored by Bell Telephone showcased the best in classical and Broadway music, reaching eight to nine million listeners each week. It continued on television from 1959 to 1968.
Earlier shows featured James Melton and Francia White as soloists. Producer Wallace Magill restructured the format on April 27, 1942 into the "Great Artists Series" of concert and opera performers, beginning with Jascha Heifetz. Records indicate that the list of talents on the program included Marian Anderson, Helen Traubel, Oscar Levant, Lily Pons, Nelson Eddy, Bing Crosby, Margaret Daum, Benny Goodman, José Iturbi, Gladys Swarthout and .The series returned to radio in 1968-1969 as Bell Telephone Hour Encores, also known as Encores from the Bell Telephone Hour, featuring highlights and interviews from the original series.
National Broadcasting television specials sponsored by the Bell System, 1957-1987includes information relating to Science series, Bell system Theshold Series, Bell telephone hour and commercial and public sponsored programs
Series 8, Chicago Office Print Advertisements, 1954-1989, is arranged alphabetically by the name of the client in ninety boxes and six oversize folders. Clients include Illinois Bell Telephone (1955-1989), Microswitch (1969-1989), Teletype (1975-1984), John Deere (1974-1989) and Caterpillar (1966-1972) are particularly well represented. Other clients of interest include Dr. Scholl's shoes (circa 1968-1972), the Girl Scouts (1976-1980), Sunbeam Personal Products Company (1973-1981), Bell and Howell (1974-1983) and Alberto Culver shampoos (1967-1971), Honeywell, Incorporated, Blue Cross and Blue Shield Associations, Kraft, Incorporated, Sears, Roebuck and Company, and YMCA.
Series 9, Los Angeles Office Materials, 1950s-1987, include printed advertisements created by this office and information relating to the employees.
Subseries 9.1, Print Advertisements, 1977-1987, printed advertisements arranged in one box alphabetically by client. There is a sparse sampling of clients from this particular Ayer branch office. The majority of the advertisements contained within this series are from Pizza Hut (1986-1987). Also included are Computer Automation (1977-1978), State of the Art, Incorporated (1982) and Toshiba (1986).
Subseries 9.2, Personnel Files, 1950s-1970s, includes cards of employees who worked in the Los Angeles office. Information on the cards includes name, address, telephone number, birthday, date hired, departure date and why (retired, terminated, resigned, etc) and position. Not all cards have all information. There is also a photograph of the employees on the cards.
Series 10, Foreign Print Advertisements, 1977-1991, undated, NW Ayer maintained partnerships with international companies such as Sloanas Ayer in Argentina, Connaghan & May Paton Ayer in Australia, Moussault Ayer in Belgium, NW Ayer, LTD. in Canada, GMC Ayer in France, Co-Partner Ayer in Germany, Wong Lam Wang in Hong Kong, MacHarman Ayer in New Zealand, Grupo de Diseno Ayer in Spain, Nedeby Ayer in Sweden, and Ayer Barker in United Kingdom. This group of material is a small sampling of advertisements created from these International offices. It is arranged alphabetically by client. There are quite a few automobile advertisements (i.e. Audi, Fiat, General Motors, Mercedes-Benz, and Volkswagen). In addition there are numerous advertisements for various personal items from MacLean's toothpaste to Quick athletic shoes to Labello lip balm, etc. Most of the advertisements have the creator's name printed on the advertisements.
Series 11, Cunningham & Walsh, Incorporated Materials, 1915-1987, undated contains 98 boxes 11 folders materials from the New York advertising agency acquired by NW Ayer in the 1960s. The company began with Newel-Emmett, an agency of nine men which broke up in 1949. Two of the men Fred Walsh and Jack Cunningham formed this agency in bearing their names in 1950. The agency created "let your fingers for the walking campaign for American Telephone & Telegraph, Mother Nature for Chiffon, and Mrs. Olson for Folgers's coffee and let the good times roll for Kawasaki motorcycle. In 1986, NW Ayer Incorporated purchased Cunningham & Walsh Incorporated.
Subseries 11.1, Print Advertisements, 1915-1987, are contained in ninety eight boxes of primarily print advertisements arranged alphabetically by client name. Clients that are particularly well represented are Graybar (electrical implements, circa1926-1937), Johns-Manulle (circa1915-1971), Smith and Corono typewriters (circa 1934-1960), Sunshine Biscuit Company (circa 1925-1961), Texaco Company (circa 1936-1961), Western Electric (circa 1920- 1971) and Yellow Pages (circa 1936-1971). Cunningham and Walsh also represented several travel and tourism industry clients, including Cook Travel Services (circa 1951-1962), Italian Line (circa 1953-1961), Narragansett and Croft (circa 1956-1960) and Northwest Airlines (circa 1946-1955). There are photographs of Texaco advertisements dating from 1913-1962. There is also a scrapbook of advertisements from the Western Electric Company dating from 1920-1922.
Subseries 11.2, Radio and Television Advertisements, 1963-1967, consist of materials created for Western Electric. Materials are arranged in chronological order.
Subseries 11.3, Company Related Materials, 1962-1986, undated include client lists, information relating to NW Ayer purchase and annual report 1962.
Series 12, Hixson & Jorgensen Materials, 1953-1971, a Los Angeles advertising company, merged with Ayer in 1969. This series is housed in one box. Within the box are four scrapbooks and folders with a hodgepodge of materials relating to advertising. Of most interest are the scrapbooks. Two scrapbooks deal with Hixson and Jorgensen's self promotion ad campaign "the right appeal gets action" (1953-1957). The other two scrapbooks contain news clippings about the company and its activities (1959-1971).
Series 13, Newell-Emmet, 1942-1957, founded in 1919 and governed in the 1940s by a partnership of nine men. The partnership broke up in 1949 when the men went their separate ways. The materials consist of print advertisements for one of client, Permutit Company, a water conditioning company. The materials are arranged in one box in chronological order.
Series 14, House Print Advertisements, 1870-1991, 16 boxes consists of advertisements or self-promotion advertisements to campaign for new clients. The series is arranged chronologically by date into fifteen boxes. Within the series are two scrapbooks containing self promotion ads from 1888-1919 and 1892-1895. Numerous house ads relate to Ayer's "Human Contact" campaign. In addition to the self promotion ads, Ayer ran advertisements expounding about particular concepts or themes for example, one month the concept would "understand" while another month would be "teamwork" and yet another would be on "imagination". Some of the self promotion ads target specific groups like Philadelphia businessmen. Other advertisements incorporate the fine arts.
Series 15, Scrapbooks, 1872-1959, relates to company events, records and news clippings about Ayer's history. The six boxes are arranged by chronological date. Two of the boxes focus solely on the death of founder F.W. Ayer (1923). Another box houses a scrapbook that showcases Ayer's annual Typography Exhibition (1931-1959). One box contains a scrapbook that specifically deals with correspondences relating to Ayer's advertising. Yet another box's contents are folders of loose pages from scrapbooks that have newspaper clippings, order forms, correspondences and other company records. In one box, a bound scrapbook houses a variety of materials relating to Ayer and advertising (i.e. newspaper clippings, competitor's advertisements, NW Ayer's advertisements, correspondences for advertisements, clippings regarding the "theory of advertising."
Series 16, Publications, 1849-2006, are housed in thirty four boxes and are arranged into three main categories.
Subseries 16.1, House Publications, 1876-1994, covers diverse topics; some proscriptive works about the Ayer method in advertising, some commemorating people, anniversaries or events in the life of the agency. Materials consist of scattered issues of the employee newsletter The Next Step 1920-1921. The materials are arranged in chronological order by date of publication. Ayer in the News, The Show Windows of an Advertising Agency, 1915, book form of advertisements published on the cover of Printer's Ink, highlighting Ayer's relations with advertisers. The Story of the States, 1916, Reprint in book form of a series of articles published in Printer's Ink for the purpose of adding some pertinent fact, progressive thought and prophetic vision to the Nationalism of Advertising highlights major businesses, manufacturer, natural resources and other qualities or attractions of each state. The Book of the Golden Celebration, 1919, includes welcome address and closing remarks by founder F. Wayland Ayer, The Next Step, 1920 employee newsletter with photographs, employee profiles, in-house jokes, etc., Advertising Advertising: A Series of Fifty-two Advertisements scheduled one time a week. Twenty-seven, thirty and forty inches, a day of the week optional with publisher, 1924
Subseries 16.2, Publications about NW Ayer, 1949-2006, includes a book first published in 1939. Includes articles, documenting events and is arranged chronologically by date of publication.
Subseries 16.3, General Publications about Advertising, 1922-1974, are arranged chronologically by date of publication and relate primarily to the history of advertising.
Subseries 16.4, Publications about Other Subjects, 1948-1964, include four books about the tobacco industry primarily the history of the American Tobacco Company and Lorillard Company from the Cunningham and Walsh library.
Series 17, Business Records, circa 1885-1990s
Subseries 17.1, Contracts, 1885-1908, undated, are arranged alphabetically and span from 1885-1908. The majority of the contracts are with newspaper and magazine publishers from around the country.
Subseries 17.2, General client information, 1911-1999, undated, including active and cancelled lists with dates, client gains, historical client list, (should move this to series 20) Ayer Plan User Guide Strategic Planning for Human Contact, undated
Subseries 17.3, Individual Client Account Information, 1950s-1990s, undated, contain information used by Ayer to create advertisements for some of its clients. American Telephone &Telegraph Corporate Case History, American Telephone &Telegraph Corporate advertisement memo, commissioned artists for DeBeers advertisements, DeBeers information relating to the creative process and photography credits, a case history for DeBeers Consolidated Mines, Ltd., The Diamond Engagement Ring, Managing Communication at all levels, DuPont publications, JC Penny Marketing Communication Plan Recommendation, Leaf, Incorporated, Saturn presentation, and USAREC oral presentation.
Subseries 17.4, Potential Clients, 1993, includes grouping has a questionnaire sent to Ayer by a potential client. Questionnaire response for Prudential Securities, 1993 Prudential Securities advertising account review, 1993.
Subseries 17.5, Financial Records, 1929-1938, includes balance sheet, 1929 May 1 Balance sheet and adjustments Consolidated statement of assets and liabilities, Expenses 191936-37 Business review and expenses, 1937 and 1938 Business review and expenses comparative statement, 1937 and 1938.
Series 18, Legal Records, circa 1911-1982, Ayer's legal records are arranged by twelve subject groupings within four boxes. The twelve groupings are advertising service agreements (circa 1918-1982), bylaws, copyright claims, correspondences, international correspondences, dissolution of trusts, stock information, agreements between partners, incorporation materials, reduction of capital, property information and miscellaneous materials. The bulk of the materials are the advertising service agreements. These agreements are between Ayer and their clients and state the services Ayer will offer and at what cost. The bylaws are Ayer's company bylaws from 1969 and 1972. The copyright claims are certificates stating Ayer's ownership over certain published materials (i.e. "Policy", Media Equalizer Model, and Don Newman's Washington Square Experiment). The correspondences relate to either the voting trust and receipts for agreement or the New York Corporation. The international correspondences are from either Ayer's Canadian office or London office. The dissolutions of trusts contains materials about the dividend trust of Wilfred F. Fry, the investment trust of Winfred W. Fry, the voting trust, and the New York corporation. The stock information has stock certificates and capital stock information. The agreements between partners (1911-1916) specify the terms between F.W. Ayer and his partners. The incorporation materials (circa 1929-1977) deal with Ayer advertising agency becoming incorporated in the state of Delaware. The reduction of capital grouping is a notification that shares of stock have been retired. The property information grouping contains property deeds and insurance policy (circa 1921-1939), a property appraisal (1934), and a bill of sale (1948). The miscellaneous grouping contains a house memo regarding a set of board meeting minutes and a registry of foreign companies in Commonwealth of Pennsylvania (1929-1954).
Subseries 18.1, Advertising Service Agreements, 1918-1982
Subseries 18.2, Bylaw Materials, 1969-1972
Subseries 18.3, Copyright Claims, 1962-1969
Subseries 18.4, Correspondence, 1928-1933
Subseries 18.5, International Office Correspondence, 1947-1948
Subseries 18.6, Dissolution of Trusts, 1934-1937
Subseries 18.7, Stock Information, 1934-1974
Subseries 18.8, Agreements between Partners, 1911-1916
Series 19, Personnel Records, circa 1889-2001, are arranged into eight groupings within eight boxes. The groupings are employee card files, photographs, Ayer alumni, biographies, speeches, recollections, oral histories, and miscellaneous. Typed manuscript of book A Copy Writer Speaks by George Cecil, NW Ayer, Incorporated copy head 1920s-1950s
Subseries 19.1, Employee card files, circa 1892-1915; 1929-1963, consists of index cards with the name, age, job title, date and wage increases, date of hire/fire, as well as remarks about the employee's service and/or reasons for seeking or leaving the job. Materials are arranged alphabetically by the last name of the employee within three boxes.
Subseries 19.2, Photographs, circa 1924-1984, undated, are housed in two boxes. The photographs grouped together by subjects i.e. personnel, company events, Ayer buildings, and miscellaneous. This grouping primarily consists of personnel photographs. Includes a glass plate negative dated 1924 of NW Ayer.
Subseries 19.3, Ayer Alumni, circa 1989-98, include employees who have left Ayer. There is a listing of Ayer "graduates" and their current job. Emeritus, Ayer's alumni newsletter 1989-1996, makes up the majority of materials in this grouping. The newsletter keeps the alumni up to date with the happenings of Ayer and what has become of former Ayer employees. Emeritus is a quarterly newsletter devoted to the activities, thoughts and feelings of Ayer alumni a body of people who consists of retirees and former employees.
Subseries 19.4, Biographical Information, circa 1889-1994, undated, prominent members of Ayer's operations had biographical sketches completed of them. This was true for the bio sketches of Robert Ervin, Louis T. Hagopian, and George A. Rink. There is a substantial file on Dorothy Dignam ("Mis Dig"), a leading woman in the advertising world from the 1930s to the 1950s. Also of interest is a video ("The Siano Man") compiled by Ayer employees to commemorate Jerry Siano's retirement from Ayer in 1994. The series is arranged alphabetically by last name.
Subseries 19.5, Speeches, circa 1919-1931; 1975, contains speeches made by Wilfred W. Fry and Neal W. O'Connor. Wilfred W. Fry had various speaking engagements connected with Ayer. Contained in this group is a sampling of his speeches from 1919 to 1931. Neal O'Connor's speech "Advertising: Who Says It's a Young People's Business" was given at the Central Region Convention for the American Association of Advertising Agencies in Chicago on November 6, 1975. The speeches are arranged alphabetically by the speaker's last name.
Subseries 19.6, Recollections, 1954-1984, undated, are arranged alphabetically by last name. These are recollections from Ayer employees about the company and its advertisements. Some recollections are specifically about certain types of advertisements, like farm equipment while others reflect on F. W. Ayer and the company.
Subseries 19.7, Oral History Interview Transcripts, 1983-1985; 1989-1991, include interviews with key NW Ayer personnel, conducted by Ayer alumnae Howard Davis, Brad Lynch and Don Sholl (Vice President creative) for the Oral History Program. The materials are arranged alphabetically by the last name of the interviewee.
Subseries 19.8, Oral History Interview Audio Tapes, 1985-1990, include interviews on audiotape the materials are arranged alphabetically by the last name of the interviewee.
Subseries 19.9, Internal Communications, 1993-1999, includes information sent to employees relating to retirements, management changes, awards won by the company, promotions, potential new accounts, free items, grand opening of Ayer Café, donation events, sponsorship programs, holiday schedules, discounts for employees from clients, Ayer joins MacManus Group.
Subseries 19.10, General Materials, 1940; 1970, includes agency directory entry including a list of the employees, 1970s, annual banquet program for the Curfew Club May 22, 1940 a group formed by the Philadelphia employee in 1938. It sponsored numerous sports, social and educational activities. Groups were formed in public speaking, music appreciation and a series of talks on Monday evenings title the modern woman. The front page was a series of talks for general interest. A list of officers, 1991, Twenty five year club membership, 1973 December 1, List of NW Ayer graduates, 1970, List of Officers, 1991 May 31, Obituary for Leo Lionni, 1999 October 17, List of photographers of advertisements, 2001
Series 20, Background and History Information, 1817-1999, undated includes a chronology, 1817-1990, quick reference timeline, 1848-1923, loose pages from a scrapbook containing examples of correspondence, envelopes, advertisements dating from 1875-1878; slogans coined by NW Ayer & Sons, Incorporated, 1899-1990, history of management, 1909-1923, articles and photographs about the building and art galleries, 1926-1976, publications about the Philadelphia building, 1929, pamphlet relating to memories of NW Ayer & Sons, Incorporated, 1930s-1950s, television history, 1940-1948, Article about the history of the company, 1950 January, pocket guide, 1982, AdWeek reports about standings for advertising agencies, information relating to Human Contact which is NW Ayer's Information relating to Human Contact, undated which is their philosophy on advertising.
Series 21, Materials Created by other Advertising Agencies, 1945-1978, undated, consists of print advertisements collected by Ayer from other major advertising companies. The companies include Doyle Dane Bernback, Incorporated, Leo Burnett Company, Grey Advertising Agency, D'Arcy Ad Agency, Scali, McCabe, Sloves, Incorporated and Erwin Wasey Company. The materials are arranged in alphabetical order by client and include products from Ralston Purina and Van Camp (Chicken of the Sea), Kellogg, American Export Lines and No Nonsense Fashions.
Series 22, 2010 Addendum of Print Advertisements, circa 1879s-1999, undated, includes material given to the Archives Center in 2010. It is organized into seventy one oversized boxes and contains proofsheets of print advertisements for select Ayer clients. These are arranged alphabetically by client name and include substantial quantities of materials from American Telephone &Telegraph (1945-1996), Bahamas Ministry of Tourism (1967-1987), Carrier (1971-1981), Citibank (1973-1991), DeBeers (1940s-1960s and1990s), Electric Companies Advertising Program [ECAP] (1942-1970s), General Motors (1989-1998), J.C. Penney (1983-1986), Newsweek (1966-1975), and Proctor and Gamble (1980s-1890s). There are also numerous other clients represented by smaller quantities of materials.
Subseries 22.2, Print Advertisements on Glass Plate Negatives, 1879-1881, undated, include Cannon towels, Cheny Brothers silks, Cornish & Company organs and pianos, Enterprise Manufacturing Company, 1879 sad iron, an ad from Harper's Weekly 1881 for ladies clothing, Ostermoor & Company mattresses, Pear's soap, Porter's cough balsam, Steinway pianos.
Series 23, Microfilm of Print Advertisements, circa 1908-1985, consists of three boxes of printed advertisements for the American Telephone and Telegraph Company. Some of the same advertisements might also be found in series two, three and four.
Arrangement:
The collection is arranged into twenty-three series.
Series 1: Scrapbooks of Client Print Advertisements, circa 1870-1920
Series 2: Proofsheets, circa 1870-1930
Series 3: Proofsheets, circa 1920-1975
Series 4: 2001 Addendum, circa 1976-2001
Series 5: Billboards, circa 1952-1956
Series 6: Audiovisual Materials
Series 7: Radio and Television Materials, 1933-1993, undated
Series 8: Chicago Office Print Advertisements, 1954-1989
Series 9: Los Angeles Office Materials, 1950s-1987
Subseries 9.1: Printed Advertisements, 1977-1987
Subseries 9.2: Personnel Files, 1950s-1970s
Series 10: Foreign Print Advertisements, 1977-1991, undated
Series 11: Cunningham & Walsh Incorporated Materials, 1915-1987, undated
Subseries 11.1: Printed Advertisements, 1915-1987
Subseries 11.2: Radio and Television Advertisements, 1963-1967
Subseries 11.3: Company Related Materials, 1962-1986, undated
Series 12: Hixson & Jorgensen Materials, 1953-1971, undated
Series 13: Newell-Emmet, 1942-1957
Series 14: House Print Advertisements, 1870-1991
Series 15: Scrapbooks, 1872-1959
Series 16: Publications, 1849-2006
Subseries 16.1: House Publications, 1876-1994
Subseries 16.2: Publications about NW Ayer, 1949-1995
Subseries 16.3: General Publications about Advertising, 1922-2006
Subseries 16.4: Publications about other Subjects, 1948-1964
Series 17, Business Records, circa 1885-1990s
Subseries 17.1: Contracts, 1885-1908, undated
Subseries 17.2: General Client Information, 1911-1999, undated
Subseries 22.2: Print Advertisements on Glass Plate Negatives, 1879-1881, undated
Series 23: Microfilm of Print Advertisements, circa 1908-1985
Biographical / Historical:
Founded in Philadelphia in 1869, NW Ayer & Son is one of the oldest and largest advertising agencies in America. For most of its history, it was the undisputed leader and innovator in the field of advertising. In 1876, NW Ayer & Son pioneered the "open contract", a revolutionary change in the method of billing for advertising which became the industry standard for the next hundred years. NW Ayer pioneered the use of fine art in advertising and established the industry's first art department. It was the first agency to use a full-time copywriter and the first to institute a copy department. The agency relocated to New York City in 1974. During its long history, the agency's clients included many "blue-chip" clients, including American Telephone & Telegraph, DeBeers Consolidated Diamond Mines, Ford Motor Company, Nabisco, R. J. Reynolds and United Airlines. However, in later years, the Ayer's inherent conservatism left the agency vulnerable to the creative revolution of the 1960s and 1970s, the advertising industry restructuring of the 1980s and the economic recession of the early 1990s. The agency was bought out by a Korean investor in 1993. In 1996, NW Ayer merged with another struggling top twenty United States advertising agency, Darcy, Masius, Benton & Bowles, under the umbrella of the McManus Group. Ayer continues to operate as a separate, full-service agency.
Through a series of buyouts and mergers, Ayer traces its lineage to the first advertising agency founded in the United States, a Philadelphia agency begun by Volney Palmer in 1841. Palmer began his career in advertising as a newspaper agent, acting as middleman between newspaper publishers and advertisers across the country. By 1849, Palmer had founded his own newspaper, V. B. Palmer's Register and Spirit of the Press, and had developed a complete system of advertising which included securing advertising space and placing ads in scores of commercial, political, religious, scientific and agricultural journals across the country. Palmer went one step further than the "space jobbers" of the day when he began offering "advertisements carefully drawn for those who have not the time to prepare an original copy." Always an enthusiastic promoter of advertising as an incentive to trade and American economic growth, Palmer promised advertisers that "every dollar paid for advertising in country newspapers will pay back twenty-fold" and encouraged skeptical consumers that "he who wishes to buy cheap should buy of those who advertise." When Palmer died in 1863, the agency was bought by his bookkeeper, John Joy, who joined with another Philadelphia advertising agency to form Joy, Coe & Sharpe. That agency was bought out again in 1868 and renamed Coe, Wetherill & Company. In 1877, Coe, Wetherill and Company was bought out by the newly formed NW Ayer & Son.
Francis Wayland Ayer was an ambitious young schoolteacher with an entrepreneurial streak. Having worked for a year soliciting advertisements on a commission basis for the publisher of the National Baptist weekly, Francis Ayer saw the potential to turn a profit as an advertising agent. In 1869, Ayer persuaded his father, Nathan Wheeler Ayer, to join him in business, and with an initial investment of only $250.00, NW Ayer & Son was born. Notwithstanding a smallpox epidemic in Philadelphia in 1871 and the general economic depression of the early 1870s, the agency flourished. The senior Ayer died in 1873, leaving his interest in the agency to his wife, but Francis W. Ayer bought her out, consolidating his interest in the company's management. In 1877, with Coe, Wetherill & Company (the successor to Palmer's 1841 agency) on the verge of bankruptcy and heavily indebted to Ayer for advertising it had placed in Ayer publications, Ayer assumed ownership of that agency. Thus did NW Ayer lay claim to being the oldest advertising agency in the country.
Both Nathan Wheeler and Francis Wayland Ayer began their careers as schoolteachers, and one of their legacies was a commitment to the cause of education: correspondence schools and institutions of higher learning were historically well-represented among Ayer clients. Just after World War I, the agency was heralded as "co-founder of more schools than any citizen of this country" for its conspicuous efforts to advertise private schools. Well into the 1960s, an "Education Department" at Ayer prepared advertisements for over three hundred private schools, camps and colleges, representing almost half the regional and national advertising done for such institutions. In fact, to its clients Ayer presented advertising itself as being akin to a system of education. In 1886, Ayer began promoting the virtues of the Ayer way advertising with the slogan, "Keeping Everlastingly at It Brings Success."
The agency's goals were simple: "to make advertising pay the advertiser, to spend the advertiser's money as though it were our own, to develop, magnify and dignify advertising as a business." Initially, Ayer's fortunes were tied to newspapers, and the agency began to make a name for itself as compiler and publisher of a widely used American Newspaper Annual. During the first years, Ayer's singular goal was "to get business, place it [in newspapers] and get money for it"; after several years as an independent space broker, however, Francis Ayer resolved "not to be an order taker any longer." This decision led NW Ayer and Son to a change in its mode of conducting business which would revolutionize the advertising industry: in 1876, Ayer pioneered the "open contract" with Diggee & Conard, Philadelphia raised growers and agricultural suppliers. Prior to the open contract, NW Ayer & Sons and most agencies operated as "space-jobbers," independent wholesalers of advertising space, in which the opportunities for graft and corrupt practices were virtually unlimited. In contrast, the open contract, wherein the advertiser paid a fixed commission based on the volume of advertising placed, aligned the advertising agent firmly on the side of the advertiser and gave advertisers access to the actual rates charged by newspapers and religious journals. The open contract with a fixed commission has been hailed by advertising pioneer Albert Lasker as one of the "three great landmarks in advertising history." (The other two were Lasker's own development of "reason-why" advertising copy and J. Walter Thompson's pioneering of sex appeal in an advertisement for Woodbury's soap.) Although the transition to the open contract did not happen overnight, by 1884, nearly three-quarters of Ayer's advertising billings were on an open contract basis. Since Ayer was, by the 1890s, the largest agency in America, the switch to direct payment by advertisers had a significant impact on the advertising industry, as other agencies were forced to respond to Ayer's higher standard. Just as important, the open contract helped to establish N W Ayer's long-standing reputation for "clean ethics and fair dealing" -- a reputation the agency has guarded jealously for over a century.
The open contract also helped to establish Ayer as a full service advertising agency and to regularize the production of advertising in-house. From that point forward, Ayer routinely offered advice and service beyond the mere placement of advertisements. Ayer set another milestone for the industry in 1888, when Jarvis Wood was hired as the industry's first full-time copywriter. Wood was joined by a second full time copywriter four years later, and the Copy Department was formally established in 1900. The industry's first Art Department grew out of the Copy Department when Ayer hired its first commercial artist to assist with copy preparation in 1898; twelve years later Ayer became the first agency to offer the services of a full time art director, whose sole responsibility was the design and illustration of ads.
Ayer's leadership in the use of fine art in advertising has roots in this period, but achieved its highest expression under the guidance of legendary art director Charles Coiner. Coiner joined Ayer in 1924, after graduating from the Chicago Academy of Fine Arts. Despite early resistance from some clients, Coiner was adamant that "the use of outstanding palette and original art forms bring a greater return in readership, in impact and prestige for the advertiser." To this end, Coiner marshaled the talents of notable painters, illustrators and photographers, including N.C. Wyeth and Rockwell Kent (Steinway), Georgia O'Keefe (Dole), Leo Lionni (DuPont), Edward Steichen (Steinway, Cannon Mills), Charles Sheeler (Ford), and Irving Penn (DeBeers). Coiner believed that there was a practical side to the use of fine art in advertising, and his success (and Ayer's) lay in the marriage of research and copywriting with fine art, an arrangement Coiner termed "art for business sake." Coiner's efforts won both awards and attention for a series completed in the 1950s for the Container Corporation of America. Titled "Great Ideas of Western Man" the campaign featured abstract and modern paintings and sculpture by leading U.S. and foreign artists, linked with Western philosophical writings in an early example of advertising designed primarily to bolster corporate image. In 1994, Charles Coiner was posthumously named to the American Advertising Federation's Hall of Fame, the first full time art director ever chosen for that honor.
Coiner and fellow art director Paul Darrow also created legendary advertising with the "A Diamond Is Forever" campaign for DeBeers; ads featured the work of Pablo Picasso, Salvador Dali and other modernist painters. The "A Diamond is Forever" tagline was written in 1949 by Frances Gerety, a woman copywriter at Ayer from 1943 to 1970. In 1999, Ad Age magazine cited "A Diamond is Forever" as the most memorable advertising slogan of the twentieth century.
Coiner also earned respect for his volunteer government service during World War II; he designed the armbands for civil defense volunteers and logos for the National Recovery Administration and Community Chest. As a founding member of the Advertising Council in 1945, Ayer has had a long-standing commitment to public service advertising. In the mid-1980s, Ayer became a leading force in the Reagan-era "War on Drugs". Lou Hagopian, Ayer's sixth CEO, brokered the establishment of the Partnership for a Drug-Free America, a media coalition which generated as much as a million dollars a day in donated advertising space and time to prevent the use and abuse of illegal drugs. Famous names appear among NW Ayer's clientele from the very earliest days of the agency. Retailer John Wanamaker, Jay Cooke and Company, and Montgomery Ward's mail-order business were among the first Ayer clients. The agency has represented at least twenty automobile manufacturers, including Cadillac, Chrysler, Ford, General Motors, Plymouth, and Rolls-Royce. Other major, long-term clients through the years have included American Telephone & Telegraph, Canada Dry, Cannon Mills, Hills Bros. Coffee Company, Kellogg's, R. J. Reynolds, Steinway and Sons, United Airlines, and the United States Army. By the time of Ayer's hundredth anniversary in 1969, some of these companies had been Ayer clients for decades if not generations, and the longevity of those relationships was for many years a source of Ayer's strength.
But the advertising industry began to change in the late 1960s and 1970s, due in part to a "creative revolution." Small advertising agencies won attention with provocative copywriting and art direction that more closely resembled art than advertising. Advances in market research allowed clients to more narrowly tailor their advertising messages to distinct groups of consumers, and this led to a rise in targeted marketing which could more readily be doled out to specialized small agencies than to larger, established firms like NW Ayer & Son. The civil rights and anti-war movements also contributed to increasing public skepticism with the values of corporate America, and by extension, with some national advertising campaigns. Older, more conservative firms like Ayer were hard pressed to meet these new challenges.
About 1970, in an effort to meet these challenges and to establish a foothold on the West Coast, Ayer bought out two smaller agencies--Hixson & Jorgenson (Los Angeles) and Frederick E. Baker (Seattle). The agency relocated from Philadelphia to New York City in 1974 in an attempt both to consolidate operations (Ayer had operated a New York office since the 1920s) and to be closer to the historic center of the advertising industry. Riding the wave of mergers that characterized the advertising industry in the late 1980s and 1990s, Ayer continued to grow through the acquisition of Cunningham & Walsh in 1986 and Rink Wells in 19xx.
During this transitional period, Ayer received widespread acclaim for its work for the United States Army, which included the widely recognized slogan "Be All You Can Be". Ayer first acquired the Army recruitment account in 1967 and with help from its direct marketing arm, the agency was widely credited with helping the Army reach its recruitment goals despite an unpopular war and plummeting enlistments after the elimination of the draft in 1973. Ayer held the account for two decades, from the Vietnam War through the Cold War, but lost the account in 1986 amid government charges that an Ayer employee assigned to the account accepted kickbacks from a New York film production house. Despite Ayer's position as the country's 18th largest agency (with billings of $880 million in 1985), the loss of the agency's second largest account hit hard.
NW Ayer made up for the loss of the $100 million dollar a year Army account and made headlines for being on the winning end of the largest account switch in advertising history to date, when fast food giant Burger King moved its $200 million dollar advertising account from arch-rival J. Walter Thompson in 1987. Burger King must have had drive-thru service in mind, however, and Ayer made headlines again when it lost the account just eighteen months later in another record-breaking account switch. Another devastating blow to the agency was the loss of its lead position on the American Telegraph and Telephone account. Ayer pioneered telecommunications advertising in 1908, when the agency was selected to craft advertising for the Bell System's universal telephone service. Despite valiant efforts to keep an account the agency had held for most of the twentieth century, and for which they had written such memorable corporate slogans as American Telephone &Telegraph "The Voice with a Smile" and "Reach Out and Touch Someone", the agency lost the account in 1996.
After a wave of mergers and acquisitions in the late 1980s, the economic recession of the early 1990s hit Madison Avenue hard, and Ayer was particularly vulnerable. Despite the agency's long history and roster of "blue-chip" clients, Ayer was not known for cutting-edge creative work. Moreover, though the agency had offices overseas, Ayer had never built a strong multinational presence, and many of the smaller international offices were sold during the financial turmoil of the 1980s. This left a real void in the new climate of global marketplace consolidation. By about 1990, earnings were declining (although Ayer was still among the top twenty United States agencies in billings), and the agency was suffering from client defections, high management turnover, expensive real estate commitments and deferred executive compensation deals, all fallout of the high-flying 1980s. This was the atmosphere in 1993, when W.Y. Choi, a Korean investor who had already assembled a media and marketing empire in his homeland, began looking for an American partner to form an international advertising network. Jerry Siano, the former creative director who had recently been named Ayer's seventh CEO, was in no position to refuse Choi's offer of $35 million to buy the now floundering agency. The infusion of cash was no magic bullet, however. Choi took a wait-and-see approach, allowing his partner Richard Humphreys to make key decisions about Ayer's future, including the purging of senior executives and the installation of two new CEOs in as many years.
The agency's downward trend continued with the loss of another longtime client, the DeBeers diamond cartel in 1995. Adweek reported that Ayer's billings fell from $892 million in 1990 to less than $850 million in 1995. Several top executives defected abruptly, and the agency failed to attract major new accounts. Ayer was facing the loss not merely of revenue and personnel, but the loss of much of the respect it once commanded. Ayer remained among the twenty largest U.S. agencies, but an aura of uncertainty hung over the agency like a cloud. A new CEO was appointed, and Mary Lou Quinlan became the agency's first woman CEO in 1995. A year later, Ayer and another struggling top twenty agency, D'arcy, Masius, Benton & Bowles, combined as part of the McManus Group of companies. In 1998, the McManus Group had worldwide billings of more than $6.5 billion.
Under the McManus Group, Ayer was able to expand its international operations and begin to rebuild a stronger global presence. Several important new clients were won in 1997 and 1998, including Avon, General Motors, Kitchenaid, several Procter & Gamble brands and, most notably, Continental Airlines worldwide accounts. Born in the nineteenth century, Ayer may be one of a very few advertising agencies to successfully weather the economic and cultural transitions of both the twentieth and twentieth first centuries. Ayer was eventually acquired by the Publicis Groupe based in Paris, France which closed down the N.W. Ayer offices in 2002.
Related Materials:
Materials in the Archives Center
Warshaw Collection of Business Americana (AC0060)
Hills Bros. Coffee Incorporated Records (AC0395)
Provenance:
The collection was donated by N W Ayer ABH International, April 15, 1975 and by Ayer & Partners, October 30, 1996.
Restrictions:
The collection is open for research use.
Physical Access: Researchers must use microfilm copy. Researchers must handle unprotected photographs with gloves. Researchers must use reference copies of audiovisual materials. When no reference copy exists, the Archives Center staff will produce reference copies on an "as needed" basis, as resources allow.
Technical Access: Viewing the film portion of the collection without reference copies requires special appointment, please inquire; listening to audio discs requires special arrangement. Do not use original materials when available on reference video or audio tapes.
Rights:
Publication and production quality duplication is restricted due to complex copyright, publicity rights, and right to privacy issues. Potential users must receive written permission from appropriate rights holders prior to obtaining high quality copies. Archives Center cost-recovery and use fees may apply when requesting reproductions.
Collection items available for reproduction, but the Archives Center makes no guarantees concerning copyright restrictions. Other intellectual property rights may apply. Archives Center cost-recovery and use fees may apply when requesting reproductions.
Collection Citation:
Doc Cheatham Papers, 1939-1998, Archives Center, National Museum of American History
Collection items available for reproduction, but the Archives Center makes no guarantees concerning copyright restrictions. Other intellectual property rights may apply. Archives Center cost-recovery and use fees may apply when requesting reproductions.
Collection Citation:
Doc Cheatham Papers, 1939-1998, Archives Center, National Museum of American History
Collection includes music manuscripts, articles and clippings, concert programs, passports, and photographs.
Scope and Contents:
This collection documents, mostly in photographs, the musical career of Mongo Santamaria. Other materials include music manuscripts, magazine and newspaper articles, flyers, posters, and passports.
Series 1, Photographs, circa 1950s–1990s, includes primarily black and white and some color images of Mongo Santamaria. There is a photograph of Santamaria with the first Congo he brought from Cuba to the United States. Of particular interest is Santamaria performing with Tito Puente and Cal Tjada's bands. Some of the earlier photographs document performances at the Palladium Nightclub and Apollo Theatre. There are publicity photographs of Santamaria and his band created by the recording studios. The photographs also include award ceremonies, bar scenes and concert appearances. The materials are arranged in chronological order.
Series 2, Music Manuscripts, 1958-1985; undated, includes music created by Santamaria and music performed by him but written by other composers. Escena Afro-Cubanas composed and arranged by Valerie Capers (1985), Just Say Good-by by Rodgers Grant, Mambo Olga Pachanga by Nicolas Martinez (1961) and Peace by Horace Silver are included among these materials. The materials are arranged in alphabetical order by title.
Series 3, Personal and Background Information, 1945-1996; undated, include a profile of Santamaria and other musicians written in Japanese. There are also magazine articles documenting the development of Santamaria's career and his public appearances. Articles from the Miami Herald and the Chicago Tribune are also included among the materials. Personal items consist of Santamaria's Cuban and American passports. The materials are arranged in alphabetical order by type.
Series 4, Performance Materials, 1977-1996; undated, includes the National Academy of Recording Arts and Sciences Certificate to Mongo Santamaria and his Latin-Jazz Orchestra in recognition of nomination for the Best Tropical Latin Performance for Free Spirit, Espirito Libre, 1985. There are also flyers and an entertainment guide, some in Spanish, advertising public appearances for concert performances. A program in French for a jazz festival in Vienna includes profiles of the performers. There are posters including a black and white drawing of jazz musicians by Robert Leonard (1985) and appearances at the Miami Jazz and Heritage Festival, Apollo Theatre, Oberlin College and the Blue Note. Materials are arranged in alphabetical order by type.
Arrangement:
The collection is divided into 4 series.
Series 1: Photographs, circa 1950s-1990
Series 2, Music Manuscripts, 1958-1985 and undated
Series 3, Personal and Background Information, 1945-1996 and undated
Series 4, Performance Materials, 1977-1996 and undated
Biographical / Historical:
Cuban-born percussionist, composer, arranger, and bandleader.
Related Materials:
The materials in this collection complement the Latino Music Collection, Tito Puente Papers, Chico O'Farrill Papers, Dizzy Gillespie Collection and Paquito d'Rivera Music Manuscripts and Photograph.
Provenance:
Donated to the Archives Center by Mongo Santamaria's daughter, Nancy Anderson.
Restrictions:
Collection is open for research.
Rights:
Fees for commercial reproduction. Reproduction restricted due to copyright or trademark.
The Cover Girl Make-Up Advertising Oral History and Documentation Project, 1923-1991, is the result of a year-long study in 1990, which examined the advertising created for Noxell Corporation's Cover Girl make-up products from 1959 to 1990. The objective of the project was to document, in print and electronic media, the history of Cover Girl make-up advertising since its inception in 1959.
Scope and Contents:
Twenty-two oral history interviews (conducted by Dr. Scott Ellsworth for the Archives Center) and a variety of print and television advertisements, photographs, scrapbooks, personal papers, business records and related materials were gathered by the Center for Advertising History staff. The objective was to create a collection that provides documentation, in print and electronic media, of the history and development of advertising for Cover Girl make-up since its inception in 1959.
Collection also includes earlier material related to other Noxell products, including Noxzema, with no direct connection to the Cover Girl campaign.
Arrangement:
The collection is arranged into eight series.
Series 1: Research Files
Series 2: Interviewee Files
Series 3: Oral History Interviews
Series 4: Television Advertising Materials
Series 5: Print Advertising Materials
Series 6: Company Publications and Promotional Literature
Series 7: Photographs
Series 8: Scrapbooks
Biographical / Historical:
George Avery Bunting founded the Noxzema Chemical Company in Baltimore, Maryland in 1917. In the 1890s, he left behind a teaching job on Maryland's Eastern shore to move to Baltimore, where he hoped to pursue a career as a pharmacist. He landed a job as errand boy and soda jerk at a local drugstore, where he worked while attending classes at the University Of Maryland College of Pharmacy. Valedictorian of the Class of 1899, Bunting was promoted to manager of the drugstore, which he purchased. Bunting began to experiment with the formulation of medicated pastes and compounds, which he marketed to his customers. In 1909, he began refining a medicated vanishing cream, which he introduced in 1914. "Dr. Bunting's Sunburn Remedy," an aromatic skin cream containing clove oil, eucalyptus oil, lime water, menthol and camphor, was mixed by hand at his pharmacy. Marketed locally as a greaseless, medicated cream for the treatment of a variety of skin conditions, including sunburn, eczema, and acne, the product was renamed "Noxzema" for its reputed ability to "knock eczema." By 1917, the Noxzema Chemical Company was formed. During the 1920s, distribution of the product was expanded to include New York, Chicago, and the Midwest and, by 1926, the first Noxzema manufactory was built in northwest Baltimore to accommodate the demand for nearly a million jars a year.
Having achieved a national market by 1938, Noxzema Chemical Company executives pursued product diversification as a means to maintain the corporate growth of the early years. In the 1930s and 1940s, line extensions included shaving cream, suntan lotion and cold cream, all with the distinctive "medicated" Noxzema aroma.
In the late 1950s, Bill Hunt, director of product development at Noxzema, suggested a line extension into medicated make-up. Creatives at Sullivan, Stauffer, Colwell & Bayles, Incorporated (SSC&B), Noxzema's advertising agency since 1946, suggested that the advertising for the new product focus on beauty and glamour with some reference to the medicated claims made for other Noxzema products. In contrast to other cosmetics, which were sold at specialized department store counters, Noxzema's medicated make-up would be marketed alongside other Noxzema products in grocery stores and other mass distribution outlets. After experimenting with names that suggested both glamour and the medicated claims (including Thera-Blem and Blema-Glow), Bill Grathwohl, Noxell's advertising director, selected Carolyn Oelbaum's "Cover Girl," which conveyed the product's usefulness as a blemish cover-up, while invoking the glamorous image of fashion models. These three elements of the advertising, wholesome glamour, mass marketing, and medicated make-up, remain central to Cover Girl advertising nearly a half-century later.
Beginning with the national launch in 1961, American and international fashion models were featured in the ads. The target audience was identified as women between eighteen and fifty-four and, initially, the "glamour" ads were targeted at women's magazines, while the "medicated" claims were reserved for teen magazines. Television ads featured both elements. Cover Girl advertising always featured beautiful women -- especially Caucasian women, but the Cover Girl image has evolved over time to conform to changing notions of beauty. In the late 1950s and 1960s, the Cover Girl was refined and aloof, a fashion conscious sophisticate. By the 1970s, a new social emphasis on looking and dressing "naturally" and the introduction of the "Clean Make-up" campaign created a new advertising focus on the wholesome glamour of the "girl next door," a blue-eyed, blonde all-American image. In the 1980s, the Cover Girl look was updated to include African-American, Hispanic and working women.
In January 1970, SSC&B bought 49% of the Lintas Worldwide advertising network. After SSC&B was acquired by the Interpublic Group of Companies in 1979, the entire Lintas operation was consolidated under the name SSC&B/Lintas in 1981. With the Procter & Gamble buy-out of the Noxell Corporation in September 1989, the cosmetics account was moved to long-time P&G agency Grey Advertising, in order to circumvent a possible conflict of interest between P&G competitor Unilever, another Lintas account. In 1989 SSC&B/Lintas, Cover Girl's agency since its launch in 1961, lost the account it helped to create and define, but the brand continues to dominate mass-marketed cosmetics.
This project is the result of a year-long study of advertising created for the Noxell Corporation's Cover Girl make-up products, 1959-1990. The effort was supported in part by a grant from the Noxell Corporation. The target audience was identified as women 18-54, and initially, the "glamour" ads were targeted at women's magazines, while the "medicated" claims were reserved for teen magazines. Television ads featured both elements. Cover Girl advertising has always featured beautiful women (especially Caucasian women), but the Cover Girl image evolved over time to conform with changing notions of beauty. In the late 1950s-1960s, the Cover Girl was refined and aloof, a fashion conscious sophisticate. By the 1970s, a new social emphasis on looking and dressing "naturally" and the introduction of the "Clean Make-up" campaign created a new advertising focus on the wholesome glamour of the "girl next door," a blue-eyed, blonde all-American image. Through the 1980s, the Cover Girl look was updated to include African-American and Hispanic models and images of women at work.
Related Materials:
Materials in the Archives Center
Warshaw Collection of Business Americana (AC0060)
N W Ayer Advertising Agency Records (AC0059)
Separated Materials:
"The Division of Home and Community Life, Costume Collection (now Division of Cultural and Community Life) holds eighty-six cosmetic items and one computer that were also donated by the Noxell Corporation in 1990 in conjunction with the oral history project. These artifacts include lipstick, manicure sets, brushes, make-up, eye shadow, blush, powder puffs, eyelash curler, nail polish, and mascara. See accession number 1990.0193.
"
Provenance:
Most of the materials in the collection were donated to the Center for Advertising History by the Noxell Corporation, 1990. All storyboards and videoscripts, and a large collection of business records and proofsheets were donated by George Poris in June 1990. All mechanicals were donated by Art Weithas in June 1990. (These contributions are noted in the finding aid).
Restrictions:
Collection is open for research but a portion of the collection is stored off-site and special arrangements must be made to work with it. Contact the Archives Center for information at archivescenter@si.edu or 202-633-3270.
Abstract: Collection consists of over a century of paper dolls documenting their use as advertisements, and depictions of popular culture, fashion trends, family lifestyles, gender roles, ideal communities,and cultural heroes.
Scope and Contents:
Collection consists of paper dolls dating from the 1800s-1998. The bulk of the paper dolls, however, date from the 1900s-1970s. Due to the Grepkes' careful selection, the paper dolls are in excellent condition, most were never used or played with. In addition, most of the sets are complete, with few or no missing pieces. A sustainable amount of the collection remains in original packaging which often included the periodical or comic book in which it was published, the original box, or a folder or booklet. A substantial amount of these paper dolls was commercially produced with examples of hand-made dolls and clothing. Clothing for the dolls is mostly created from paper with examples of cloth, wood, and plastic. Hand colored commercially produced dolls and clothing also exist within the collection. Special features on the dolls could include hair, plastic eyes, photographic faces, and moveable parts.
The artwork aspect of the collection provides potential research use with illustrations by such paper doll artists as Queen Holden, who was renowned for her dolls of the 1930s, and Tom Tierney, who has depicted almost every celebrity of the 20th century in paper doll form. Originals and reproductions of Grace Gebbie Drayton's (1877-1936) Dolly Dingle paper dolls series, which appeared in the Pictorial Review from 1913-1933, are included among the materials. Drayton is well known for her creation and illustration of the "Campbell Kids." She illustrated books and other publications and designed dolls and toys. Frances Tipton Hunter, creator of the "Little Busy Bodies" who appeared in Women's Home Companion in 1922 and 1923, career spanned from the 1920s to her death in 1957. Besides the "Little Busy Bodies" her work also appeared in periodicals including the Saturday Evening Post, The Delineator, Collier's, and Ladies Home Journal.
Not just seen from the perspective of artwork or playthings the serious scholar will be able to focus on a variety of topics related to the dolls. Researchers interested in fashion, popular culture, and images of women, children, or celebrities will find this collection of great value. The collection has a large representation of movie and television stars from the 1930s through the 1950s. In addition, American notions of ideal family sizes, settings, relationships, teenage life, and leisure activities are represented in the collection. Dates of the paper dolls are most often time of publication rather than era they represent.
Arrangement:
The collection is arranged in 14 series.
Series 1, Advertisements, circa 1800-1980, undated
Series 2, Animals, circa 1950-1995, undated
Series 3, Celebrities, circa 1930-1995, undated
Subseries 3.1, Film, circa 1930-1995, undated
Subseries 3.2, Music, circa 1950-1995, undated
Subseries 3.3, Pop Culture, circa 1950-1995, undated
Subseries 3.4, Royalty, circa 1950-1995, undated
Subseries 3.5, Stage and Theater, circa 1930-1950, undated
Subseries 3.6, Television, circa 1950-1995, undated
Series 4, Literature, circa 1920-1995, undated
Series 5, Mass Media, circa 1935-1995, undated
Subseries 5.1, Cartoons, circa 1960-1995, undated
Subseries 5.2, Comic Books, circa 1940-1995, undated
Subseries 5.3, Motion Picture Film, circa 1935-1995, undated
Subseries 5.4, Newspapers, circa 1934-1951, undated
Subseries 5.5, Radio, circa 1940-1955, undated
Subseries 5.6, Television, circa 1950-1995, undated
Series 6, Toys, circa 1890-1990, undated
Subseries 6.1, Paper Dolls, circa 1890-1980, undated
Subseries 6.2, Three Dimensional Dolls as Paper Toys, circa 1910-1990, undated
Series 7, Family, circa 1880-1990, undated
Subseries 7.1, Children, circa 1880-1980, undated
Subseries 7.2, Infants, circa 1920-1970, undated
Subseries 7.3, Family, circa 1930-1950, undated
Subseries 7.4, Teenagers, circa 1910-1990, undated
Series 8, Clothing and Fashion, circa 1890-1995, undated
Subseries 8.1, Bridal, circa 1900-1990, undated
Subseries 8.2, Clothing of the World, circa 1900-1995, undated
Subseries 8.3, Designers, circa 1950-1980, undated
Subseries 8.4, Eras and Historic, circa 1890-1995, undated
Subseries 8.5, Military, circa 1940-1950, undated
Series 9, Historical Figures and Events, circa 1950-1998, undated
Subseries 9.1, African American, circa 1990-1995, undated
Subseries 9.2, Military, circa 1970-1990, undated
Subseries 9.3, Religion, circa 1984-1998, undated
Subseries 9.4, United States Presidents, circa 1970-1995, undated
Subseries 9.5, United States History, circa 1950-1990, undated
Subseries 9.6, Women, circa 1910-1995, undated
Subseries 9.7, World Leaders, circa 1980-1990, undated
Series 10, Holidays and Celebrations, circa 1930-1990, undated
Series 11, Occupations, circa 1900-1995, undated
Series 12, Periodicals, circa 1890-1995
Subseries 12.1, Characters, circa 1900-1995
Subseries 12.2, Periodicals, circa 1890-1995
Series 13, Miscellaneous Materials, circa 1890-1995, undated
Series 14, Publications, 1978-1993
Subseries 14.1, Articles, circa 1980-1990
Subseries 14.2, Books, 1978-1993
Biographical / Historical:
Donald Eugene Grepke (September 18, 1932- April 15, 2005) and Carolyn Joan Moyer Grepke (December 10, 1937- December 19, 1995) began collecting paper dolls in the 1970s in Fort Wayne, Indiana. Donald was born and raised in Fort Wayne where he attended Elmhurst High School, worked at a grocery store filling station, and graduated in 1951. In 1955, he began working at Zollner Corporation, manufacturers of pistons for cars and trucks, and retired on disability in 1989.
Carolyn Joan Moyer was born in Pennville, Indiana. Carolyn's family moved to Fort Wayne when she was four years old and after a few years they moved to Churubusco, Indiana. They returned to Fort Wayne where Carolyn attended North Side High School and graduated in 1956. Carolyn began working at Lincoln National Life Insurance Company after high school and continued to work there until she passed away.
Donald Grepke and Carolyn Moyer married at Trinity United Methodist Church in Fort Wayne, Indiana on March 2, 1957. One child, Randell Lee Grepke, was born to the union on May 5, 1958.
One of Carolyn's favorite toys as a child was paper dolls. One day while reading a publication about antiques, Donald saw an advertisement for an auction which included paper dolls in excellent condition. This began their paper doll collection. Over the next - 20-25 years, while on vacations and weekend drives, they would stop at antique shops, flea markets, and auctions in search of paper dolls. When Carolyn worked on weekends, Don would venture out by himself or with a male friend in search of paper dolls. Their collection grew to over 4,000 paper dolls.
After Carolyn passed in 1995, Don lost interest in collecting paper dolls. He pondered for about three years on what to do with the collection. He decided to donate the collection to the Smithsonian Institution in memory of his wife, where the materials would be available to the public for research and exhibition purposes.
Related Materials:
Archives Center, National Museum of American History
Helen Popenoe Paper Doll Collection (NMAH.AC.1156)
Elinor S. Miller Paper Doll Collection (NMAH.AC.1110)
Ming-Ju Sun Garfinckel's Fashion Drawings (NMAH.AC.0897)
Sam DeVincent Collection of Illustrated American Sheet Music, Series 9: Domestic and Community Life (NMAH.AC.0300)
Brownie Wise Papers (NMAH.AC.0509)
Edward J. Orth Memorial Archives of the World's Fair (NMAH.AC.0560)
Division of Cultural and Community Life, National Museum of American History
Division holds a collection of paper dolls.
Provenance:
The collection was donated to the Archives Center, National Museum of American History, Smithsonian Institution, by Donald Grepke in memory of his wife Carolyn Grepke in December 2000.
Restrictions:
Collection is open for research.
Rights:
Collection items available for reproduction, but the Archives Center makes no guarantees concerning copyright restrictions. Other intellectual property rights may apply. Archives Center cost-recovery and use fees may apply when requesting reproductions.
Collection documents Barton Arthur Cummings's career as an advertising industry spokesman, particularly in the areas of advertising education, and advertising in the public interest.
Scope and Contents note:
Collection documents Cummings's professional career as an industry spokesman, particularly in the areas of advertising education, and advertising in the public interest. Materials include manuscripts, interviews, photographs, speeches, awards, magazine articles, interview transcriptions, and newspaper clippings. There is a significant amount of material relating to his book Advertising's Benevolent Dictators published in 1984. Collection is arranged into five series. Series 1, Speeches and publicity, Series 2, Business papers, Series 3, Published and unpublished manuscripts, Series 4, Advertising's Benevolent Dictators, and Series 5, Multi-media materials.
Arrangement:
Collection is arranged into five series.
Series 1, Speeches and Publicity, 1950-1988, undated
Series 2, Business Papers, 1938-1991
Series 3, Published and Unpublished Manuscripts, 1981-1991, undated
Series 4, Advertising's Benevolent Dictators, undated
Series 5, Multi-Media Materials, undated
Biographical/Historical note:
Barton Arthur Cummings (1914-1994) was a former Chief Executive Officer of Compton Advertising, Incorporated, and Chairman Emeritus of Saatchi & Saatchi Worldwide.
Cummings began his advertising career working during school breaks at his father's advertising agency, the Earl Cummings Advertising Agency (later Cummings Brand McPherson Associates, Incorporated) in Rockford, Illinois. He graduated with a degree in Journalism from the University of Illinois in 1935, where he also played varsity football. Cummings maintained a lifelong interest in football, and in 1959 was awarded the Sports Illustrated Silver Anniversary Award for former college football stars who go on to distinguish themselves in other fields.
After graduation, Cummings took a trainee position with his father's agency, leaving several months later to take a trainee position with Swift & Company. From 1936 until 1942 he was with Benton & Bowles in New York, where he was a copywriter on accounts for Hellmann's Real Mayonnaise and Lord Calvert Whiskey, among others. During World War II, he served in the Offices of War Information and Price Administration in Washington, DC. He resigned in 1943 to join the Navy, and was assigned to the Amphibious Forces, 7th fleet. He saw action in Guinea, Borneo, and the Philippines.
After the War, Cummings joined Maxon, Incorporated as an account executive, and was elected to Vice President a year later. In 1947, he began a long and successful career with Compton Advertising, moving from account executive to President in only eight years. In 1963, Cummings was named chairman and chief executive officer, a position he held for nearly twenty years. When Compton merged with Saatchi & Saatchi in the 1980s, Cummings was named chairman emeritus of that international agency.
Mr. Cummings enjoyed a distinguished career as leader and spokesman for every major advertising industry association. He served as chairman of the American Association of Advertising Agencies (1969-1970); chairman of the American Advertising Federation (1972-1973), Chairman of the Ad Council (1979-1981), chairman of the board of trustees for the James Webb Young Fund at the University of Illinois, and chairman and director of the Advertising Educational Foundation. Other public service included work as the chairman of the advertising division for the New York Heart Association (1963-1973), chairman of the Public Service Advisory Committee for the City of New York, and director of the Better Business Bureau of Metropolitan New York (1954-1977). Throughout his career, Mr. Cummings championed the use of advertising in the public interest, and washas been outspoken on the need for advertising education and industry self-regulation.
Mr. Cummings was preceded in death by his first wife Regina Pugh Cummings when he died in 1994. He was survived by his second wife Margaret K. Cummings, children Ann Haven Cummings Iverson, Peter Barton Cummings, and Susan Cummings, and one grandchild, Haven Cummings Iverson.
Provenance:
Collection donated by Barton Arthur Cummings in November 1991.
Restrictions:
Collection is open for research.
Rights:
Collection items available for reproduction, but the Archives Center makes no guarantees concerning copyright restrictions. Other intellectual property rights may apply. Archives Center cost-recovery and use fees may apply when requesting reproductions.
Collection primarily documents American folk art collected by Frederick Fried (1908-1994) and his wife Mary McKensie Hill Fried (1914-1988). It includes photographic materials, newspaper clippings, magazine articles, research files, lecture notes, unpublished manuscripts, brochures, drawings, printed advertisements, blueprints, books, patents, correspondence, trade literature, sheet music, auction catalogs, oral history interviews, and commercially recorded music. Of particular interest is the material relating to carousels. There is a substantial amount of material relating to New York architecture, wood carvings, show figures, weathervanes, mechanical and coin operated machines, amusement parks, the circus, tattoos and lesser-known folk arts. The collection is arranged by subject or genre in the order maintained by Frederick and Mary Fried.
Arrangement:
Series 1, Professional Materials, 1930-1995, undated
Subseries 1.1, Lectures, 1968-1989, undated
Subseries 1.2, Research Notes, 1962-1975, undated
Subseries 1.3, Published and Unpublished Materials, 1960-1990, undated
Subseries 1.4, Exhibitions, 1966-1985, undated
Subseries 1.5, Correspondence, 1945-1995, undated
Subseries 1.6, Office Files, 1930-1991, undated
Series 2, Sculptors and Ship Carvers, 1855-1987, undated
Series 3, Ship Carving Reference Files, 1875-1990, undated
Subseries 16.2.1, Lectures and Performances, 1969-1973, undated
Subseries 16.2.2, Interviews, 1940-1976, undated
Subseries 16.2.3, Conferences and Meetings, 1973-1977
Subseries 16.2.4, Music, 1956, undated
Subseries 16.2.5, Other, undated
Subseries 16.3, Videotapes, 1982-1991, undated
Biographical / Historical:
Frederick P. Fried was born December 11, 1908 in Brooklyn, New York. He grew up in the Williamsburg section of Brooklyn where his father owned a clock business across the street from Charles Carmel, a carousel carver. Fried acquired a fine-arts education in the 1930s with an emphasis on sculpture. He served with the Air Force during the Second World War. After a successful military career, Fried worked as art director in several fashion agencies. He met Mary McKenzie Hill, an academically trained artist in one of the studios.
Mary McKenzie Hill was born in 1914 in Baltimore, Maryland. She graduated from the Maryland Institute of Fine Arts. After graduation, she spent a year abroad studying before she returned to the United States to work as a fashion illustrator in Baltimore and New York. During World War Two Hill was a draftsman for a firm of architects.
Fried and Mary Hill married in 1949. The couple had two children Robert Hazen and Rachel. Around 1953 Fried began to collect architectural ornaments in New York. Fried served as the art director for Bonwit Teller in New York City from 1955-1962. He left the fashion world in 1962 to pursue his passion for collecting and writing full time. Fried published his first book, Pictorial History of Carousels in 1964. In 1967, Fred and Mary Fried purchased a forty-acre farm in Bristol, Vermont where the family spent their summers.
In 1968, Fried led a national campaign to preserve the Titanic Memorial Lighthouse (Seamen's Church Institute at South Street). He also became active in politics and served as the campaign manager for a New York State senator. His interest in Indian cigar store figures resulted in his publication Artists in Wood: American Carvers of Cigar Store Indians, Show Figures and Circus published in 1970. The focus of the book was Samuel Anderson Robb a New York wood carver. Fried co-founded the National Carousel Association in 1973. In 1978, Fried wrote America's Forgotten Folk Art with his wife Mary. This publication covered subjects such as carousels, banner painting, scarecrows, beach sand sculpture, tattoos, cast iron toys, amusement park architecture and trade signs.
Fried's collecting goal was to first preserve artifacts and to then make them available through his writings and exhibitions. His most treasured relics were the items he salvaged from the ruins of Coney Island. Fried referred to such artifacts as the uncelebrated arts. He became one of the founders of the Anonymous Arts Recovery Society a group of individuals who saved architectural ornaments from the wreckers' balls. In addition, he was one of the founders of the National Carousel Round Table which was created to preserve hand-carved merry-go-rounds. As a result of his collecting, research and writing Fried became recognized as the authority on carousels, coin-operated machines, and cigar store figures. He served as a consultant to many Museums; in particular as chief consultant on American Folk Art for the Smithsonian Institution.
Frederick and Mary Hill worked together in many ways to document, collect, preserve and increase the awareness about primarily the folk arts. Mary McKenzie Hill Fried passed away in 1988 at the age of seventy-four. Frederick P. Fried died July 1994 at the age of eighty-six.
Related Materials:
Materials in the Archives Center, National Museum of American History
E. Howard Clock Company Records (NMAH.AC.00776)
M. Francis Misklea Carousel Collection (NMAH.AC.0665)
Archives Center Carousel Collection (NMAH.AC.0675)
Messmore and Damon, Incorporated Company Records (NMAH.AC.0846)
Anthony W. Pendergast Collection (NMAH.AC.0882)
Frank Paulin Photoprints (NMAH.AC.1373)
Wurlitzer Company Records (NMAH.AC.0469)
Industry on Parade (NMAH.AC.0507)
Reel #191, Craftsmen of the Carousel, 1954. Manufacturing merry-go-rounds for amusement reports. Arrow Development Co., Mountain View, California.
Provenance:
Collection a bequest of the Frederick Fried Estate.
Rights:
Reproduction restricted due to copyright or trademark. Fees for commercial reproduction.
Wyeth, N. C. (Newell Convers), 1882-1945 Search this
Extent:
103.6 Linear feet
Type:
Collection descriptions
Archival materials
Scrapbooks
Photographs
Date:
1821
1815
circa 1896-2011
Summary:
The records of the New York City gallery James Graham & Sons measure 103.6 linear feet and date from 1815, 1821, circa 1896-2011 (bulk 1950s-1980s). The collection generally documents the gallery's contemporary art department during the time in which Robert Claverhouse Graham, Sr. worked at the gallery (1940-1979); records prior to 1954 are sparse and scattered. Gallery records include artist files; correspondence; exhibition files; financial records; inventory records; printed materials; sales, loans, and consignment records; scrapbooks; and photographic materials. Also found are records from Coe Kerr Gallery regarding exhibitions.
Scope and Content Note:
The records of the New York City gallery James Graham & Sons measure 103.6 linear feet and date from 1815, 1821, circa 1896-2011 (bulk 1950s-1980s). The collection generally documents the gallery's contemporary art department during the time in which Robert Claverhouse Graham, Sr. worked at the gallery (1940-1979); records prior to 1954 are sparse and scattered. Gallery records include artist files; correspondence; exhibition files; financial records; inventory records; printed materials; sales, loans, and consignment records; scrapbooks; and photographic materials. Also found are records from Coe Kerr Gallery regarding exhibitions of artwork by Jamie Wyeth, and to a lesser extent, Andrew and N.C. Wyeth.
Over the years, the gallery changed names and established contemporary art departments. In addition to records of James Graham & Sons, the collection holds the records of Duveen-Graham Modern Art (in partnership with Albert Duveen), Graham Gallery, Graham Modern, JG|Contemporary, and, to a lesser extent, The Clapp and Graham Co.
Alphabetical files are a mix of business correspondence and business records. The bulk of the series contains correspondence with galleries, museums, other institutions, and, to a lesser extent, clients regarding sales, consignments, and loans of artwork. Also found are materials relevant to the daily operations of the gallery, including correspondence, subject files, and scattered financial, business and legal records.
Exhibition files provide scattered documentation of the gallery's exhibitions through catalogs, clippings, correspondence, guest books, notes, photographs, press materials, price lists, and sales receipts and other financial records.
Artists' Files document the numerous artists who have been represented by the gallery, especially modern American artists. Folders for each artist can contain a variety of materials, including correspondence with the artist or with institutions regarding consignments, loans, sales and exhibitions; photographic materials primarily of artwork; sales invoices; exhibition catalogs, postcards, and other printed materials; press releases; magazine and newspaper clippings; price lists; artist binders; and research materials on artists and artwork. Also found are some subject files, per original arrangement. There is extensive material related to artists Carmen Cicero, Susan Crile, Elaine De Kooning's portrait of President John F. Kennedy, Edwin Dickinson, muralist Seymour Fogel, Nancy Fried, Irving Kriesberg, Gari Melchers, Jonathan Santlofer, Reeve Schley, Peter Stevens, Joan Thorne, and Selina Trieff.
Artwork files document sales, consignments, and loans of artwork primarily from the mid-1980s to 2000s. Materials include agreements and contracts; condition reports; correspondence; invoices and receipts; photographs of artwork; shipping records; and photocopied printed material and other documentation. This series requires written permission from the donor in order to access.
Sales records from 1959-1984 (missing 1974) are found in the Financial Records series. Also found are check stub books from the mid-late 1950s; price lists; records for the Four Seasons Charter Corp.; and scattered banking, consignment, tax, and other financial records. Inventory cards from mid-1950s-1970s and inventory lists, often with notations and prices, are found in the series Inventory Records.
Coe Kerr Gallery Records regarding the Wyeths document Jamie Wyeth's exhibitions primarily from the mid-1970s-early 1980s. Also found is limited material regarding Andrew Wyeth and N.C. Wyeth. Materials include correspondence, photographs, exhibition printed materials, and extensive newspaper clippings.
There are exhibition catalogs, books, announcements, magazines, clippings, postcards, posters and other printed materials related to artists, John Graham & Sons exhibitions, and exhibitions by Graham artists held at other galleries and museums. Also found is an 1815 fifty cent note which was redeemed in 1821.
Seven scrapbooks document discrete aspects of the business, including the gallery's advertising, participation in an art fair, and the careers of artists Guy Coheleach and Van Dearing Perrine. Materials housed in the scrapbooks include clippings, catalogs, photographs, and other printed materials.
Photographic Materials include mostly black and white photographs, negatives, slides and transparencies of artwork; scattered photographs of installations, artists, and the gallery; and a handful of personal snapshots. The bulk of the photographs are undated, but were likely printed between 1950s-1990s.
Arrangement:
The collection is arranged as ten series:
Missing Title
Series 1: Alphabetical Files, circa 1896, 1902-1999, bulk 1955-1986 (Boxes 1-15, 102; 15 linear feet)
Series 2: Exhibition Files, 1912, 1947-2004 (Boxes 16-24, 102; 8.1 linear feet)
Series 3: Artists' Files, circa 1907-2006, bulk 1955-1999 (Boxes 24-62, 95-96, 102-110; 47.5 linear feet)
Series 4: Artwork Files, circa early 1900s-2011, bulk mid-1980s-2009 (Boxes 63-71, 94, 101; 9.3 linear feet)
Series 5: Financial Records, circa 1937-1993 (Boxes 72-76, 96; 4.5 linear feet)
Series 6: Inventory Records, circa 1954-1993 (Boxes 76-78, 96; 2.1 linear feet)
Series 7: Coe Kerr Gallery Records Regarding Wyeths, 1964-1988 (Boxes 78-80, 97; 2.7 linear feet)
Series 8: Printed Materials, 1815, 1821, 1949-2006 (Boxes 81-82, 97; 2.1 linear feet)
Series 9: Scrapbooks, 1897-1990s (Boxes 82, 98-100; 0.9 linear feet)
Series 10: Photographic Materials, 1929-1990s (Boxes 83-93, 96, 100-101, 110; 11.5 linear feet)
Historical Note:
The James Graham & Sons gallery has been owned and managed by the Graham family in New York City since 1857. Throughout its history, the gallery has specialized in decorative arts, antiques, and 19th-early 20th century and contemporary American art.
In 1857, Samuel Graham founded a gallery at 66 Third Street and specialized in furniture. Graham was joined by his son James in the 1880s and expanded the business to include antiques and decorative arts. James A. Graham, the third generation Graham, joined the gallery in the early 20th century. James Graham and antiques dealer Marshall Clapp created Clapp & Graham in 1914, a partnership which was dissolved around 1940.
James R. Graham, the fourth generation Graham, joined the gallery in 1937, followed by his brother Robert Claverhouse Graham, Sr. in 1940. The gallery was then named James Graham & Sons and was located at 514 Madison Avenue. At this time, the gallery specialized in bronzes, ceramics, silver, sculptures, and 19th-early 20th century American art. Robert C. Graham, Sr. introduced modern American art, especially The Eight, into the gallery's inventory.
In 1955, the gallery moved to 1014 Madison Avenue, where it remained until the late 2000s. That same year, Graham opened its first contemporary department with Albert Duveen. Duveen-Graham Modern Art gallery was based on the third floor of the Madison Avenue building and dealt solely in contemporary art until its closing in 1958. Robert C. Graham, Jr. (Robin) joined the gallery in 1963, becoming the fifth generation Graham to run the family business. The gallery is currently located at 32 East 67th Street.
Betsy Fahlman's "James Graham & Sons: A Century and a Half in the Art Business" (2007) was a valuable resource in constructing this Historical Note.
Related Material:
Among the other resources relating to James Graham & Sons in the Archives of American Art is an oral history interview with Robert Claverhouse Graham, November 19, 1976, and the David Herbert papers, 1950-1995.
Provenance:
The James Graham & Sons records were donated in 2007, 2008, and 2012 by Priscilla Caldwell and Jay Grimm of James Graham & Sons and in 2018 by Cameron Shay of James Graham & Sons.
Restrictions:
This collection is open for research. Access to original papers requires an appointment and is limited to the Archives' Washington, D.C. Research Center.
Rights:
The Archives of American Art makes its archival collections available for non-commercial, educational and personal use unless restricted by copyright and/or donor restrictions, including but not limited to access and publication restrictions. AAA makes no representations concerning such rights and restrictions and it is the user's responsibility to determine whether rights or restrictions exist and to obtain any necessary permission to access, use, reproduce and publish the collections. Please refer to the Smithsonian's Terms of Use for additional information.
Spanish Advertising and Marketing Service Search this
Association of Hispanic Advertising Agencies Search this
Extent:
3.5 Cubic feet (3 boxes)
Type:
Collection descriptions
Archival materials
Storyboards
Video recordings
Posters
Photographs
Advertisements
Audio cassettes
Clippings
Date:
1962 - 2000
Summary:
The Association of Hispanic Advertising Agencies Collection includes advertisements, research, and publications produced by SAMS (Spanish Advertising and Marketing Service), which was founded by Luis Diaz Albertini in 1963.
Scope and Contents:
The collection documents the work of SAMS (Spanish Advertising and Marketing Service). It contains advertising campaign materials such as print advertisements, storyboards, proofs of print advertisements, point of purchase advertisements, audio recordings of radio advertisements, and video footage of television commercials. SAMS created advertising for manufacturers of tobacco, movies, cosmetics, watches, toothpaste, cleansers, food products, and alcoholic beverages, to name a few. SAMS was founded during a time in which the "Spanish speaking" consumer was of growing significance in the American market, and American advertisements increasingly catered to and targeted this audience.
The collection contains extensive explanatory notations written by Sara Sunshine, a Cuban immigrant, who created advertising print, audio, and visuals from the 1960s to 1990s and founder of the co-founder of Spanish Advertising and Marketing Services, the nation's first Latino ad agency.
Arrangement:
The collection is divided into seven series.
Series 1: Storyboards and Scripts, 1970-1995
Series 2: Advertisements, 1962-1974
Series 3: Publications, 1976-1988
Series 4: Marketing Research, 1962-1984
Series 5: Packaging, 1962
Series 6: Ephemera, 1980-1989
Series 7: Audiovisual Materials
Biographical / Historical:
Luis Diaz Albertini founded SAMS (Spanish Advertising and Marketing Service) in 1963. Sara Sunshine was the head copywriter and art executive. The agency had a staff of just four employees. It was the first full-service Spanish language advertising agency in the United States. In 2007, the Association of Hispanic Advertising Agencies was formed. Among its goals was preserving the industry's past and preserving the history of Hispanic advertising. The first archival collection they accepted was the records of SAMS. Originally housed at the University of Maryland, it was transferred to the National Museum of American History in 2015.
Related Materials:
Materials at the Archives Center
Goya Foods, Inc. Records (AC0694)
Provenance:
Donated to the Archives Center in 2015 by the Association of Hispanic Advertising Agencies, through Horacio Gavilan.
Restrictions:
Collection is open for research.
Rights:
Reproduction restricted due to copyright or trademark. Contact the Archives Center for details.
The Stanley Lomas Television Commercial Collection consists of 226 television commercials for products including dishwashing soap, beer, cigarettes, soft drinks, and breakfast cereals. The collection also includes a short 1954 film demonstrating the DuMont Electronicam, a camera designed for simultaneous live broadcast and film recording. There is also an oral history interview conducted with Stanley Lomas in 1990. Supporting documentation includes memoranda about the use of television in advertising, photographs, articles by or about Stanley Lomas, and an abstract of the oral history interview.
Arrangement:
The collection is arranged in two series.
Series 1: Supporting Documentation, 1947-1990
Series 2: Audiovisual, 1950-1990
Subseries 2.1: Television Commercials, 1950-1956
Subsubseries 2.1.1: Reel 1
Subsubseries 2.1.2: Reel 2
Subseries 2.2: Oral History
Biographical / Historical:
Stanley A. Lomas (1913-2003) began working in television in 1948 at the DuMont network. He started his career producing sports broadcasts.. He went on to produce television commercials, first live and then filmed, for William Esty and Company, Inc., an ad agency with major clients including R.J. Reynolds, Coca Cola, and Colgate Palmolive. Around 1949 Lomas became Esty's vice president for televison commercial creation and production. Lomas often used celebrities to promote the products in his commercials. Many of the commercials in the Stanley Lomas Collection feature baseball players, Hollywood actors, and television personalities. Among the most well-known commercials are those that have doctors recommending specific cigarette brands. Lomas left Esty in 1957 and later founded his own agency, Stanley A. Lomas & Associates which specialized in market research. After retiring Lomas embarked on a career as an artist.
Provenance:
Donated by Stanley Lomas, January 18, 1990.
Restrictions:
Unrestricted research use on site by appointment. Only reference videos may be used. Reel 1 has been digitized and is available in the Smithsonian Institution Digital Asset Management Systen (DAMS).
Rights:
Reproduction fees for commercial use. Copyright restrictions. Contact staff for information.
Topic:
Baseball players -- 1950-1960 -- United States Search this
Athletes -- 1950-1960 -- United States Search this
Celebrities -- 1950-1960 -- United States Search this
Television advertising -- 1950-1960 -- United States Search this
The collection documents S. Newman Darby's development of the sailboard, which became known as the windsurfer through sketches, mechanical drawings, plans, patent specifications, legal documents, photographs, correspondence, notebooks, clippings, periodicals, and an 8mm film.
Scope and Contents:
The S. Newman Darby Windsurfing Collection, 1946-1998, documents the body of Newman Darby's inventive output as well as the development of the windsurfing industry. It consists of sketches, mechanical drawings, plans, patent specifications, legal documents, photographs, correspondence, notebooks, clippings, periodicals, an 8mm film and a videocassette. The collection is particularly rich in the material related to the development of the sailboard, including Darby's personal memoirs. It contains U.S. and foreign patents related to windsurfing as well as records and reports related to Darby's testimony in litigation and the recognition of the priority of his invention. the collections research value lies in the documentation of the invention of the windsurfer and the industry and culture it spawned. It documents the processes of invention and marketing of new devices. It is evidence of the full range of S. Newman Darby's imagination, life and career.
Arrangement:
The collection is divided into six series.
Series 1: Biographical materials, 1969-1982
Series 2: Inventions and designs, 1953-1990
Series 3: Darby Industries, 1982-1983
Series 4: History of windsurfing, 1944-1998
Series 5: Photographs, 1946-1997
Series 6: Audio-Visual materials, 1965-1997
Biographical / Historical:
S. Newman Darby is recognized as the first person in the United States to conceive of connecting a hand-held sail rig fastened with a universal joint to a floating platform for recreational use. He called it sail boarding in 1965, when he published his designs in Popular Science Monthly magazine. Although he and his brothers Ronald and Kenneth began manufacturing the boards through their company Darby Industries, they never applied for a patent.
S. Newman Darby (1928-2016) was born in West Pittston, Pennsylvania. He graduated from West Pittston High School in 1946. A sign painter and artist, like his father Sidney Darby, he studied drafting at the Pennsylvania State University extension school where he took chemistry, business, art, and photography courses for one year. His first invention, the Darby Dory, a folding rowboat dates from 1953. The sailboard developed out of Darby's experiments with a personal pontoon catamaran, each hull being big enough for one foot and designed to be operated with a hand-held sail and no rudder. By 1964 he had designed a universal joint that connected a mast to a flat bottom sailing scow. This board had a centerboard, tail fin and kite shaped free sail. Early tests were conducted on Trailwood Lake and the Susquehanna River, near West Pittston.
Today sail boarding is known as windsurfing. It adopted its name from Windsurfer International, a company Hoyle Schweitzer and Jim Drake established on the basis of a patent granted to them in 1970 for a "wind-propelled apparatus." In all essential qualities, their claims duplicated Newman Darby's earlier work.
After Schweitzer bought out Drake's share in 1973, he energetically promoted the sport and licensed manufacturing rights to more than 20 companies around the world. Schweitzer forcefully prosecuted patent infringements he perceived among windsurfer manufacturers and he threatened to sue the 1984 Olympic Committee should it authorize a board produced by a manufacturer not licensed by Windsurfer International.
Although he was aware of the growth of the sport and the profits flowing into Windsurfer International through its licensing activities, Darby was unable to mount a legal challenge to Schweitzer. His priority in the invention of the sport was overlooked and almost forgotten.
In the late 1970's, Mistral, a Swiss manufacturer sued by Windsurfer International in Germany, located Darby and presented his "prior art" as a defense. In the early 1980's, courts in the United States were asked to rule on the validity of the Windsurfer International patent. Newman Darby's prior art was at the center of the controversies. The court voided Windsurfer's original patent and Schweitzer was forced to apply for a reissue based on severely limited claims. He lost the use of "windsurfer" as a trademark. Schweitzer retained the reissued patent through further challenges until it expired in 1987. The example of Newman Darby has become a textbook case of the importance of thorough searches for "prior art" for patent attorneys.
Following completion of the patent litigation Darby designed original sail rigs for Mistral in Europe and Horizon in the United States. In 1982 Newman entered into a new partnership with his brothers Ronald and Kenneth and formed NRK, Inc., to design and manufacture windsurfing boards, training devices and to produce written and video documentaries of his contributions to the history of the sport.
Naomi Albrecht Darby, Newman's wife, sewed the first sails for the boards and participated in their testing and marketing. She documented Darby's inventions through the years in photographs and moving images. Over the years, Darby has worked on numerous inventions--most of them related to wind propulsion. Like many independent inventors, Newman Darby conceives of his ideas, executes all of the mechanical plans, builds his own prototypes and tests them. Darby continues to research improvements in windsurfing and to teach courses in boat building and design.
Related Materials:
An original sailboard, rig, mast and daggerboard from the same period are also housed in the Pennsylvania State Museum at Harrisburg.
Separated Materials:
The Division of Culture and the Arts (now Division of Cultural and Community Life) holds artifacts relating to S. Newman Darby and his invention of the windsurfer, including an original board, boom and mast, and sail dating from 1964. See accessions #1998.0086 and #1998.0323.
Provenance:
Most of the collection was donated to the Archives Center of the National Museum of American History by S. Newman Darby and his wife Naomi on February 3, 1998.
Restrictions:
Collection is open for research.
Rights:
Collection items available for reproduction, but the Archives Center makes no guarantees concerning copyright restrictions. Other intellectual property rights may apply. Archives Center cost-recovery and use fees may apply when requesting reproductions.
This collection consists of archival materials compiled by National Museum of American History Curator Katherine Ott, on numerous subjects relating to disability and the rights of the disabled.
Scope and Contents:
The Disability Reference Collection represents a range of research materials acquired by curators Audrey Davis (1967-1996) and Katherine Ott (2002- ) and Janice Majewski (1978-2001), the first director of the Smithsonian's Accessibility Program in support of their collecting and exhibition work in the Division of Medicine and Science at the National Museum of American History.
Material includes scholarly and popular articles, advertisements, product literature, clippings, schematics, photographs, audio, video, and ephemera. Some materials were sent to Davis and Ott by members of the general public who heard about their work; others were purchased by Ott at flea markets and on e-Bay.
Combined with associated Archives Center collections and objects housed in the curatorial divisions at NMAH, this collection constitutes one of the largest and most significant sources on American disability history. It is especially strong in accessibility policy documents from the early days of the Rehabilitation Act and the Americans with Disabilities Act (ADA) and its implementation, and product trade literature of the 1980s and 1990s. The collection also has a rich selection of newsletters and magazines published for various disability sectors, such as the Toomey J Gazette on polio and Mainstream.
Each series represents a subject or type of material. Researchers should look across all series when examining a topic or type of material. For example, trade literature items for the disabled person are found not only in the dedicated series, but also in series specific to a particular disability (i.e. Blindness: Aids and Appliances). Another example is material on polio. Researchers should look in the dedicated series, but also in Series 9: Edna Hindson's Scrapbooks and Series 8: Ron Mace.
Arrangement:
The collection is arranged into seventeen series.
Series 1: Blindness, 1945-2001
Series 2: Hearing, 1855-2009
Series 3: Polio, 1925-2008
Series 4: Universal Design, 1962-2006
Series 5: Subject Files, 1863-2008
Series 6: Americans with Disabilities Act: 1968-2015, undated
Series 7: Brody, Lee/TTY, 1941-2001
Series 8: Mace, Ron, 1950-1990
Series 9: Hindson, Edna R., 1946-1954, 1991, 2003
Series 10: Lindahl, Lisa, 1988-2002, undated
Series 11: Wheelchairs, 1853-2007
Series 12: Arizonans for Safe and Equal Access to Transportation, 1987-1992
Series 13: Printed Material, 1959-2013
Series 14: Trade Literature, 1971-2013
Series 15: Newspaper Clippings, 1973-2000
Series 16: Ephemera, 1866-2011, undated
Series 17: Audio Visual Materials, 1979-2005
Historical Note:
The Disability Reference Collection represents a range of research materials [primarily] acquired by curators Audrey Davis (1967-1996) and Katherine Ott (2002-) in support of their collecting and exhibition work in the Divison of Medicine and Science at the National Museum of American History (NMAH). The collection also contains material acquired by Janice Majewski (1978-2001), the first director of the Smithsonian's Accessibility Program. Additional materials have been added since the collection was transferred to the Archives Center.
Audrey Davis (1934-2006) was a NMAH curator from 1967 to 1996. Her interest and expertise in rehabilitation medicine, including prosthetics and orthotics, led to important three-dimensional collections in the Division of Medicine and Science. Davis did a series of showcases on such topics as hearing aids, artificial noses, and a large exhibition in 1973 entitled Triumph over Disability: the Development of Rehabilitation Medicine in the U.S.A., for the 50th anniversary of the American Congress of Rehabilitation Medicine. The exhibition was dedicated to Mary Elizabeth Switzer, an influential figure in the field. Katherine Ott joined the Division in 2001 as a permanent curator and broadened research to include pan-disability issues. Ott led exhibitions on the history of maxillofacial surgery (About Faces, 1998), The Disability Rights Movement (2000-2002), polio (Whatever Happened to Polio?, 2005-2006), HIV and Aids Thirty Years Ago (2011-2012); general disability history (EveryBody: An Artifact History of Disability in America, 2013), and the Americans with Disabilities Act (ADA25, 2015). Ott received a grant in 2000 from NMAH's Lemelson Center for the Study of Invention and Innovation to study the history of Universal Design; this included the collection of supporting materials.
Janice Majewski was the first director of the Smithsonian's Accessibility Program. Her tenure lasted from 1978 to 2001. She gathered background on museums and accessibility, followed current events, consulted on museum projects around the United States, and received a constant flow of product literature from vendors hoping for a Smithsonian contract. Most of the assistive technology brochures, policy papers, and gray literature on accessibility came from her office.
Related Materials:
Materials in the Archives Center
Kevin M. Tuohy Papers (NMAH.AC.0317)
Milton S. Wirtz, D.D.S., Artificial Eye Collection (NMAH.AC.0501)
Van Phillips Video Oral History and Papers (NMAH.AC.0859)
Safko International, Inc. Records (NMAH.AC.0911)
Hariett Green Kopp Papers (NMAH.AC.1130)
Division of Science, Medicine and Society HIV/AIDS Reference Collection (NMAH.AC.1134)
Collection of TTY (text telephone) equipment, business records, posters, and awards relating to telecommunications pioneer Lee Brody. TTY phones allow the deaf, hard of hearing, or speech-impaired to use the telephone to communicate.
Gallaudet University Library Deaf Collections and Archives
The Harry G. Lang Collection on Early TTY History, 1947-1999
Collection of correspondence, news clippings, technical data, and other materials documenting the invention and first 15 years of the phone teletypewriter for the deaf.
North Carolina State University Libraries
Ronald L. Mace Papers, 1974-1998
Collection of correspondence, project reports, architectural drawings, videos, and publications.
Provenance:
The core of the collection was assembled by curators Audrey Davis (1967-1996) and Katherine Ott (2002-) in support of their collecting and exhibition work in the Division of Medicine and Science at the National Museum of American History. The collection also contains material acquired by Janice Majewski, the first director of the Smithsonian's Accessibility Program. Additional materials have been added since the collection was transferred to the Archives Center.
Restrictions:
Collection is open for research.
Rights:
Collection items available for reproduction, but the Archives Center makes no guarantees concerning copyright restrictions. Other intellectual property rights may apply. Archives Center cost-recovery and use fees may apply when requesting reproductions.
Materials document Bob Rule's career as a yo-yo demonstrator, expert, promoter and contest winner.
Scope and Contents:
The collection documents the career of Bob Rule as a professional demonstrator and promoter of yo-yos and spinning tops for Donald F. Duncan Yo-Yo Company, Incorporated, the Union Wadding Company, and his own KIEVE Enterprises. Materials in this collection include photographs, newspaper clippings, scrapbook pages, correspondence, manuals, and other business records. The bulk of this collection consists of photographs and newspaper clippings that document the promotional events and contests he managed between 1960 and 1970. Materials found in this collection would be useful to those interested in the history of toys and recreation in general, as well as the history and promotional strategies of Duncan Yo-Yo Company, Incorporated.
Series 1, Personal Papers, circa 1950s–2002, undated, includes correspondence, biographical narratives, clippings, photographs, and other papers associated with the personal life and professional career of Bob Rule. Photographs in this series are mostly of Rule demonstrating yo-yos and spinning tops, but also present are photographs of Rule posing with specialized cars, his family and friends, and of social events attended by Rule. Correspondence in this series focuses on business matters including his book Yo-Yo Secrets and letters from children in response to a promotional event aired on television in 1963 and 1964. The correspondence and photographs are arranged in chronological order when possible.
Series 2, Duncan Yo-Yo Company, Incorporated, circa 1955–1964, undated, include field manuals, trade literature, business cards of Duncan employees, clippings, and photographs. The newspaper clippings in this series are about the business ventures and employees of Duncan Yo-Yo Company, Inc. Photographs are mostly of Duncan top and yo-yo displays in the 1950s and 1960s, but photographs of the Duncan factory in Luck, Wisconsin, and Duncan employees are also present. Materials in this series are arranged chronologically when possible.
Series 3, Promotional Events and Competitions, circa 1950s–1990s, undated, comprise of photographs, newspaper clippings, correspondence, event itineraries, and other printed material associated with promotional events and yo-yo competitions attended and managed by Bob Rule across the United States and in Canada, Puerto Rico, and Mexico. The itineraries, rules, rosters, and programs associated with various local, regional, and national competitions are present. Many of these materials were originally included in a scrapbook, which was disassembled and scattered throughout the collection prior to the collection coming to the Museum. Materials in this series are arranged chronologically when possible.
Series 4, Other Yo-Yo Professionals, circa 1955–2000, undated, consists of photographs and clippings that document the careers of other yo-yo experts and contest winners. Also included are various group photographs of yo-yo personalities, many include Bob Rule. A minimal number of pages from Rule's personal website (www.mryoyo.com) that detail the materials found in this series are also present. Files are arranged alphabetically by last name and by date within the folder when possible.
Arrangement:
The collection is divided into five series.
Series 1, Personal Papers, circa 1950s–2002, undated
Series 2, Duncan Yo-Yo Company, Incorporated, circa 1955–1964, undated
Series 3, Promotional Events and Competitions, circa 1950s–1990s, undated
Series 4, Other Yo-Yo Professionals, circa 1955–2000, undated
Biographical / Historical:
Bob Rule grew up in Detroit, Michigan, and began yo-yoing as a young boy in 1948. He entered his first yo-yo contest in 1949 and in 1952, began working part-time for Donald F. Duncan, Incorporated managing yo-yo contests and demonstrations in the Detroit area. In 1955, he went to work full-time for Duncan as a professional yo-yo demonstrator. In this role, he traveled across the United States and to Canada, Puerto Rico, and Mexico demonstrating yo-yo tricks, managing yo-yo contests, and appearing on local television stations to promote the Duncan line of yo-yos and spinning tops. In 1960, he began calling himself "Mr. Yo-Yo" and eventually trademarked the name in 1970.
He left Duncan when the company went out of business in 1965 and settled in Atlanta, Georgia, with his family where he went into the slot car racing business. He owned Champion Slot Racing Products, which he eventually merged with another company he founded, BoLINK Industries, a radio control car racing company. Bob Rule also founded KIEVE Enterprises, a public relations firm with a division by the name of Yo-Yo Promotions. This division combined Rule's yo-yoing skills with sales pitches for various companies that hired him to advertise their products or entertain their employees and/or customers.
From 1970 to 1973, Bob Rule went back to work as a yo-yo demonstrator in connection with the Union Wadding Company of Pawtucket, Rhode Island. Although he was not on their payroll, Rule demonstrated their line of Festival yo-yos.
Rule prides himself on the confidence and presentation skills he acquired throughout his career as a yo-yo professional. He believes that these skills laid the foundation for the success he experienced in other aspects of his life. Rule and his second wife Elleda (his first wife Kathy died of cancer in 1988) reside in Duluth, Georgia, where he continues to promote the yo-yo by attending yo-yo contests, staying in contact with other yo-yo personalities, and hosting a website that documents his career as a yo-yo professional, www.mryoyo.com.
Materials in the Archives Center, National Museum of American History:
Duncan Family Yo- Yo Collection (AC0807)
Provenance:
The collection was donated to the Museum by Bob Rule in 2003.
Restrictions:
Collection is open for research.
Rights:
Collection items available for reproduction, but the Archives Center makes no guarantees concerning copyright restrictions. Other intellectual property rights may apply. Archives Center cost-recovery and use fees may apply when requesting reproductions.
Jones, Caroline Robinson, 1942-2001 (advertising executive) Search this
Container:
Box 101, Folder 5
Type:
Archival materials
Date:
1950s-1980s
Collection Restrictions:
Collection is open for research.
Collection Rights:
Collection items available for reproduction, but the Archives Center makes no guarantees concerning copyright restrictions. Other intellectual property rights may apply. Archives Center cost-recovery and use fees may apply when requesting reproductions.
Materials relating to Henry J. Kaufman, including photographs and ID cards; and the records of the Kaufman firm, including six scrapbooks, one for each decade; company newsletters, photographs, and other papers detailing the business history of the company as well as its social and other internal activities.
Scope and Contents note:
This collection consists of various business papers, personal papers, and advertising samples of Henry Kaufman and the Washington, D.C. advertising firm Henry J. Kaufman and Associates. The bulk of the collection consists of seven scrapbooks from the 1930s-1970s that detail the company's social and internal activities as well as business history. Researchers will find this collection particularly valuable for its insight into office culture and the ways in which it changes throughout the decades.
Series 1, Business Papers, 1930s-1980s, contains various business papers, photographs, and advertising samples relating to Henry J. Kaufman and Associates.
Subseries 1.1, Scrapbooks, 1930s-1970s, contains seven scrapbooks put together by Henry J. Kaufman and Associates. The scrapbooks contain press coverage of the firm, newspaper clippings relating to members of the company, information regarding clients and campaigns, photographs of company events, and examples of office humor and culture. Five of the scrapbooks are divided by decade, beginning with the 1930s and ending with the 1970s, but two of the books cover date ranges longer than one decade. The scrapbook contained in Box 5 is dedicated mainly to Kaufman's tenure as president of the Advertising Club of Metropolitan Washington, Incorporated. Several of the scrapbook pages have been disassembled, but there are numbered and photocopied pages to maintain the provenance of the collection. The folders labeled "Material" contain the material originally located on the disassembled scrapbook pages.
Subseries 1.2, Newsletters, 1933, circa 1958, 1968-75, 1978, contains editions of the company newsletter The Kaufman Report, an earlier newsletter entitled Corner Stone, and a direct mail piece.
Subseries 1.3, Advertising Campaigns, circa 1962-1990s, undated, contains an assortment of advertisements sponsored by Henry J. Kaufman and Associates. Highlights are the Porsche Corporation, The Wall Street Journal, and a portfolio of advertising samples from 1977-1979.
Subseries 1.4, Other Materials, 1951-1984, undated, contains a variety of business papers, correspondence, photographs, personnel lists, and press coverage related to the agency. Henry J. Kaufman and Associates relocated to the Canal Street Building in 1963, and a number of the documents and photographs in this subseries are related to the move.
Series 2, Kaufman's Personal Papers, 1950s-1990s, undated, contains information pertaining more to Henry J. Kaufman than to the company. The most substantive parts of the series are photographs of Kaufman and tributes relating to his birthdays and death.
Arrangement:
The collection is divided into two series.
Series 1, Business Papers, 1930s-1980s
Series 2, Kaufman's Personal Papers, 1950s-1990s, undated
Biographical/Historical note:
Henry J. Kaufman (1906-1997) founded his Washington, D.C. based advertising agency in 1929, only months before the stock market crash. Business in some companies was quite poor after the collapse, and many desperate executives were willing to risk money on advertising. The agency Henry J. Kaufman and Associates profited from the risk and grew rapidly, adding public relations and other services and eventually became the largest advertising firm in the Washington, D.C. area. The company had both local and national clients and campaigns, including the Porsche Corporation and the Society of American Florists. In addition to its print media, the agency was especially successful in the field of radio advertising, sponsoring an award in commercial radio announcing as well as regularly winning awards of its own. Kaufman was a member of the Advertising Club of Metropolitan Washington, Incorporated (known as the Ad Club) and served as president in the 1940s. He was considered the founder and "dean" of Washington, D.C. advertising and headed Henry J. Kaufman and Associates for fifty years until he sold it in the late 1970s. He stayed active in consulting work and acted as a mentor to others in the advertising field until his death in 1997. Kaufman and his wife Irma were married sixty-six years.
Related Materials:
Mateials in the Archives Center
NW Ayer Advertising Agency Records (NMAH.AC.0059)
Caroline R. Jones Collection (NMAH.AC.0552)
Provenance:
The collection was donated to the Archives Center in June 2003 by Mr. Kaufman's nephew, Kenneth J. Luchs.
Restrictions:
Collection is open for research but is stored off-site and special arrangements must be made to work with it. Contact the Archives Center for information at archivescenter@si.edu or 202-633-3270.
Rights:
Collection items available for reproduction, but the Archives Center makes no guarantees concerning copyright restrictions. Other intellectual property rights may apply. Archives Center cost-recovery and use fees may apply when requesting reproductions.
The materials relate to the creation and operation of El Chico Corporation.
Scope and Contents:
The collection consists of material related to the El Chico Corporation and to the two families involved in its creation and management. The business materials consist primarily of financial reports and studies, annual reports, articles and clippings and investment information. Advertising, menus, labels and packaging are also included among these materials. In addition, there are photographs and articles relating to the Cuellar and Caballero families.
Arrangement:
The collection is arranged into three series.
Series 1, El Chico Corporation Business Records, 1950-1990; undated
Series 2, Cuellar Family Papers, 1920s-2006
Series 3, Caballero Family Papers, 1908-1989
Biographical / Historical:
Adelina Cuellar was born in Mexico in 1871. She and her husband Macario migrated to Texas in 1892 and were married in Laredo, eventually becoming sharecroppers in Kaufman, Texas. In 1926, Mrs. Cuellar began making tamales to sell at the Kaufman fair, assisted by her twelve children. This venture became so successful that two of her sons opened a café in Kaufman with Mama Cuellar as the cook. The café failed during the Depression, as did several others opened by the Cuellar family in Texas, Oklahoma, and Louisiana.
In 1940, Adelina's sons Macario and Gilbert opened a restaurant, El Charro, in Dallas featuring their mother's recipes. They hired their friend Jose Valdez Caballero to manage the restaurant; he had grown up in his family's restaurant in Temple, Texas. El Charro became profitable, and the family began to expand its operations into Houston and Fort Worth. The restaurant chain became El Chico, and most of the family moved to Dallas to work in the business.
The Cuellar brothers diversified their business into frozen and canned foods, franchising, and numerous other enterprises that became the El Chico Corporation. Jose Caballero continued to work for the company as an executive until his retirement. He is credited with the development of popular recipes and with the invention of the hard shell taco. Adelina Cuellar lived to the age of 98 and saw her tamale stand grow into a Tex-Mex empire. Today, there are one hundred El Chico restaurants in the United States and world-wide.
Related Materials:
Materials in the Archives Center
Frito Company Records, circa 1892-2009 (AC1263)
Coon Chicken Inn Collection, circa 1913-1960s (AC1153)
Warshaw Collection of Business Americana, 1724-1965 (AC0060)
Virginia Mericle Menu Collection, 1960-1990 (AC1212)
Byron Fogel Placemat Collection, circa 1930-1981 (AC0419)
Provenance:
The collection was donated by Fifi Caballero Benson, John A. Cuellar, and Carmen Summers in 2011 and 2012.
Restrictions:
Collection is open for research.
Rights:
Collection items available for reproduction, but the Archives Center makes no guarantees concerning copyright restrictions. Other intellectual property rights may apply. Archives Center cost-recovery and use fees may apply when requesting reproductions.
Citation:
El Chico Resturants Collection, 1908-1990, Archives Center, National Museum of American History.
