Around the world on commercial airlines

In 1979, two Vancouver businessmen, Orst Perry and Adolf Schiel, set a world record for traveling around the world on commercial airlines. They started in Vancouver and ended up in Vancouver. They did this in 54 hours, 42 minutes. It cost them $7000 each.

I can think of a lot better ways to spend $7000 than sitting on a plane for several days. But it seems that others have pursued this same record. A press release from Nov 2016 says that Brother Michael Bartlett set a new record for flying around the world on commercial airlines by doing it in 57 hours, 17 minutes.

That's slower than the time set in 1979, but I'm guessing that Bartlett must have adhered to stricter rules. It says that he had to "cross the equator and land at points that are approximately 108 degrees apart and roughly on the same north–south longitude."

Notre Dame Observer - Feb 28, 1979

Posted By: Alex - Sun Apr 30, 2017 - Comments (3)
Category: World Records, Air Travel and Airlines, 1970s

Looking Forward to Being Attacked

In 1977, Lieutenant Jim Bullard of the Memphis police department published a self-defense manual for women titled Looking forward to being attacked. The general theme was that if a bad guy attacked you, it gave you the chance to beat him up, which could be fun. His idea was to use some humor to make the self-defense lessons more interesting.

Some of the self-defense tips from his book:

• If you're grabbed, don't scream. Even if he didn't intend to hurt you, it'll be an automatic reflex to shut you up.
• If he grabs for your purse or any personal belongings, let them go. Defend personally. Don't defend property.
• Don't try to kick, scratch or punch him. Instead, through the principle of attack the "weakest point" you can escape 90 percent of the time.
• If you have a chance, jab any sharp object including your thumb into his trachea — his adam's apple. That is a man's most vulnerable area.
• One hundred and fifty pounds of pressure will kill a person. Seven pounds of pressure is all anyone can comfortably stand.
• The ears are the second most vulnerable area. Slap your hands against them.
• The eyes are the third choice and always carry your car keys when going to your car in a dark parking lot. If you can, scrape them across the assailant's eyes. Use a ball point pen, if you have it out of your purse.
• A fourth choice, especially when held around the waist from behind, is to reach back and strike at a man's testicles.
• If you find a burglar is outside your home, warn him first, and then you can take a cannon and blow him into the next county. 99.6 percent of the time you scream when someone's outside, warn him, he'll run. If he doesn't, you can legally assume he's coming in to kill you. A shotgun is the most efficient weapon. Kill him. You're doing society a favor when you do do it. I've seen those that didn't do it, and it's a very sad case.

More images at Awful Library Books.

Posted By: Alex - Sat Apr 29, 2017 - Comments (1)
Category: Martial Arts, Books, 1970s

Macho Cologne

Introduced by Faberge in 1976. It was described as being "packaged with a startlingly new futuristic look." Which is to say that it was packaged as a giant phallus.

I like the ad promoting it as a Father's Day gift. I can just imagine a son or daughter giving this as a present to their dad.

Indianapolis Star - Oct 30, 1976

The Pocono Record - June 17, 1977

The marketing of the cologne must have gained some notoriety. I found a brief discussion of it in an academic study of marketing — Marketing and Semiotics: New Directions in the Study of Signs for Sale (1987):



Update: Thanks to Brian for drawing our attention to Pierre Cardin Man's cologne, which also featured a suggestively shaped bottle.

And I just noticed that the Father's Day ad features both Macho cologne and Pierre Cardin Man's cologne. So if you gave your dad both, what message would you be sending him?

Posted By: Alex - Wed Apr 26, 2017 - Comments (8)
Category: Advertising, 1970s, Perfume and Cologne and Other Scents

Mystery Illustration 42

The splendid sartorial sense of this fellow is explicitly deemed by the advertisement to be inducement to trust his taste in another area. What product would you imagine his clothes are justifying. Liquor? Cars? Hairspray?

The answer is here.

And after the jump.

More in extended >>

Posted By: Paul - Thu Apr 13, 2017 - Comments (5)
Category: Fashion, Advertising, 1970s

The BS Patriots

1971: After relocating the Boston Patriots from Boston to Foxborough (a half-hour south), team owner Billy Sullivan decided he needed to rename the team. So they became the Bay State Patriots.

A month later he changed the name again, to the New England Patriots. The reason this time: a radio announcer had referred to the team as the "BS Patriots." Sullivan explained, "We didn't think that abbreviation would reflect well on either the team or the league."

The Palm Beach Post - Mar 23, 1971

Posted By: Alex - Wed Apr 05, 2017 - Comments (2)
Category: Odd Names, Sports, 1970s

Volkswagen Beetle Limousine

So maybe you don't want to turn your Beetle into a lawnmower...



Original ad here.




Article here.

Posted By: Paul - Wed Apr 05, 2017 - Comments (3)
Category: Excess, Overkill, Hyperbole and Too Much Is Not Enough, 1970s, Cars

Follies of the Madmen #309

Original ad here.

Posted By: Paul - Fri Mar 31, 2017 - Comments (1)
Category: Animals, Anthropomorphism, Business, Advertising, Products, Fashion, Nature, 1970s

Gotta Get Over the Hump

Your new theme song for Wednesdays.

Gotta get over da hump!

More on the creators.

Posted By: Paul - Wed Mar 29, 2017 - Comments (2)
Category: Music, 1970s

Pack It Right

This Department of the Army video continually uses a woman in a well-stuffed bikini to illustrate how to "pack it right."

Posted By: Paul - Tue Mar 28, 2017 - Comments (1)
Category: Government, PSA’s, Sex Symbols, 1970s

The Vidifont Titling Device

How did TV put a caption on the screen in the Sixties?

Graphics, including all title graphics (i.e. "President Lyndon B. Johnson” or "Walter Cronkite”) were set in type or drawn by graphic artists. The graphic was photographed using 35-mm film, the film developed, and a 35-mm slide generated. The time to generate a slide exceeded one hour. The slide, when used, was placed in a special projector, scanned by a television camera, and keyed into the studio video feed. This method was known as ‘Superimposition’. Since the news department had to be prepared to identify any speaker who might appear before the cameras during the convention, Bass was faced with creating in excess of 4000 slides in advance for each convention. If an individual who was not a delegate or an alternate was called upon to give a seconding speech or to participate in an interview, a title slide probably would not be available. Bass was seeking an instantaneous, graphics-quality titling capability solution to the problem. The goal was to produce graphics that could be transparently mixed with artwork created using traditional methods.

Imagine then the delight when the Vidifont device was invented.



Original ad here.

Posted By: Paul - Fri Mar 24, 2017 - Comments (0)
Category: Technology, Television, 1960s, 1970s