Follies of the Mad Men #14

Yes, we believe our clients are dumber than a sack of troll dolls, and are not afraid to insult them to their faces.

This illustration, by the way, comes from the great Abner Dean.

Who We Are
Alex Boese Alex is the creator and curator of the Museum of Hoaxes. He's also the author of various weird, non-fiction, science-themed books such as Elephants on Acid and Psychedelic Apes. Paul Di Filippo Paul has been paid to put weird ideas into fictional form for over forty years, in his career as a noted science fiction writer. Contact Us

Comments

Given that some dopes have used kerosene to start a fire, is this the kind of customer Aetna is after?

Posted by Paul on 08/22/08 at 01:37 PM

DC--LOL!

Posted by Paul on 08/22/08 at 01:58 PM

Did people really just have 1 gallon buckets of kerosene laying around?

Posted by kingmonkey in Athens, Ontario on 08/22/08 at 03:11 PM

Kingmonkey--I should have mentioned that this ad appeared in NEWSWEEK for September 18, 1950, an era when perhaps it was faintly more likely to have big buckets of kerosene handy.

Posted by Paul on 08/22/08 at 03:38 PM

Hazeljane--I guess we can't discriminate, can we?

Posted by Paul on 08/22/08 at 03:38 PM

Big Gary--excellent datapoints! Thanks!

Posted by Paul on 08/22/08 at 05:11 PM

1st of all... one need not journey back 58 years to find idiots attempting to light fires with flammable liquids. Just run over to youtube.

Just 10 days ago, while driving through the mountains of N.W. Greece I saw one of those kerosene cans being filled up yet again! And I recognized it as one just like the ones almost every household in Quincy had back in the 50s.

Posted by Expat47 in Athens, Greece on 08/23/08 at 01:31 AM

Stan--imbibing kerosene? EEYEEUW!

Posted by Paul on 08/23/08 at 10:04 AM

Expat47--good point! Flames + accelerants + idiots = disaster, in any era.

Posted by Paul on 08/23/08 at 10:04 AM

MichaelK, ah yes, that's a famous cold-weather or disaster-related story! Happens with charcoal grills too.

Posted by Paul on 08/23/08 at 04:43 PM

Wayne--you may have hit the real motive behind this ad: please stop dying from stupidity, or our customer base will evaporate.

Posted by Paul on 08/26/08 at 10:33 AM

Commenting is not available in this channel entry.