The night before our trip to Harrisburg Pa., Sarah and I sat in our bedroom arguing over which vintage ad compositions to take with us. Two years prior at a family estate sale, we had purchased boxes of 1930s, 40s, 50s, and 60s marketing concepts. The sellers were related to a former art director for McCann Erickson – and until now – the stash of iconic brand work-ups was stowed away in a basement.
We had spent several months cataloguing the collection, placing the individual pieces into protective covers and organizing them by binder. Now on the eve of our Antiques Road Show (AR) adventure, we fumbled through hundreds of hand illustrations, proofs and lithographs from the Golden Age of promotions.
“There’s just too damn many to bring,” I said, as the likes of Chevy, Ford, Esso, Coca-Cola, Ritz Crackers and National Biscuit Company passed through my fingers. We knew that AR would only allow up to 2 entries. We had over 2,000.
Screw it, Sarah decided. Let’s bring one container filled with several binders… that’s a single submission. So we packed up our favorites – about 50 pounds worth – and a dolly.
The next morning we sped up I-95 to an eclectic soundtrack of Band of Horses, Los Campesinos, Brandy Carlisle, Strand of Oaks and Dinosaur Jr. We were zoned-in, running on gas-station coffee and the dream of a big appraisal.
In the trunk of our car, nearly 100 years of brand messaging and visuals told an American pop-culture story. Some of the first iterations of the Esso Tiger… Premiers for the Coca Cola King Size bottle… War bond poster proofs that foretold of a Hitler assassination… Promo ideas that celebrated the new Ford V8 and associated price tag of less than $4K… It was all there.
Up until this moment, Sarah and I had talked to a few museum curators, and each of them became captivated by our collection. They most all insisted it was extremely rare, with some saying they’ve not seen anything like it. Beyond the historical aspect, however, its value was completely speculation. We hoped to get a clearer picture by the end of this trip.
Hills started to push up through the terrain as we coasted further from our Southern home and toward the North East. Go Gas and Bojangles options faded in the rearview, giving way to Wawa and Roy Rogers. As we got closer, an occasional Giant storefront served as a mile maker of sorts – a compass point indicating that we were no longer in our neck of the woods.
What irony; measuring travel progress by the corporate beacons outside our windshield. After all, it was branding that sent us on this trip. After about 7 hours in the car, we reached what would become the bedrock of our advertising story. “Welcome to Pennsylvania: The Keystone State.”
