The Early Years of Jell-O

Anyone who has listened over the years to Garrison Keillor's radio program A Prairie Home Companion will know that Jell-O plays an important part in Lutheran church life. Jell-O goes with everything, even lutefisk.  In 1993, my husband, children, and I moved to Cloquet, Minnesota, where we learned first-hand that all those jokes about Jell-O are firmly based in reality.  A couple of years after we had moved to Cloquet, a new friend gave me a recipe book that illustrates how Lutherans are in on the joke: Lutheran Church Basement Women: Lutefisk, lefse, lunch, and Jell-O. Yep, the book includes a chapter of Jell-O recipes, with directions for making "Everyday Jello," "Jello for a Crowd," and "Jello and Vegetables," among others. Not very imaginative, our Lutheran Jello lovers (though the title of "Under-the-Sea Pear Salad," sometimes known as "Pharoah's Army Jello," does suggest some hidden depths). Among the boxes of Armstrong-Nugent ephemera are many recipe booklets from the early-to-mid-twentieth century, and among these is at least one little recipe booklet for Jell-O, from which I've taken the images on this post.

You can learn about the history of Jell-O by visiting a Kraft Foods website, "Jell-O History: Behind the Wiggle." There you will discover that lime-flavored Jell-O--good for salads!--was introduced in 1930. The little booklet from which I've taken these images does not list lime as one of the flavorings, so it must have been published before 1930. The Kraft Foods Jell-O history also reveals how well-known artists in the 1920s created illustrations used in Jell-O advertisements. In this little Jell-O recipe booklet, with folded pages tied together with one string running through holes at the upper left-hand corner of each page, are several full-color illustrations. I've included a few of those here. Click on the images for a better view.

Cigarette Advertising, 1930s

Among the family material that I am trying to catalog (not just on this blog but also in real time--in the limited space of my study) are magazine and newspaper clippings, recipes, greeting cards, canceled bank checks, and other such ephemera. Occasionally, I will load up some images that strike me as interesting. These images are from the cover pages of The Literary Digest. Only the covers remain; the pages of text were long removed. The image at above-left is from the inside back cover of The Literary Digest, dated February 21, 1931 (Vol. 108, No. 8), with price noted on the front cover as 10 cents.  The next image, an advertisement for Chesterfields, is from the the back cover of the February 6, 1932, edition of  The Literary Digest (vol. 112, No. 6). The third image is on the back cover of the April 23, 1932, edition of the same magazine (vol. 113, No. 4).

When I first began noticing cigarette advertising in the late-1960s and early-1970s, the images associated with cigarette advertising were rugged cowboys (the Marlboro Man) and women celebrating their sexual and cultural freedom ("You've Come a Long Way, Baby"). I did not realize that women were a target audience for cigarette companies as early as the 1930s.  Notice that one of the ads is being endorsed by Betty Compson, an actress of the early-twentieth century. And, despite the note in tiny print about taking the advice of your physician, the first ad promotes cigarette smoking as an almost healthy exercise, associating the "toasting" of the tobacco to healthful sunshine.  For a better view, click on the images.