See early tampoms Dale, Wix
and B-ettes and a bunch
of other earlier ones.
See San-Nap-Pak sanitary napkin ads from 1932
and 1945 and Ads for teenagers.
See the roughly contemporary Cashay tampon,
box, instructions. (Procter & Gamble donation, 2001), and
Dale (U.S.A., 1930s?-1940s?) Tampons, box, instructions.
(Procter & Gamble donation, 2001)
And, of course, the first Tampax AND - special
for you! - the American fax tampon,
from the early 1930s, which also came in bags.
See a Modess True or False? ad in The American
Girl magazine, January 1947, and actress Carol Lynley
in "How Shall I Tell My Daughter" booklet ad (1955) - Modess . . . . because ads (many dates).
 
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The senior cat: Max C. Padd, the Distinguished
Service Institutional Wallace C. Meyer Memorial Pouncer at the Museum of
Menstruation
(Max was born in 1994 and died 7 August 2008. The following was written
mostly in 1998, the last year I had the museum
open.)
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Well, speaking of Mack C. Padd, or MaxiMUM, I just happen
to have this photo in my wallet!
Yes, THIS is the Distinguished
Service Institutional Wallace C. Meyer Memorial Pouncer at the Museum of
Menstruation, coolly sizing you up in his snappy FleaFree
collar! (His title is a professorial rank equivalent; in this photo the
tyke, in the first bloom of youth, had assistant professor status).
No one has EVER seen a mouse (or an alligator;
a 1996 visitor to MUM feared alligators would get her somehow) in the Museum
of Menstruation, perhaps due to the tireless - no, that's stretching
it; how 'bout patient - efforts of this
fleet-of-foot feline, portrayed at left at the peak of kittenhood. Isn't
he cute??
Now a 12-pound bruiser, he in no way reflects
the virtues of the genius for whom his position is named, the go-for-broke
ad man Wallace C. Meyer, the
director of the first Kotex advertising
campaign, in
1921!
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Meyer's wonderful efforts can be examined at MUM, which holds copies
of the many documents and ads he deposited at the State Historical Society
of Wisconsin (Meyer graduated from journalism school at the University of
Wisconsin). The "father" of American
advertising, Albert Lasker, who also endowed the Mary and Albert
Lasker Award in medicine, the highest award in America for medicine, later
took over the Kotex account and devised a way to spare women the necessity
of speaking to a clerk when asking for Kotex. Kotex's sales shot up!
Lasker, who owned some radio stations, insisted that they use the word
"cancer" when speaking about the disease, thus breaking the taboo
on the word on American airwaves. He also broadcast the first soap opera.
And he gave today's Planned Parenthood of America its name.
He also hired men to remove the dew from his estate lawn each morning,
using long poles. He didn't like seeing blades of grass tipped over.
My last tidbit is this: Lasker was in Johns Hopkins Hospital recovering
from psychological problems as the negotiations for an important advertising
account were going on. Reacting to an impasse, he checked himself out, spent
enough time to win the account, and told the negotiators that he now had
to return to Johns Hopkins to finish his nervous breakdown.
You see, I didn't just want to show you a picture of my cat after all.
(But while we're on the subject: a girlfriend of one of my nephews
actually named him Mack C. Padd; I didn't do it. Rather than call out "Distinguished
Service Institutional Wallace C. Meyer Memorial Pouncer!," or "Mack
C. Padd!" - what would the neighbors think? - he goes by "Max."
Or "My Man.," "Mr. Cat," "Catty-Watty,"
"Fuzzy-Wuzzy," "Pussy-Wussy," "Cattykins,"
"Pussykins," "Maxy-Waxy," or - get this - "Your
Catcellency!" as in, "You'd rather sleep in exactly the
spot I'm trying to sleep in, and you want my covers? Yes, right away,
Your Catcellency!" And I move.)
A car killed Max (1994-2008),
my first and oldest cat, my favorite, in the morning of 7 August 2008 two
months before his 14th birthday.
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See San-Nap-Pak sanitary napkin ads from
1932 and 1945 and Ads for teenagers. See the roughly contemporary Dale tampon, and very early Tampax
and fax.
© 1998 Harry Finley. It is illegal to reproduce or distribute work
on this Web site in any manner or medium without written permission of the
author. Please report suspected violations to hfinley@mum.org
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