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Early Pursettes lubricated menstrual tampon ads
Pursettes tampons, which evolved into tampons mainly for teenagers and
young women (see the many later ads listed at left), started out designed
for a mixed-age audience, as the ads below show.
Tambrands, the former maker of Tampax tampons,
generously donated these ads to your MUM as part of a huge
gift of archival material. Probably someone at Tambrands wrote the annotations,
typed the sources, and punched the holes.
Large files, long download!
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There was at least one 1930s tampon that had built-in lubrication (Dale), and many tampons
in the 1930s also had no applicators. Tampax came with the first applicator,
in the early 1930s.
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(Above) Two women talk - about tampons? - over coffee. I am given to
understand that advertising people (men, I'm sure) called this commonly
used situation - (WARNING! VULGARITY FOLLOWS!) - "Two c's in
a k": "Two cunts in a kitchen." This shows contempt for women
and the customer, identical in this case. Maybe with women more involved
in the industry (I assume) expressions like this have disappeared.
Note the last sentence: the Pursettes people are telling girls they
won't lose their virginity by inserting the tampon. This issue plagued Tampax
right from the beginning (see a famous Tampax
ad), and still inhibits many girls from using tampons
From March 1959.
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(Above) Under "FREE OFFER," I believe K, M or T
stand for Kotex, Modess and Tampax, the leaders in the menstrual hygiene
industry at the time (now it's Always pads and Tampax tampons; Procter &
Gamble owns both).
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© 1999 Harry Finley. It is illegal to reproduce or distribute
any of the work on this Web site in any manner or medium
without written permission of the author. Please report
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