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Post by mach12 on Nov 30, 2019 14:02:28 GMT -5
I was looking for some info I thought I'd read in a Chambers Cooking School newspaper ad and came across this ad I'd downloaded from the November 7, 1948 Dallas Morning News. All of the cooking school ads included Alma Chambers endorsements and this one even includes a shoe endorsement and a laundry endorsement. I can link the wanting comfortable, sturdy shoes to cooking and Alma being an expert of sorts but the laundry is kind of stretching it in my mind.
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Post by mach12 on Nov 30, 2019 14:44:28 GMT -5
This one, from the December 10, 1951 New Orleans Times-Picayune, has a good roll-up of Chambers history to that point. It also says that the original stove John Chambers built for his wife was there in NOLA too, owned by a company called Walther Bros. Inc..
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Post by pooka on Dec 1, 2019 4:34:23 GMT -5
That article is very informative. Even touching on his in optical equipment inventions. It fills in a lot of holes in the story. I like the beginning where he's making a stove to please his wife, then makes a few for his close friends.
The cooking school ads are great. Those endorsements are obvious businesses getting together to all get some benefit of a celebrity sales rep's visit. The hardware store makes sense, since they sell cookware & are provide it for the demo. The laundry seems a stretch, but in a nicer home, you've got dishtowel & aprons, as well as napkins & table cloths. All connected to cooking & serving. I guess that would be part of home economics. The shoes kinda follow, because you'd want a pair of well fitted comfortable shoes while you're working you culinary magic in the kitchen. Hey, & it says Alma will be wearing a pair of their shoes at the demo.
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Post by mach12 on Dec 1, 2019 11:31:42 GMT -5
That article is very informative. Even touching on his in optical equipment inventions. It fills in a lot of holes in the story. I like the beginning where he's making a stove to please his wife, then make a few for his close friends. The cooking school ads are great. Those endorsements are obvious businesses getting together to all get some benefit of a celebrity sales rep's visit. The hardware store makes sense, since they sell cookware & are provide it for the demo. The laundry seems a stretch, but in a nicer home, you've got dishtowel & aprons, as well as napkins & table cloths. All connected to cooking & serving. I guess that would be part of home economics. The shoes kinda follow, because you'd want a pair of well fitted comfortable shoes while you're working you culinary magic in the kitchen. Hey, & it says Alma will be wearing a pair of their shoes at the demo. I've always thought the ads were great and that article kind of pulls together a lot of bits and pieces you've come up with over the years. You're right about the laundry too. Putting myself in the shoes of the laundry it does make sense that they'd want to market themselves to homes and with Chambers being on the high end that would be a prime market. Pretty darned smart when you think about it. Good example of what they mean when they talk about thinking outside of the box. And times were changing with more women working outside of the home and needing alternatives for getting that kind of stuff done. I tend to think of the laundries in connection with all of the shops I worked in over the years where we got a fresh stack of coveralls, jackets, shop coats, shop towels and so on once or twice a week and I don't know how many times I was in a restaurant when they got a load of fresh tablecloths, towels, floor runners and so on but never thought about the home market. Except diaper service. I delivered newspapers for years and remember people setting out the diaper buckets. Yowzer. I'd have hated to have been the poor guy driving that truck. Or the mechanic having to do the service call when it broke down on a hot summer day. Talk about a career change motivator.
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Post by nana on Dec 2, 2019 17:53:06 GMT -5
Those were fun to read! In 1948 people were still getting over their wartime deprivation. You hear it in certain phrases like the one about the Lisks that housewives have been patiently waiting for. Lisk was probably busy stamping out Army mess kits or something for the duration. It must have been a heady feeling--having money to spend and there was stuff to buy!!
Celebrity endorsements often have very little relation to what they're selling. Think Henry Winkler and Tom Selleck selling reverse mortgages. As if they were some kind of financial experts! But I'm fascinated that Alma Chambers WAS a big enough celebrity to be selling shoes and laundry services. It goes to show just how well known and admired the Chambers stoves were back in the day. And it makes me a bit sad how they fell into obscurity within a generation. Fame is often fleeting.
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