1933 Fisher Body Ad
Smoking is a smelly, dangerous habit, one that I luckily have never felt the urge in which to partake. However, last century smoking was a much more socially accepted practice than it is today. Watch just about any old-timey movie made before 1960 or so and it seems that everyone is constantly taking a “Montclair Moment.”
Despite the commonness of smoking back in the day, car makers seemed to have been hesitant to depict the practice in their ads, and I struggled to find more than the tiny handful of examples depicted here, which is why I am referring to it as a non-trope in this post.
1933 Fisher Body Ad
Not surprisingly, one of the few places where it made sense to depict smokers was in the car’s ability to remove said smoke from the passenger compartment. One of the primary selling points of the “No-Draft” ventilation pioneered by Fisher Body in 1933 was its ability to quickly and easily remove cigar and cigarette smoke. Both the ad above and the lede photo are from this advertising campaign.
1963 Mercury Ad
This 1963 Mercury Ad similarly shows the benefits of the Mercury’s Breezeway rear windows. The look of utter amazement on the face of the female passenger is priceless.
This 1937 Chrysler ad features writer Alma Archer extolling the benefits of her Chrysler while doing a play on words on the habit-forming nature of cigarette smoking.
Perhaps the only other place where it made sense for automakers to depict cigarettes was when showing ashtrays, as in the 1938 Hudson ad above. For a feature that virtually every car had as standard equipment until the 1990s, there are almost no advertisements showing ashtrays or cigarette lighters being used. I guess it was just assumed that every car came with a lighter and an ashtray and that everyone knew how to use them.
Speaking of ashtrays, I honestly thought no manufacturer would ever show something as gross and disgusting as a full ashtray in an ad, so was I shocked when I stumbled upon this 1962 Ford ad. The cigarette “butts” clearly cut up, unsmoked cigarettes, but still a pretty bold move on Ford’s part.
This 1954 Willys ad is bizarre. I think they are trying to do a send-up of the “film noir hardboiled detective” trope (hence the cigarette), but it really just comes across as strange and creepy.
1965 Fiat 600D ad
Lastly, we have this ad for a 1965 Fiat 600D. As with the Willys ad above, the smoking here is not shown for its own sake, but rather in service of another trope – in this case, the “Millionaire tycoon smoking gigantic cigars” trope.
The Aero Willys ad: “Thanks for a wonderful experience.” says the man smiling at the very young and attractive woman as he has an after experience cigarette.
It’s not even hidden; it’s right out there. OK, the ad’s smaller script says the Willy’s owner is a guy, but the ad’s headline text strongly says something else.
Of course some might say: “Plaut; you’re a sick person; you see sex everywhere”.
By the way, while working through college, the Rug Mart’s retail showroom picked up a bare bones 1953 Willys 2 door sedan with 3-on-a-tree for running customer homes measuring errands. It was not that great; I mean, not worth an after experience cigarette. (*)
(*) If I had been a smoker.
I read it that he has another Aero Willys, and she liked it (and him) so much that she took her hefty salary and bought this blue one. His is around the corner at the hotel/motel.
You’re not necessarily incorrect in your “seeing sex everywhere” because this was the Fifties. And, more importantly, the pre-rock and roll Fifties. Where sex was never discussed openly, but alluded to in all sorts of manners that were only surpassed in their obsession/refusal to see it openly by the Victorian Era.
Think Monty Python with the “wink, wink, nudge, nudge, say no more” skit – but without the broad attempt at humor. Sex back then was alluded to in as many sorts of manner as the human mind could dream up, but, God forbid, never discussed openly.
That was the Sixties breakthrough.
I think your analysis of the Willys ad is correct. And yes, sex is everwhere.
The smoking is actually one of the least bizarre pieces of a very bizarre ad. The ad copy is really weird. It’s hard to tell just what voice they’re channeling. While the speaker is seemingly a “regular guy”, we’re given the line “…for Joe let me drive while he told me…”. Entirely out of character (whatever character that is).
Further, the small print that refers to the car as the “sister” of the famous Jeep is odd. Our regular guy (in 1955) wants to buy a car that’s a “sister”?
Finally, the art is poorly executed. The scale of the model next to the car is all off. It’s virtually a cartoon. Again, probably not what was intended.
Sheesh.
Aha, think I’ve cracked it! The narrative copy in that ad is being spoken by the woman, rather than the man. That makes sense (for the sensibilities of the era, at least) of details like “Joe let me drive” and the “Beautiful Sister of the famous ‘Jeep’.” Only thing that doesn’t fit is that “he makes less than I do”, but maybe he’s the new guy while she’s been there some years already.
The scale of the model next to the car is all off. It’s virtually a cartoon.
Nah, that was just par for the course in pre-photography car ads. Especially with small cars like the Aero, they wanted to make it look as large and spacious as possible.
I wouldn’t say you’re a sick person, but I’d hazard a guess the guy who’s so satisfied sure is – he looks crazed, not to mention his tight grip on those strangler gloves.
I don’t think he’s satisfied with his little Willys at all.
In that 1933 ad, what is the sequel? The Aero Jet sort of alludes to the same thing but then she just buys a car. Ashtray cleaning was always a “delight.” Ford gets credit for showing this mess. Thanks for a great presentation. I do not miss ashtrays in cars for the obvious reason. i do wish that cars were equipped with waste baskets that hold lunch bags. I have made my own over the years. However, a built in one in the console would be far better than sitting on the floor. Do guys who smoke score more than we non-smokers?
“Do guys who smoke score more than we non-smokers?”
Maybe, but only if the woman involved is also a smoker. Smokers, their breath, their hair, their clothes, their cars, and their homes, smell like that ’62 Ford’s full ash tray.
It’s a hard barrier to get past if you are not a smoker.
And it is, IMO, not worth it.
I was only involved with one woman who smoked. Never again.
There’s a reason hotels have non-smoking rooms and used car ads boast that the prior owner was a non-smoker.
My parents were smokers, especially my dad. The house reeked of cigarette smoke. The walls were covered with a grimy film of tobacco smoke. The worst part for me as a kid was having to hold cigarettes to my bedridden mother’s mouth so she could smoke. I guess the only possible responses to those influences would be to 1) start smoking or 2) stubbornly remain an adamant nonsmoker. I chose the latter, and wonder to this day about possible lasting effects of secondhand smoke.
“Maybe, but only if the woman involved is also a smoker… ”
I wouldn’t be so sure of that!
My lady wife was a non smoking doctor of medicine but for some reason thought I was the “business” ,an idiot yes, but her idiot!
She wouldn’t let me smoke in her car though or in the same room as her – threw me out the back door of the house regardless of the weather.
Sadly I now get to smoke indoors as she passed away of a NON smoking related illness.
Years back a lady I’d met and found very intriguing I refused to date because she was a smoker – a chainsmoker – and made it clear she wasn’t about to give up her habit for a man. Sorry, that’s a dealbreaker for me. I also recall not being interested in some used cars that were obviously driven by smokers (from the smell or the ashtray). I actually did live with a younger woman who occasionally smoked, but only outdoors. This seems to be common amongst the shrinking number of young people who smoke – they’ve never known a world where it where people smoked in offices, restaurants, airplanes, or even bars. Smoking is like charcoal grilling, an outdoor activity.
One ashtray-related oddity from near the end of the standard-ashtray-and-lighter era were the Chrysler AA-body sedans (Acclaim, Spirit, LeBaron), which on bench-seat models had a drawer at the bottom center of the dash that opened up to an ashtray and a single cupholder. But there was an almost hidden nonsmoker bonus: if you removed the ashtray, a panel could be slid over from the cupholder to where the ashtray used to be, revealing a second cupholder underneath it! I’ve known owners who didn’t know they had a second cupholder until I showed them.
My mom – a teenager in the 1930s referred to auto vent windows as Fischer Windows. When I asked her about it, she told me that’s just what her father and brothers called vent window in the family Chevy.
That explanation was sufficient until this post got me curious enough to look up references to the term. While I couldn’t find any modern reference to 1930s slang, there evidently was some factual basis for referring to the windows as Fischer windows.
Back in 1936, Albert Fischer of Fischer body fame obtained US patent 2,048,605 on the combination of a roll up window combined with a vent window. This became a feature on GM cars of the era – most of which advertised Body by Fischer as a selling feature.
Since the idea had been around long before Fischer tried to patent it, challenges arose as GM attempted to enforce the patent. Eventually, key claims in the patent were set aside in a case decided in 1941.
That case offers some detailed trivia as it discusses the evolution of the auto vent window. For your further reading pleasure, I’ve included a link to that old court case:
https://casetext.com/case/ternstedt-mfg-co-v-motor-products-corp
Even though GM eventually had most of the Fischer patent claims invalidated by the case, GM advertising of the feature combined with the patent evidently made an impression on enough 1930s car buyers that the feature became strongly associated with Fischer bodied cars and acquired the nickname my mother used.
As Paul Harvey would say, “. . .and now you’ve know the rest of the story.”
Thanks for the link to the court case. It was interesting to scan through it. Couldn’t read the whole thing though!
That’s fascinating. Interesting court case too – the judge seemed quite unimpressed by Fisher’s claims. This language:
“The rare and the new features, if any, in Fisher’s alleged invention are so covered up in his specifications with the familiar and the old as almost to defy detection.”
…is pretty harshly written.
Relatedly, I recently came across this period Buick brochure, which went into more depth on the issue of vent windows than I ever knew was possible:
I do love opening vent windows. I’d never heard them referred to as “Fisher windows” though. Neat.
We used to call them “wing vents”…and as a kid I did know that they were actually there to vent smoke at highway speeds, even though no one in my family actually smoked.
Earlier this summer I walked into the building of a barely-a-business, non-charity affiliated resale shop that puts most of its’ merch outdoors and smelled this sour, chemical tang in the air that I didn’t recognize until I saw the full ashtray. It had been about 20 years since I had been in an indoor space people smoked in.
I didn’t buy anything from there.
Love that MERCURY, beautiful example of MERCURY’S upscale styling. The breezeway window was inherited from late 50s Lincoln (believe huge Continentals) when dropped with 61 downsized Continentals. The design of that window Limited styling revisions. Also air conditioning was becoming more popular. As for smoking, relatives had a new 59 Fleetwood with ash trays filled with candy, refusing any smoking 🚬 to stink up their BABY. Rarely had smokers in my cars. But once a passenger asked to smoke. Reluctantly agreed provided he blow smoke out the window. Still strange aroma was very hard to get out of interior. Being naive, I had no idea (until someone Reluctantly told me) it was POT. 😲 .
Thank God that the filthy habit of smoking has lost it’s alure today.
The top photo reminds me of my best friend’s step dad.
He would whizz down Highway 90 (the same that killed Jayne Mansfield) puffing on a cigarette with his left hand and a bourbon & coke in his right, on the way to the Mississippi gulf coast for vacation.
He could flick the cigarette without removing his hand from the steering wheel and the ashes would be sucked out the vent window while he took a sip of his drink.
It was the 60’s, you had to be there!!
My grandfather would smoke anything with tobacco. I remember his 62` Chrysler 300 4 door and his 64` Dodge Polara coupe had preforated headliners with literally thousands of small pin point like holes in the fabric. The top of the headliners in both cars had a brown discolored look from all the smoke it absorbed, especially under the driver`s side.After seeing this I though it would discourage me from smoking in my cars when I became old enough to drive. I though wrong!
I wish smoking was disappearing. Seems like the only difference with today is that the allure of smoking has shifted from the upper class to the lower/poorer class. I go to any gas station or grocery store, the workers are out smoking, waiting for customers show up. Easily 3/4 of my coworkers smoke on the shop floor, sometimes in the paint booth. The guy delivering my propane smokes while filling my tank. It’s more like who doesn’t smoke?
I would pay more for a used car that hasn’t been smoked in. Also in my experience, such a car has a better chance of being maintained better. A smoked in car has more often been neglected in other ways. Same with used furniture, etc.
Call your propane company and tell them not to send over the moron who smokes while he’s filling your tank anymore. Your home and family are at risk of an explosion because of this idiot. Better yet, change companies and let Smokie’s company know why.
Yeah, I definitely agree with Hard Boiled. I’d be getting a new propane company pronto.
I was going to say the same thing as you about smoking not disappearing. I’m not going to make a case for class differences re. the habit, but I will say that for the most part I am seeing what amounts to a switch from burning tobacco to vaporizing nicotine. Every day I see cars with a big cloud of vape rolling out the window…not unlike in the Mercury ad in this article.
And sadly (IMO) I also notice when pulled up next to cars at lights/intersections that what I might assume is vape is actually weed. The whole driving while partaking thing is quite scary to this geezer.
I was at a big car cruise last night, and I smelled weed non stop for over two hours. Michigan’s gone all-in on dispensaries now that it’s legal, and I think people truly believe that because it’s legal, you can smoke it wherever you want.
” … you can smoke it wherever you want… ” .
Yes, you can. But there are some legal details of which one should be aware.
https://www.michiganautolaw.com/blog/2023/05/24/marijuana-and-driving-laws/
https://www.clickondetroit.com/news/michigan/2022/05/19/a-guide-to-michigans-recreational-marijuana-laws-what-you-should-know/
My understanding of the law is that you can only smoke in private. I’m sure there are some caveats.
Here in MA at least, driving while impaired – regardless of what has caused the impairment – is illegal. As far as I know, there’s no prohibition against smoking weed in the car up until it gets you stoned (which I would assume is the whole point)…at which point if you’re driving, it’s illegal.
The rub is that there are currently no reliable/legal tests for impairment from weed (unlike alcohol, where there is established legal precedence regarding blood alcohol tests). Hence, cops are reluctant to stop and ticket stoned drivers. This will change (it kind of has to), but at the moment we’re in a kind of legal grey zone. Meanwhile, the number of accidents that are unofficially but reasonably attributable to stoned drivers is mounting. Like most things, more people will need to be harmed before the law catches up to itself in this regard.
Thanks, next time I need a delivery I’ll let them know if he’s still working there and lights up. I don’t know his name.
Yeah, maybe it’s not really a class thing since most of the higher ups are smokers too. Owner, president, VP, HR, plant manager.
My folks smoked and as a kid it made me so sick. Reason enough to never want to do it myself.
Don’t give him the opportunity to light up on your property again. You have the right to have a safe, legal propane delivery. You don’t have to know his name. The company should have records to show who delivers to you and when. He is supposed to be a trained professional driver. He obviously falls short of his professional requirements. He definitely has no business handling explosive materials. There is no excuse for his incompetence.
I don’t mean to puff up online to you about this. It just pisses me off so bad that anyone would put you in this situation. It is just so unacceptable. Maybe the best thing to do would be to switch propane companies, and with that, the Marlboro man rides off into the sunset. Good luck and best wishes.
Thanks for the advice. I schedule my own deliveries and I’m good till next summer.
For awhile I thought I was in CC jail, the site just kept giving me an error message despite my email showing new activity happening.
Same here. My wife has to drive in to Washington, DC a few times a month for work, and she says the stench of pot is so strong and so frequent, that she puts the air conditioning on re-circulation whenever she’s driving there. She said she misses the olden days (you know, like 5 years ago), when you could walk or drive through a city and not be overcome by pot smell.
There – fixed it.
“Dear Penthouse, Thanks for a Wonderful Experience – Saturday didn’t loom up as a great day in my book, the usual errands to do, nothing significant. But if I’d know what was going to happen to me! I went downtown, parked the old bus, and went on my way. Later, one of the fellows at the office made a pass at me and offered me a lift. He was driving a new AERO WILLYS. As I stepped in, I cracked: ‘Someone’s got a raise, huh? Some ride you got there!’ Joe blushed and said, no – it wasn’t what I thought it was. Well, you know what happened. I couldn’t be satisfied any other way, and thanks to that wonderful experience, I’m enjoying a new AERO WILLYS!”
TO MEN OF EXPERIENCE: Go to a Willys showroom and drive out with the beautiful sister of your buddy JEEP. Afterwards you’ll going to need a cigarette.
GOD – I need a smoke now – thanks a lot Tom!
A nice Punch Knucklebuster….
Smoking a cigar inside of a Fiat 600 would be a truly nauseating experience.
We just returned from a 2 week vacation in Paris and were truly astonished by how many people were smoking cigarettes. It wasn’t just old folks, it was across all age groups. The French even still allow smoking in restaurants. We had forgotten how gross it was to be eating a meal only to have the people at the next table both light up cigarettes and puff away the whole time while they were eating. Truly addicted to the nicotine.
I think they smoke in the shower. I noticed it when I was in “Paris” .(ion’s ago)
Look at ANY film from the French ‘new wave’ era from 1958-1969. Just about EVERYBODY is smoking! Men, women, even children in a few. Ditto for the Italian cinema of roughly the same era .Ahh, black and white smoking memories of a classic film buff.
The chauffer driven “Fiat” is hilarious! They could have at least found a model with “back doors”..lol
As a former smoker, I always get a little wistful about the parts of smoking I enjoyed – the smell of a freshly opened pack of cigarettes, the clink-flick-klack of my Zippo lighter, and the sensation of that first satisfying drag after a good meal. But then there was everything else, including the terrible cravings and the stale smell of smoke everywhere.
I had never thought about it, but as common as smoking was then, it is odd that it was not depicted in ads more. I suppose they figured that smokers will buy the car and so will non-smokers as long as they just ignored the subject.
I really, really miss opening vent windows. I especially missed them back when I was still a smoker (and more, when I rode with a smoker). Also, it is possible that the butts in the Ford ashtray were smoked by real manly men who eschewed filter-tip cigarettes. It wasn’t just men, of course. Mrs. JPC had an aunt who smoked non-filtered Camels up until the end of her nearly 90 year life.
Me too.
Frankly, it’s the lighters that I most miss. So I keep them. Albeit without the fuel.
No one in my family smoked. Which may be why I took hard to it as a college student. That lasted about 15 years…and gave me pretty good insight into the whole glass houses thing.
whoops, forgot to make that small enough 🙂
Absurd as it seems, that remote pleasure craving still sits in the back of my mind after all this time clean, even over-riding the memory of the gaggingly odiferous pong I endured from a just-butted-out smoker only a few hours ago. For me, I’ll never not want the smell of a new ciggy just lit by a match (though none of the fug after that these days).
However, smoking in cars now just looks odd now. Occasionally, a older tradesman on his own in a ute, sure, but weirdly, I most usually notice it in some posh-looking 60+ person in a very expensive car. I probably notice the window down first.
Guess they can change the car when the ashtray’s full.
The Ford ad brought back a memory of my dad burning his hand dumping a smoldering ash tray from the Rambler’s dash. He didnt smoke, but mom did, so she had it stuffed with lipstick stained Newport butts.
Nothing more disappointing, than seeing nicely kept car interiors back in the day, spoiled by the inside smelling of cigarette smoke. Nicotine stains on the steering wheel, headliner, etc., and/or burn holes, in the upholstery and/or carpet. Thoroughly gross habit, that has stubbornly lingered too long. And taken too many lives, prematurely.
I’ve never smoked a cigarette in my life, I lost family members to lung cancer that did, and as an old car picker have literally thrown out otherwise good car interior parts because the stench was so embedded into it no amount of soap would save it… but I’ll say this, I have more visceral childhood nostalgia than just about anything else remembering walking into a hotel lobby on a hot summer vacation trip and feeling the waft of air conditioning and the smell of lingering cigarette smoke. If I were religious, that’s exactly what I want going through the gates of heaven to feel like.
And I think it looks really cool. I’m impressionable I guess.
Luckily I have a stronger survival instinct, and I always knew the harsh realities of it, especially after my grandma died when I was young(hell she was young, 65!). Thinking back at when smoking was prevalent is just like seeing traffic jams of old cars – damn sure the roads looked better than today, and I quite like the smell of unburied hydrocarbons too(EV proponents say they don’t have to go to gas stations like it’s a sales pitch! bah!) but from literally every vehicle on the road, from not just the odd classic today, and mixed with lead? Yeah, I’m glad I only lived in a time of catalytic converters and EFI.
Now a days though with legalization I’m starting to smell weed almost to the extent of cigarettes 15 years ago before the bans, last time I stayed at a hotel I stayed last year had that distinct scent waft into my nostrils upon entry like the old days, only difference is I find the smell of marijuana actually revolting.
I smoke pot but have never smoked cigarettes. Because I have always hated being forced to endure the stench of someone else’s vice I would never smoke anything in public or indoors anywhere but my own home, and not even then if others are present. My attitude is do what you want but leave me out of it. Just seems so crass and rude. Also embarrassing in the same way that having really bad breath or body odor would be.
Here’s FDR indulging in two of his favorites passions. Chain smoking Camels and driving his 1936 Ford Phaeton convertible.
Having just re-watched the Ken Burns documentary on the Roosevelts and seeing lots of footage of FDR, the lede picture in this article immediately called to mind FDR in his characteristic pose (behind the wheel wearing a hat with a cigarette clenched in his teeth).
It also reminded me that FDR only lived to be 63, dying of congestive heart failure. The Camels didn’t help.
Geeze, I’m almost as old as FDR…
I’m curious how FDR was able to drive a car after he had polio…must have been some specially modified vehicle for his use, right?
Sure did.
A good and timely thread here .
I well remember being stuck in cars, trains, boats, school rooms, on and on with billowing clouds of cigarette smoke that burned my eyes and made my stomach turn .
Nevertheless by age 12 I too began to smoke because it was ‘cool’ ~ after all, most grown ups smoked……
I was a heavy smoker until I quit cold turkey at age 24 .
I still hate the stench and also miss the fiddling with a new pack, tamping them down on the dashboard before opening, so on and so forth .
I mostly recall older folks calling them “No Drafts”, very few ever used “VentiPane” .
In the mid 1930’s Chryslers and Plymouths had a nifty little lever at the bottom edge of the wing vent that if you flipped it with the door window rolled up, would lock the vent wing to it so it rolled down with the door window…….
IIRC 1932 (?) was the year Ford finally added a radio as an accessory and Henry, a non smoker decreed the small control panel replaced the center mounted ash tray .
I see more and move young folks vaping, when I talk to them about it they all claim it’s “different” from smoking and they cannot possibly get cancer from it ~ how well they’ve been brainwashed .
-Nate
(in soggy, hard raining So. Cal.)
I miss the vent wings in cars. I don’t mss the ashtrays. But I have a huge problem with the
anti-smoking nazis even though I don’t smoke. Cigarettes, that is. Or cigars. Or non-tobacco substances. I am an occasional pipe smoker and collector of vintage briar pipes. It’s a hobby rather than simply a habit. And I wish that when they make anti-smoking laws, they’d take us old-school traditional tobacco pipe smokers into account instead of being indiscriminate about it as they usually are. I won’t go into specifics as this is not the place for it, but other pipe smokers will know the issues involved.
Pipe smokers pictured in a car ad are even rarer than cigarette smokers. You’d have to go back at least to this 1925 Pierce Arrow ad…
I miss the near automatic inclusion of ashtrays and lighters in the cars of yesteryear. One of my favorite memories is using ’em as providers of evidence (along with many other little things) as to how a used car was used when car shopping. Little old lady owned cars usually had clean and unused ashtrays in the backseat… while family owned cars frequently sported ones that had never contained cigarette butts, but had bits of gum and food detritus in them.
I remember Mom looking at slightly used 4th Camaro convertible at a dealership, and it was being pushed by this lady salesperson who was really trying to mansplain the whole thing to Mom with some kind of faked southern drawl (yeah, it was just as awkward as it sounds). Part of the ramble was about how she’d always been lovingly garaged and never been smoked in (the car). I plucked the ash encrusted cigarette lighter out of its receptacle and proclaimed “Bullshit!” while holding it in the air, as the saleswoman got this plugged up look on her face and bumbled a few more words before giving up and returning to her lair.
Just ran across another example of a cigarette in an auto ad. This one is for a 1963 Buick. Looks like Mother (in pearls, of course) is helping the child get in the car while Dad, at the steering wheel, lights up.