Card of the Day - 2024-10-13

Guerin Boutron Advert
Guerin-Boutron [trade : chocolate ; O/S - Paris, France] "Advertising card" (1920s) 1/1 -

This is a much later card than the ones we have shown from this maker before, and it is very Art Deco in its design.

There are two things from which we get this date. 

The first are the child`s eyes, which are bigger than you would expect. This is a nod to the beginnings of what we know as "googly eyes" - and they were first seen in a comic strip by Billy deBeck, which began in 1919, and was called "Barney Google and Snuffy Smith". Mr. Google had very large expressive eyes and pretty soon everyone was calling them "googly eyes", encouraged all the more so, slightly later, by a hit song called "Barney Google with the Goo-Goo-Googly Eyes", which was sung by Eddie Cantor, amongst other people.

The second thing is the child`s hair. This is a bob, and it is an interesting haircut, because it is often said to be a side effect of women`s liberation, though it actually owes its existence to the First World War, when women on war work found it much easier, and safer, to have short hair.

However they also could have got the idea from film star and dancer Irene Castle, who had her long locks trimmed in 1915 before she went into hospital for an operation. When she reappeared on screen, she could have worn a wig, but chose not to. Sadly her partner, and husband, Vernon, then left to go to war. He joined the British Royal Flying Corps, and was regarded as an excellent pilot but then he died in a plane crash on a training base in Texas, in 1918. Irene could have given up then but instead she went solo, married three more husbands and was heavily involved with animal rights. She would almost certainly have fed this cat before herself.