{"id":763,"date":"2019-10-18T13:24:41","date_gmt":"2019-10-18T12:24:41","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/blogs.sussex.ac.uk\/libstaff\/?p=763"},"modified":"2019-10-18T13:28:12","modified_gmt":"2019-10-18T12:28:12","slug":"the-hills-stamp-booklets","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/blogs.sussex.ac.uk\/libstaff\/archives\/763","title":{"rendered":"The Hills Stamp Booklets"},"content":{"rendered":"\n

Leonard Cheshire intern Vicky Ward takes us through some of the stranger ‘health’ adverts in the Hills stamp collection currently being catalogued at the Keep<\/a>…<\/p>\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n

The Hills Stamp\nBooklets<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n

\"A
A selection of stamp advertisements from the Hills stamp collection<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n\n\n\n

\u201cBeauty and health are your patriotic duty.\u201d This is the\nmessage carried by a majority of the adverts in the 1930s section of Hills collection\nof stamp booklets. The Hills donation, part of the University\u2019s wider Special Collections,\nwas donated by a stamp enthusiast. Covering the period from 1891 \u2013 1975 the\nbooklets, although no longer containing any stamps, are a fascinating piece of\nadvertising history, which provide a small but perfectly formed glance into the\neveryday life of Britain during the early 20th<\/sup> century.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\"An
An advert for Dubarry talcum powder<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n\n\n\n
\"An
An advert for Omniped elastic foot cushion<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n\n\n\n

The period between the two World Wars is especially\ninteresting; as the 1930s draw to a close and the Second World War looms\ncloser, adverts begin to develop a preoccupation with the nebulous concept of \u2018health\u2019\nand there is a notable upswing in the number of advertisements for beauty\nproducts. Hair oils should be used for \u201chair health;\u201d \u201cFamily Health Soap\u201d is\nessential; books are injected with \u201cgood health in every page;\u201d even perfume is\nadvertised as the scent of \u201cYouth and Health.\u201d In each of their adverts Bovril\nproclaims their mission to \u201cmaintain good health,\u201d and almost every single\nbooklet contains an advert for some kind of cure or remedy. \u201cCuricones,\u201d for\narthritis and rheumatism, or \u201cADRAX\u201d for bladder complaints, or \u201cPenatrol Brand\nInhalant\u201d- a lavender-scented germicidal oil to be used in fighting off coughs\nand colds. There is a new invention that graces the pages in 1938; Broncig\nPowder for cigarettes. The powder is supposed to \u201cimpregnate\u201d the cigarette with\nhealth benefits, claiming to prevent \u201csmoker\u2019s cough, catarrh, hayfever,\nbronchitis and colds\u201d without \u201ctainting\u201d the flavour. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

\"A
A selection of stamp adverts for Dubarry products<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n\n\n\n

Advertising within the stamp books also remind us of the\nextreme times people lived through. An advert from 1920 offers \u201cBattlefield\nTours\u201d in Ypres and Bruges. The battlefields of the First World War, still\nbearing the scars of years of fighting, may seem an odd holiday destination nowadays.\nHowever, these tours were in part aimed at those who had lost loved ones in the\nFirst World War, as well as allowing them to visit war graves. Some chose to\ntake these tours to visit the graves of family members, or to gain closure on\nthe collective trauma that the war had left in its wake. On the other hand,\nsome undertook these journeys purely out of interest – for \u201cfun, larks and a\nfew battlefields thrown in\u201d. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

The stamp booklets are still in the process of being\ncatalogued but when complete will provide a great resource to those researching\nadvertising, and as a complementary collection to the Mass Observation Archive.\n<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\"An
An advert for Brighton & Hove<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n\n\n\n
\"An
An advert for Hastings<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n\n\n\n

Vicky Ward interned\nwith the University of Sussex for 3 months, after graduating from the\nUniversity of Kent, with a First in English Literature. Whilst at The Keep,\nVicky worked through a large amount of material including the Hills stamp book\ndonation.<\/strong><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Leonard Cheshire intern Vicky Ward takes us through some of the stranger ‘health’ adverts in the Hills stamp collection currently being catalogued at the Keep…<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":160,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"spay_email":"","jetpack_publicize_message":"","jetpack_is_tweetstorm":false},"categories":[150885,26],"tags":[4119,151045,4161,151065,150885,26,151086,252,151062],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"","jetpack_publicize_connections":[],"jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"jetpack_shortlink":"https:\/\/wp.me\/p9fi5f-cj","jetpack_likes_enabled":true,"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/blogs.sussex.ac.uk\/libstaff\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/763"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/blogs.sussex.ac.uk\/libstaff\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/blogs.sussex.ac.uk\/libstaff\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.sussex.ac.uk\/libstaff\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/160"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.sussex.ac.uk\/libstaff\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=763"}],"version-history":[{"count":4,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.sussex.ac.uk\/libstaff\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/763\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":773,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.sussex.ac.uk\/libstaff\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/763\/revisions\/773"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/blogs.sussex.ac.uk\/libstaff\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=763"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.sussex.ac.uk\/libstaff\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=763"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.sussex.ac.uk\/libstaff\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=763"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}