Tom Burrell, ad man.
Courtesy of Tom Burrell
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Courtesy of Tom Burrell
Tom Burrell, ad man.
Courtesy of Tom Burrell
Note: This show originally ran in 2015.
In the early 1960s, the ad world had a one-size-fits-all philosophy. Black people, white people—they all saw the same ads. And while that sounds egalitarian in theory, it often led to hilariously inappropriate ad copy, like: “1842. It was a very good year for beer drinkers.”As Tom Burrell points out, it wasn’t really a good year for black people in the U.S., many of whom were still enslaved.
Tom Burrell was the first…
