96 Years Ago
March 1914 National Geographic
I love perusing older National Geographic magazines. On my first pass, I skip the articles and study the advertisements. I can’t quite explain my fascination, but I think it’s a combination of the artwork, fonts and language used to illustrate whatever product or service one is selling. Together they give me a small glimpse into a bygone era and leave an impression of something that is no more.
I came across this ad scanned from the March 1914 issue of National Geographic for Hy-Tex Brick, a product of the Hydraulic Press Brick Company, Largest Manufacturers of Brick Face in the World. 96 years ago this month, readers of National Geographic were looking at this very ad that you see today.
The first sentence is so strong and powerful, that for me it somehow manages to overwhelm the beautiful home featured in the ad.
Close, logical consideration of the entire field proves that the one beautiful, fire-safe, permanent, economical facing-material for the expression of every style of American home-building is Hy-tex Brick.
I want to order all three of the booklets – for a grand total of 24 cents, including postage.
Click on the image to see it full size and read the text.
2 Comments
Leave a Comment
About Brick By Chance and Fortune
St. Louis is a city with a rich heritage of brick architecture. Home to some of the largest and most innovative clay working companies of the nineteenth century, you can still see some of the finest examples of brick work ever produced all over the city and region. Today the city's brick heritage is under threat by neglect, brick theft and urban renewal.
FYI: 3 million Hydraulic Press bricks were incorporated into the facade of the Chrysler Building.
I found a Hy-Tex brick buried in our front yard. I was working on the landscaping in our 1878 Victorian home’s front yard. The brick is dark red and beautifully stamped. What a delightful surprise after I washed off the mud!