Race and Ethnicity in Advertising
The definitive online exhibition and archives about how American experiences of race and ethnicity have shaped and been shaped by the development of advertising over the course of the 20th century.
The "Daisy" Ad
Johnson, Goldwater, and the politics of fear.
Ballyhoo!: Posters as Portraiture
Think of all the celebrity advertisements you see everyday. Why pick that particular person for that particular poster?
Selling the Dream
“Don’t Sell the Steak—Sell the Sizzle!”
Joe Jelen's Ads as Primary Sources: The Ad Council's Historic Campaigns
Advertisements don’t always use ideas to sell products—sometimes they use ideas to sell ideas. Explore the ideas the Ad Council’s PSAs have sold, Joe Jelen suggests.
The Big Picture: Match the Ad to the Year
Be it the radio or the television, the slogans related to popular or unpopular products tend to stick on our mind.
Spot the President: Presidential Campaign Ads
Decide whether these statements on the more-than-50-year-old tradition of television campaign ads are true or false.
A Look at Slavery through Posters and Broadsides
How to identify the author, audience, date, and message of historical posters.
Emergence of Advertising in America: 1850-1920
Follow the rise of professional advertising with these advertising items and publications from 1850 to 1920.
Alcohol, Temperance, and Prohibition
More than 1,800 primary sources provide a window into the Temperance Movement and Prohibition.
Marchand Archive
Memorializes Roland Marchand with more than 6,100 images, including more than 2,000 advertisements, and 48 lesson plans drawn from his collection.
Making the Macintosh: Technology and Culture in Silicon Valley
Preserves the history of the Macintosh through interviews with designers, technical writers, Apple employees, and others.
Fifty Years of Coca-Cola Television Advertisements
Archives 50 Coca-Cola commercials, broadcast outtakes, and experimental footage.
Posters from the WPA, 1936-1943
Showcases more than 900 Work Projects Administration (WPA) posters produced as part of the New Deal.
Medicine and Madison Avenue
Provides more than 600 health-related newspaper and magazine advertisements from 1910 to 1960.
Ad*Access
Archives more than 7,000 newspaper and magazine advertisements printed in the U.S. from 1911 to 1955.
Digital Scriptorium
12 collections provide primary sources on ads, health and medicine, the Civil War, sheet music, and more.
Living Room Candidate: Presidential Campaign Commercials, 1952-2008
More than 250 television commercials trace campaign issues and the selling of American presidential candidates.
Geography of Slavery in America
Provides transcriptions and images of more than 4,000 newspaper advertisements for runaway slaves and indentured servants between 1736 and 1803.
Making Sense of Advertisements
Advertisements have surrounded us for years. How can you interpret them? Where can you find them?