For if you turn to page 93 of an issue of “Cosmopolitan” magazine from that month and year, you’ll find the following tidbit of TMI:
“Jim adored her when they married. But now — so soon — he almost ignores her. Unfortunately, this wife was not even aware of her one fault which caused his love to cool ... failure to practice sound feminine hygiene with a scientifically correct preparation ... such as Lysol.”
Yup, Lysol. I won’t even go there.
The magazine, along with a companion volume from 1943, arrived on my desk courtesy of a co-worker who collects such things. They’re terrific portals to the past, and blow away the myth that there was no suggestion of sex, intimate matters and hedonistic living before the 1960s.
I don’t know if this particular “Cosmo” is a forerunner of the same-named women’s magazine of today, the one with covers shrieking about hot lovemaking secrets from its perch in the supermarket checkout line. But both issues are racy enough in their own ways.
The 1949 volume, flush with images of post-World War II prosperity, grabs you from the get-go with the cover line “Read the story no other magazine would dare to print.” The story in question is actually an exposé of the boxing world, but I’m surprised it’s not the one titled “Girls on the Prowl,” which declares with alarm that “fifteen- to eighteen-year old ‘free lancers’ are replacing the old professional shakedown girls and prostitutes, creating a vice problem too insidious for police to handle. ...” It profiles one such lady as “a veritable VD factory.”
No, I’m not going to make any Lysol jokes.
There are two fiction stories illustrated with images of lovelies in the buff, and another with an eye-popping depiction of a guy clad only in boxer shorts embracing a sultry temptress wearing a full-length mink. Is this what Grandma was reading back in the day?
The 1943 issue, when we were deep in the war, is more somber in tone; but, war or no war, we sure liked our booze and smokes, if the number of ads for hard liquor and cigarettes is any indication. One spot for Southern Comfort is on a page facing another one for Philip Morris, coffin nails that were “recognized by medical authorities.” That’s right — smoking won’t hurt you. On to victory!
So there you have everything today’s purists wring their hands over: smoking, drinking, illicit lovemaking and information about sex and intimacy. I don’t know if somebody back in ’49 looked at that ad that begins “Love-quiz ... for married women only” and uttered “too much information;” but, if they did, they were probably firing up a Philip Morris and pouring a shot of Comfort in the meantime.
Stephen Kopfinger is a Sunday News staff writer. Contact him at skopfinger@lnpnews.com or at 291-8799.
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