Origins of Things

The famous Hollywood sign was originally a real estate ad.


Gender color of pink for boys and blue for girls was an early 1900s department store way to advertise clothing colors. Customers did not like the choice, so the store changed to blue for boys and pink for girls.

Sweetest Day tradition was started by a panel of candy company owners in the early 1920s as a way to boost sales of candy. Contrary to the notion that many people still think it was started by greeting card companies.

Deodorants were not used until Edna Murphey came along. She had an antiperspirant/deodorant product that her father had used in surgery, to keep his hands from sweating. She got the help of an ad agency and started a marketing campaign to convince people that being sweaty and smelly was absolutely the height of social embarrassment. It worked.

Lobster was once considered a poor person’s food. There was an overabundance of it. Indentured servants complained about getting so much lobster that rules were established limiting it to only three meals per week.


As canneries on the coasts became bigger and figured out how to send lobster throughout the country. They began to market it as an exotic delicacy. Before long, demand skyrocketed and the price did also.