One of my proudest achievements: as complete a revival of the Gobbler as you'll get today. Assuming you want it. There was a time I thought this place was the height of gauche and kitsch, and while that's still the case . . . I've grown to love it. Go HERE.
The ghastly designs forced on decent, hard-working Americans by the trend-setters. There's no justice, but there is this site. It's the original 1999 version, revived for the present. Go HERE.
Every few years I'll get mail explaining why underwear elastic was so poor in the 50s. But they can't explain the celery. Go HERE.
The start of it all, right here. This is a promotional site for the book, but it has plenty of material. Upgrade in progress! Go HERE.
A long time in the making: an additional argument against any sort of warm feelings about the 70s. Contains Sears 1974, the Faces of The Price is Right, Ice Capades catalogs, and more. A new site in 2011! Go HERE.
The return - and total revision - of an ancient site. Advertising art repurposed as Actual Art, complete with pretentious commentary! Go HERE.
Comic Sins is the new all-inclusive whizbang assemblage of illustrated delights. We have covers every Tuesday, and a bold, fresh new site on comic book advertising. Newspaper comics through the era can be found HERE; it includes the internet’s largest Lance Lawson archive. Big Little Books examines the chunky comics genre. The main page, where you’ll find a general menu, is HERE.
A salute to everything deeply creepy about 50s and 60s "men's" mags. REVIVED AND UPDATED in late 07. Updates coming in late '12. Meanwhile, go HERE.
Before the personal computer came along, companies sold their big iron with carefully staged promotional photos. Thrill to the yesteryear mainframes and the bouffanted women who loved them! Go HERE.
An old collection of weary japery from the 20s, interspersed with hangover remedies. Go HERE.
A pamphlet describing the Glories of Socialist Opera! Please to be enjoying. LINK.
Home-front propaganda in WW2. Update coming this year. For now, go HERE.
For years the Institute sent out a monthly magazine, the American Home Ironizer; here are some selections from the archives. Updated as our ongoing digitization of the archives continues. (Old site, c. 2003.) LINK.
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If you’re just joining the Institute, welcome! If you’re coming back for another visit, apologies for not doing this sooner. The Institute of Official Cheer has been on the internets since 1996 or so; it goes fallow for a while, then springs to life with an enormous new project, gets some half-baked redesign based on some fancy I got that looked good right up until I uploaded it.
This is the most recent example of that, I suppose.
Many old sites have been given a new look, and the Gallery of Regrettable Food is beginning its 14th year with a total overhaul, and a billion bytes of new material. The 70s site is new for 2011, and full of horrid things.
What can I say? It’s the Institute. It’s just a place full of stuff. Enjoy.
Lileks
02 06 12
For your listening pleasure: a selection of louge and "library" music to get you in the mood. Swank! A few of these are from "Music for TV Dinners," which might be the best collection of library and industrial music you'll find. A few songs on the albums you've heard before; they've become famous in their own loveable way.
If you can ever get "Curley Shirley" out of your head, you've accomplished something quite remarkable. Me, I'm partial to the "Riviera Set," a fine piece of 60s quasi-dabba-dabba with fuzz guitar and some pillow-soft swank around the :55 seond mark.
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Below you'll find links to the fine Ultra-Lounge collection, which can be had for less money today than I paid back in 1997. Damned internet! I mean wonderful internet.
Whoa, Nellie. A collection of men's fashion photography from the 50s, 60s and - shudder - the 70s. Go HERE.
In 1949, the Sunbeam Bread company put out a comic book to get kids to eat bread. Their secret weapon: an interminable history lesson that tied the jobs of iron miners and classical violinists to your toast. (c. 1999, redesigned 2010.) LINK.
How do you get kids to eat right and take their vitamins? Simple - scare the urine out of them with hideous meat collages! Meet the Dayalets - they're child-tested and doctor approved. (c. 2000, updated 2010) LINK.
A 1972 vacation promo. Yea, how times have changed. (c. 1999, redesigned 2010.) LINK.
Advertising art, stripped of its context, treated like actual art. (c. 1998.) Offline at the moment.
For years, newspapers could always rely on a dog photo to soften the grim news of the day. It was a boon for humans; we like dogs. It was hell on the dogs. A collection of newspaper photos from the 40s, 50s and 60s. LINK.
Once they were beloved by, well, hundreds; once they proudly shilled for products that filled the shelves of your local store. These are the orphans of the commercial culture, ready for you to adopt them as your own. As seen in Forbes! (c. about a billion years ago.) Returning in 2012.
Here's where you can learn all about the Institute, its mission and its history. Not required reading to enjoy the Institute's fine products, but when you've burned through everything else, this might make a little more sense. (Note: ancient site, redesigned in 2010.) LINK.
All words by J. Lileks c. 1995-2011. Site "design" by the same guy.
