If a suffragette sasses you. Don't answer back. Gently light a Nebo. Watch her eyes grow dreamy. Hear her sigh: 'I wish I was a man.', A 'Satin Wonder' in each package.
“I wish I were a man.” This advertisement utilizes the contemporary women’s suffrage liberation movement to target men and women alike. The words are directed to a man who may be offended by the “sass” if a Suffragette, but they also appeal to Suffragettes and other strong women – like flappers and spinsters – as well. The ad’s headline crosses out the word “Boys” and replaces it with “Person.” This strikethrough not only serves as a joke referring to the Suffragettes’ insistence on equality in all aspects of daily life, but it also serves as a direct marketing ploy, attempting to attract daring women and spur them to smoke Nebos out of rebellion. The suffragette pictured here closely resembles Lucy Page Gaston, founder of the “Anti-Cigarette League” in 1899. It was not until the late 1920s that an “American girl next door” was depicted in cigarette and tobacco ads. The brand name, Nebo, is evocative of both Mount Nebo in Jordan, which boasts a stunning view of Jerusalem from its summit, and of the Babylonian god of writing destinies, named Nebu in the Nevi’im of the Tanakh in Isaiah 46:1. These Oriental, exotic associations were popular when the brand was first introduced by the John Surbrug Company, as Turkish cigarettes were in vogue; However, this and other Nebo ads of the time suggest that when P. Lorillard Company purchased Nebo in 1911, they took the brand in a new direction, engaging with political and social movements of the time.
cork, equality, Female, Independence, suffragette, woman
