These ads were found on the backs of two old magazines I bought recently from a newsagent's: the US News & World Report from May 21, 1962 and September 3, 1962.
In the light of today's attitudes and limitations on tobacco advertising, the pictures may seem bizarre, even comical.
They're certainly blatent, with the image on the left associating smoking with sex (as if to say "smoke our brand and you too can have an orgy") and the ad on the right associating smoking with freshness and health ("in the rich taste of a Salem cigarette, you'll notice a softness very like the clear, mild springtime air...")
But in fact they're only superficially different to advertisements we see for tobacco and all sorts of other products today. So while the tobacco industry is lobbying the British Government not to ban all tobacco advertising and sponsorship (on the grounds that it won't decrease cigarette consumption but encourage black-market trading, ha ha) it's worth remembering that advertisers will tell any kind of lie to get you to buy their product.
