My grandmother belonged to a generation that smoked… a lot. I mean, across the globe we still do, but she used to tell me, “when I started smoking, people believed menthols would cure a sore throat.” While I can’t speak to whether it was sort of a collective effort to ignore the obvious health concerns of breathing smoke into your lungs or whether they actually believed that, it’s interesting and sometimes hilarious the angles that were taken to advertise cigarettes back then. Even watching Mad Men they make no bones about tobacco not even needing to be advertised because it was so alluring and addictive on its own, but these audacious vintage ads for cigarettes are still a blast to look at! Have a look at some of the stranger ones we’ve found below. 


Geez, the lengths advertisers would go to to make smoking seem family-friendly. It goes without saying that this approach simply would not fly these days, but you have to hand it to them for creativity. Enjoy the rest of these wild and wonderful vintage ads and tell us:

Which is most shocking or interesting to you?

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