HERE’S a classic subway placard ad found on one of the vintage trainsets the Transit Museum rolls out every so often, mostly in June, September and December, an ad for Arrow Collars. You might remember Arrow as a shirt manufacturer but this ad is specifically for shirt collars. Before the 1930s, shirts came without collars and detachable collars were sold and thus, you had to but both shirts and collars; things got easier after that when shirts were manufactured with the collars stitched on.
Cluett, Peabody & Co. of Troy, NY were originally collar manufacturers and created the Arrow brand of detachable shirt collars. According to the Free Dictionary, “About 1905 the company began an advertising campaign that featured an idyllic young man wearing an Arrow shirt with the detached collar… Hundreds of printed advertisements were produced from 1907 to 1930 featuring the Arrow Collar Man. The fictional Arrow collar man became an icon and by 1920 received more than 17 thousand fan letters a day.”
I have a personal connection to Cluett-Peabody because for many years, both my mother Betty and grandmother B. worked in its office in Troy. In the photo above, my grandmother is seated second from left, and my mother is standing in the second row, fourth from left, next to the tall guy. As usual, she is the prettiest woman in the picture.
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4/17/23
3 comments
In the 1910’s and 1920’s, my maternal grandfather was working in Manhattan, but traveled to family living in central Massachusetts. The trip was by train, in pre-airconditioned cars, with coal-fired steam locomotives. He told me that, during warmer weather the windows would be open and his bright white shirt collar would be obviously dirty by the time he arrived. The first thing he would do was change out the sooty collar with a new one. It always amazed me that there was comment about the equally dirty shirt, or suit.
Wish this type of art style would make a comeback to ads. It’s one of my favorite styles.
Arrow often featured artwork created by a neighbor of mine (100 years ago) JC Leyendecker. His house is just down the street from me in Neuro Shell. He had a small circle of male models including Brian Donlevy, who went on to be a star in Hollywood.