In Eagle Comic, the sponsored stories and advertisers’ contributions were always very interesting. Walls Ice Cream had their ordinary run-of-the-mill adverts:
But they also had “Tommy Walls- the Wonder Boy”. The first stirrings of product placement. The perfect planting of a brand name in young, impressionable minds. I think that lots of the young readers actually thought that this story was part of the comic itself. I know I did:
The first picture says “NEW JET LINER MAKES FIRST TEST TODAY”
The last one says “WHAT A WIZARD DESIGN” which is countered by “BUT LOOK”
Clearly something has gone drastically wrong, but if you eat lots and lots and lots of Walls ice cream, you’ll be able to save the day:
It must take sacks and sacks of sugar consumed to have the strength to hold the wing and the fuselage of a jet airliner together as it flies to an airport and makes a normal landing. Where was Tommy Walls when the De Havilland Comet was crashing all over Europe?
Cadbury’s came a close second with their “Cadbury’s Corner Quiz”. Here’s the first question:
And Question 2:
And Question 3:
And the final question:
And, of course, there were the ordinary quarter page adverts. Television told our mothers not to forget the Rowntrees Fruit Gums. Only listen to this irritating tune if you have always wanted your brain reformatted :
As well as the commercial links between our mothers and Rowntrees Fruit Gums, ‘Eagle’ Comic also emphasised the point with a comic strip starring “Ronnie the Gumster” :
But what’s a “Gumster” ? Something you find in a Forrest? Like Forrest Gumster.
John Knifton 