Blast From The Past

Celebrity and cartoon character endorsements of products aimed at children are as old as advertisement itself. Your grandfather might have done yard work to try to earn enough to score a Babe Ruth-endorsed Louisville Slugger and your kid likely wants anything that features Spiderman. 

Some of the best pitchmen of all time have been Hanna-Barbera's Flintstones. Even today, the prehistoric pals are still featured on a variety of products. The all-star of cartoon character endorsements has been their vitamin line, and if you were born in the 70s or 80s, you'll remember this television spot interrupting Saturday morning cartoons. 

But, the cave dudes didn't always endorse such a healthy lifestyle. In fact, your parents may have been introduced to the beginnings of an addiction if they were born in an era where there were no limits on what could be advertised. My dad was 9 and mum was 5 when this piece was shown to audiences in the U.S. and Canada. While the Flintstones was originally a more adult cartoon, entire families would get together and watch, providing corporations the opportunity to preach to the choir and plant a seed in the minds of a new generation. 

Ads like this were banned from television 10 years later, after a last hurrah on December 31st, 1970, when almost all of the adverts were for tobacco products.