Supposed temperance poster
JoAnne Schmitz
poster:
http://www.nps.gov/archive/edis/edisonia/graphics/23430025.jpg
It shows a group of ten disapproving, sour-looking women with a sign above
them, stating, "Lips that touch liquor shall never touch ours". The
background is an obvious fake landscape and the sign is obviously attached
directly to the fake landscape.
The picture was so stereotypical I could not believe it to be genuine.
Look at #4 from the right with her sucked-in cheeks. Look at the lady in
the center with the ridiculous hat. They are being mocked.
In the first page of Google results for the phrase, I came upon the real
explanation. It's a movie still, not a prohibition or temperance poster.
That means it's almost certainly meant to be humourous and ironic, not
earnest.
The phrase is an real temperance phrase, however; it featured in a song:
The Demon of Rum is about in the land,
His victims are falling on every hand,
The wise and the simple, the brave and the fair,
No station too high for his vengence to spare.
O women, the sorrow and pain is with you,
And so be the joy and the victory, too;
With this for your motto, and succor divine,
The lips that touch liquor shall never touch mine,
The homes that were happy are ruined and gone.
The hearts that were merry are wretched and lone,
And lives full of promise of good things to come,
Are ruined and wreck'd by the Demon of Rum.
Wives, maidens and mothers, to you it is giv'n,
To rescue the fallen and point them to heav'n.
With us for your guides you shall win by this sign,
The lips that touch liquor shall never touch mine.
O mothers, whose sons tarry long at the bowl,
Who love their good name as you love your own soul,
O maidens with fathers, and brothers and beaux;
Whose lives you would rescue from infinite woes,
Let war be your watchword, from shore unto shore,
Till Rum and his legions shall ruin no more,
And write on your banners, in letters that shine,
The lips that touch liquor shall never touch mine
============
This page features the phrase on the cover of the sheet music, unadorned by
scowling women (or any women at all).
Temperance posters typically focus on the negative effect of alcohol on the
drinker and his family, for example:
http://www.legendsofamerica.com/ah-prohibitionspeakeasy.html
A photo or drawing of a woman with child, text:
Help me to keep him pure
Please vote "against the sale of liquors"
http://www.boisestate.edu/socwork/dhuff/us/images/6-18750-99/temperance-1870.jpg
Women (not unattractive ones, either) are pictured looking dismayed at a
saloon featuring brandy smash and gin. They appear to be praying. The men
inside appear dirty and unpleasant, and angrily glare at the women. One
man is sitting drunkenly on the steps of the saloon.
http://faculty.umf.maine.edu/~walters/web%20jacksonian%20277_07/Unit%207%20millennium.html
"Tree of intemperance" showing all the negative effects of intemperance.
The roots are brandy, gin, beer, rum and so on. The branches are
Immorality, Vice, Crime, Ignorance, and Disease and something I can't read.
Beneath the tree to the right, a group of men are stumbling around, dazedly
sitting on the ground. One is seen face-to-face with a dog. A snake is
entwined around the tree, menacing a group of men to the left who are
approaching with banners (unreadable). At the base a man is trying to cut
the tree down.
An accompanying "Tree of Temperance" shows the happy results such as
Salvation, Philanthropy, Industry, Knowledge and so on, and the boughs
shelter happy families, a church and a manor. The sun shines brightly in
the distance.
http://www.westervillelibrary.org/AntiSaloon/resources/educ_on_wheels.html
V. To Illustrate Drink's Effect in Weakening Body Defenses Against Disease
Germs. (Based on a suggestion of Mr. Brown.) Materials. Make a small fort,
garrisoned by soldiers. Pasteboard or tin soldiers can usually be found in
the 5 and 10 cent store, or, lacking these, magazine pictures of soldiers
can be pasted on stiff cardboard and cut out. Mount on wheels a bottle.
Point it toward the fort as assaulting gun. Put other soldiers behind the
gun.
Legends-
(1) Label the fort and its soldiers, "White blood cells, like soldiers,
guard the body against disease germs."
(2) Label the bottle, "Liquor" or merely "Beer."
(3) Label the soldiers behind the gun, "Typhoid germs," "Tu- tuberculosis
germs..... Diphtheria germs." Attach a placard, "The ,Alcohol in Liquor [or
"Beer" if you label the bottle 'Beer"] Weakens the Body's Defenses against
Disease Germs." VI. To Illustrate the Advantages of Prohibition in
Increasing Home-Building and Tax Receipts. Materials. (1) A simple little
house. Sometimes they can be found in the 5 and 10 cent store. Mount on a
board with lawn painted green, walks brown, etc. (2) Small cylinders of
wood to represent a pile of beer barrels, or, make a picture of such a
pile.
Legends-
(1) For the house: "JOHN living under Prohibition found it easy to save a
dollar a week for a building fund. At the end of twenty-five years he owned
a little home, and was a tax-payer."
(2) For the beer barrels: "HENRY, living in a wet state, found it easy to
spend a dollar a week for beer. At the end Of 25 years all he had to show
for it was this pile of beer barrels-and he didn't own those."
http://www.november.org/Prohibition/ links to a nice group of posters both
pro- and anti-prohibition.
JoAnne "lips that touch liquor will never touch mine -- my liquor, that is"
Schmitz
--
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Do not accept lame imitations at previously okay URLs
Ralph Jones
wrote:
[snip]
>
>The phrase is an real temperance phrase, however; it featured in a song:
>
I remember seeing/hearing "Lips..." many times; it was once a
catchphrase of sorts.
[snip]
>Temperance posters typically focus on the negative effect of alcohol on the
>drinker and his family, for example:
>
There was one showing a bedraggled man lying unconscious or perhaps
dead in a gutter, captioned "The End Product of the Brewer's Art".
rj
Lee Rudolph
>On Mon, 12 May 2008 14:02:22 -0400, JoAnne Schmitz <jsch...@qis.net>
>wrote:
...
>>Temperance posters typically focus on the negative effect of alcohol on the
>>drinker and his family, for example:
>>
>
>There was one showing a bedraggled man lying unconscious or perhaps
>dead in a gutter, captioned "The End Product of the Brewer's Art".
Anti-propos of which, yesterday, when for the sake of a dinner guest I
was laying in a (small) supply of Rolling Rock, a purported potable sold
by LaTrobe Brewing, I was struck by the honesty with which the bottle
made the ingredient list clear, even to the illiterate.
Lee "quite a nice picture of a horse, really" Rudolph
Le Trôle
news:l3vg24lq6kk8h7klb...@4ax.com...
> A friend sent me a picture of what was claimed to be an anti-drinking
> poster:
>
> http://www.nps.gov/archive/edis/edisonia/graphics/23430025.jpg
>
> It shows a group of ten disapproving, sour-looking women with a sign above
> them, stating, "Lips that touch liquor shall never touch ours".
Lips that touch penises shall never touch mine.
Ralph Jones
Charles Bishop
<ra...@nomeking.kahm> wrote:
There was also "Father, dear father, come home with me now." A song, I
think about a small child sent to the saloon to convince his father to
return to the family home.
--
charles
David DeLaney
>Ralph Jones <ra...@nomeking.kahm> wrote:
>>There was one showing a bedraggled man lying unconscious or perhaps
>>dead in a gutter, captioned "The End Product of the Brewer's Art".
>
>There was also "Father, dear father, come home with me now." A song, I
>think about a small child sent to the saloon to convince his father to
>return to the family home.
<google google> Okay, thought it was a poem first, but Research shows the
melody and the words are both by Henry Clay Work. He also wrote My
Grandfather's Clock and Marching Through Georgia, says Wiki.
My contribution is "Away, away, with rum, by gum!"; the Salvation Army
appears to have taken this one over from the Temperance Union, however.
Dave "work songs" DeLaney
--
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