What Those Funny Old Smoking Ads Really Show

"Made specifically to prevent sore throats"

The early-twentieth-century popular view of tobacco was that it “weakened” people, Proctor says. “So you get this generalized view of it cutting your wind, or being bad for your heart, or bad for vulnerable people, or to young people or to women. It’s not enough to cause a serious threat to cigarette consumption. But it’s enough to make the industry want to combat it.”

Here, a U.K. ad sells a throat-friendly brand, at a time when cigs were associated with dandies and the fairer sex.

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Credit: Stanford School of Medicine