Wednesday, March 9, 2011

When Hipsters Duck Hunt, circa 1957


An interesting Fifties-vintage clothing ad featuring a Chesapeake Bay retriever, a sneak boat and one seriously dapper dude. The hunter's steely-eyed gaze rises toward the duck-filled heavens, or whatever the model (obviously a disciple of the method acting school of retail clothing modeling) imagines  duck-filled heavens to look like.

Meanwhile, the chessie is staring directly at his real master with a look that says "Another take? Are you shitting me? When the hell can I get out of this boat and away from this tool? Because I'm just about ready to bite off this dude's nuts."

Of course, on the other hand, maybe I shouldn't mock. Could you imagine an ad like this running today? Would today's ironic hipster embrace yesterday's earnest hipster fashion? Or would that be too ironic? WWRCD? (What Would Rivers Cuomo Do)...

Coincidentally, this is exactly how I dress when I go duck hunting...

8 comments:

  1. I would just like to say that I have a really hard time getting duck hunting clothing that hip in WOMEN'S cuts and sizes. As if girls can't be hip duck hunters too. Sheesh.

    ReplyDelete
  2. I appreciate the orange turtleneck (that brings the ducks right in!) and the pile-o-decoys on top of the boat. Pro-fessional!

    Then again, I recently posted a picture of Jeff Foiles in a GIANT duck boat with a 40hp, nearly catching air.......IN A FLOODED CORN FIELD. No less ridiculous than this picture!

    ReplyDelete
  3. The last sentence of this post means nothing without pictures.

    As to the hipsters, heck, you used to could read McGuane and Robert F. Jones in Esquire, you probably could have read Ruark writing about Africa in there at the time that ad came out.

    ReplyDelete
  4. ..as if a Chessie needed a reason to bite you in the nuts.

    ReplyDelete
  5. Is it just me, or does that "hunter" look an awful lot like John Turturro?

    I killed a lot of ducks in a tan upland coat and blue jeans, even though I never looked as dapper as hunter John there. I guess the ducks've learned a lot since then, because now I need 3-dimensional, photo-realistic camo just to get in the truck and drive to the duck marsh.

    ReplyDelete
  6. I am struggling with hunt/fish magazines because the computer mock-ups of hypothetical scenarios seem irrelevant and fantasized.

    ReplyDelete
  7. I think I have killed more ducks in a sun bleached tan Carhart coat than I have in camo.

    ReplyDelete
  8. And you neglect to mention......... the load of decoys IN the boat!
    That is hipster!

    ReplyDelete