- 1941 Commercial Appeal ad
During my lonely days and nights in the Lauderdale Mansion, I’ll often pull out musty copies of The Commercial Appeal or Memphis Press-Scimitar, settle back in my La-Z-Boy with a jug of moonshine, and relive the good old days.
And sometimes those days seem pretty strange. Case in point: In December 1941, Goldsmith’s (describing itself as “Memphis’ Greatest Christmas Store”) had apparently advertised some “interwoven” socks for sale. You could pay 39 cents for a pair, or get three pair for a buck. Seems reasonable, no?
But wait — that was WRONG. The following day, the store ran this correction, saying, “We are sorry — this was an error.”
Oh my gosh. What horrible mistake did they — COULD they — have made in a simple ad for SOCKS?
Why, they got the price wrong, and were losing almost 10 cents on every sale! Just look. The correct price should have been three pairs for … $1.10.
Boy, I guess they must have planned on selling lots of these socks to pay for the cost of running the correction.