Burma-Shave

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Burma-Shave is a United States brand of brushless shaving cream introduced by the American Safety Razor Company in the 1920s, famous for its clever advertising gimmick of posting limericks on sequential highway billboard signs.

Contents

1 Roadside billboards
2 Examples
3 Special promotional messages
4 Political Burma-Shaving
5 Use in fiction
6 External link

Roadside billboards

Burma-Shave sign series appeared from 1925 to 1963 in all of the lower 48 states except for New Mexico, Arizona, Massachusetts, and Nevada. Four or five consecutive billboards would line highways, so they could be read sequentially by motorists driving by.

This use of the billboard was a highly successful advertising gimmick, drawing attention and passers-by who were curious to discover the punchline.

Examples

This guy

who drives

so close behind?

Is he lonesome

or just blind?

Burma-Shave

A peach / looks good / with lots of fuzz / but man's no peach / and never was / Burma-Shave
Does your husband / misbehave / grunt and grumble / rant and rave? / shoot the brute some / Burma-Shave
Don't take a curve / at 60 per / we hate to lose / a customer / Burma-Shave
Every shaver / now can snore / six more minutes / than before / by using / Burma-Shave
He played / a sax / had no B.O. / but his whiskers scratched / so she let him go / Burma-Shave
Henry the Eighth / sure had trouble / short-term wives / long-term stubble / Burma-Shave
Grandpa's beard / was stiff and coarse / and that's what / caused his / fifth divorce / Burma-Shave
Missin' / kissin'? / Perhaps your thrush / can't get through / the underbrush — try / Burma-Shave
A chin / where barbed wire / bristles stand / is bound to be / a no ma'ams land / Burma-Shave
Dinah doesn't / treat him right / but if he'd / shave / dyna-mite! / Burma-Shave
To change that / shaving job / to joy / you gotta use / the real McCoy / Burma-Shave
Don't lose / your head / to gain a minute / you need your head / your brains are in it / Burma-Shave
The bearded Devil / is forced / to dwell / in the only place / where they don't sell / Burma-Shave
In Cupid's little / bag of trix / here's the one / that clix / with chix / Burma-Shave
A shave / that's real / no cuts to heal / a soothing / velvet after-feel / Burma-Shave
Riot at / drug store / calling all cars / 100 customers / 99 jars / Burma-Shave
The wolf / is shaved / so neat and trim / Red Riding Hood / is chasing him / Burma-Shave
This cooling shave / will never fail / to stamp / its user / first-class male / Burma-Shave
The monkey took / one look at Jim / and threw the peanuts / back at him / he needed / Burma-Shave
If you don't know / whose signs these are / You haven't driven / very far (no final "Burma-Shave" sign)

Special promotional messages

Free offer! Free offer! / Rip a fender off your car / mail it in / for a half-pound jar / Burma-Shave

:A large number of fenders were received by the company, which made good on its promise.

Free — free / a trip to Mars / for 900 / empty jars / Burma-Shave

:One respondent did submit 900 empty jars; the company replied: "If a trip to Mars you's earn, remember, friend, there's no return." After he collected 900 more jars for the return trip, the company sent him on vacation to Moers (near Duisburg, North Rhine-Westphalia, Germany).

Political Burma-Shaving

In Nova Scotia, Canada, Progressive Conservative premier John Buchanan would stand at the end of a long line of party signs and wave to morning traffic. This took on the name Burma-Shaving, and continues to this day by candidates of all parties.

Use in fiction

Movies and television shows set in the 1950s (either "period pieces" or time-travel plots) have used the Burma-Shave roadside billboards to help set the scene. Examples are The World's Fastest Indian and the pilot episode ("Genesis") of Quantum Leap.

External link

[the Burma-Shave jingles]

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