MTFCA Forum

In the goñden age of illustration, a picture was indeed worth a thousand words ! (This one may be worth two !! )

So nice with mule(?) and tire sign. The art reminds me of this:

Leslie / Lesley ?()

Rich's "pain balm" illustration is the work of Lesley Bruce, living artist known as the "crazy horse artist". I can't make out the signature on the Fisk ad, but it's doubtless from the 1920s.

Mules often get a bum rap from horsemen who find them difficult to relate to. Mule men, however, are sort of like born-again Christians in the intensity of their devotion and willingness to proselytize. Personally, I've never had anything to do with mules, so I can't really comment on their temperament.

That reminded me of this, always liked the humor of it !

Rich, I dug up that your Fisk ad was "1926 Fisk Time To Retire ad- Leslie Thrasher". It appeared in March 1926 Country Life. Perhaps other places.
FWIW
Rich

Great stuff! Thanks all!

I love the look between the farrier and the mule!

Thanks for that, Rich. Charles Leslie Thrasher 1889-1936 became a commercial illustrator at the age of 17, produced his first of 360 covers for Saturday Evening Post in 1912. He attended tje Pennsylvania Academy of Fine Art, studied in Paris, and was a student of Howard Pyle. He served in WW I, where his lungs were severely damaged in a poison gas attack. He died as the result of smoke inhalation in a house fire which destroyed most of his work.

Likely his most famous SEP cover was "Tipping the Scales" the butcher with his thumb on the scale facing his lady customer whose finger is pushing up on the scale cradle. It's generally mis-attributed to Norman Rockwell who was a friend.

Thanks Rich B. and Rich E. for the fun ads and information on the Fisk ads and Leslie Thrasher. Just two weeks ago I bought this reproduction 14" x 18" Fisk tire sign at our local swap meet. Didn't pay much for it and the images are embossed. I have it hanging on the exterior wall of the shop.

Thanks Bob. We remember many Norman Rockwell illustrations but there are others like Thrasher, whose work is equally as wonderful. It is so nice to have a place to see them on the Forum. Thrasher studied under renowned illustrator Howard Pyle, the “father of American Illustration". He got advice from Norman Rockwell and might have surpassed his work had he not died at 47. He painted covers for Saturday Evening Post, Everybody’s, Collier’s, Red Book and Popular Magazine as well as ads for such companies as Chesterfield Cigarettes, Cream of Wheat, DuPont, and Fisk Tire. I'm so glad to discover his work here.
Here is one of his more famous ones. I probably dismissed some of his thinking they were Rockwell's.
Rich