Catalog Shopping, 1975
Jancee Dunn has posted a few pages from a 1975 J.C. Penney catalog over on her blog. It's a world of groovy matchy-matchy outfits, macho men wearing ambiguous underwear, and a certain fashion sense you could only define as Pre-Bicentennial. Oh, and there were bongs. For a cooler, smoother smoking experience, apparently.
Anyone else remember the exciting possibilities waiting to be discovered within the fresh pages of a gigantic catalog from Sears or J.C. Penney? Colorful days indeed.
Wow, this brings up memories for me of Christmas 1976. My mom was pregnant with my youngest sister, baby #5, due on Christmas Day. All of our presents were from the catalog. I bet it was J.C. Penney!
Posted by: Barb in Nebraska | September 28, 2007 at 09:03 PM
These bring back memories for those of us who were not babies in 1975. The bongs were in a J.C. Penney catalog? I remember seeing clothes like this at one of the early large shopping malls in the Chicago suburbs. Evolution is a good thing.:-)
Posted by: Cathryn Hrudicka | September 28, 2007 at 09:17 PM
A polyester nightmare! Thank heaven those wild and crazy guys didn't have big American bulges. ;)
Posted by: Adnohr Yak | September 28, 2007 at 09:23 PM
Is that Burt Reynolds? I'm too young for this... ;)
... and where can I get a mustache like the dude in the cowboy hat? Why can I not get it in that catalog??!
Posted by: Kroosh | September 30, 2007 at 08:43 PM
OMG, all men were gay in the 70's ... weren't we?
Posted by: rbtroj | October 01, 2007 at 12:53 PM
I'm so terrified by the "Abandoned Shed" motif of the third picture. Since when did Capote's description of mass murder Kansas become inspiration form sweater vests?!?!?!
What a dark and chilling times the '70s were!! Thank god I grew up in the sensible and forthright 80's!
Posted by: Valley Girl Intelligentsia | October 01, 2007 at 02:47 PM
I have fond 70s Catalog Memories, though not necessarily of browsing pages full of Superbad 70s mustache monsters in their tight and strangely gymnastic underpants. I spent most of the 70s overseas, and had zero access to American television or radio ads for any of the discolicious toys available at the time. The best I could do was catalogs, specifically the AAFES (Army & Air Force Exchange Service) catalog, which was about 4 feet thick and contained one of every item on the planet. The toy section alone was as big as the Chicago phone book and was crawling with lustrous 70s photography like the examples above, smoky lenses, grotesque close-ups, every color in the Big Puke Rainbow; I would spend hours buried in that catalog, with occasional jaunts over to Ladies Underwear and "Accessories" for good measure. The internet has been a wonderful way to relive all those long-dead memories (I hadn't thought of the words "AAFES Catalog" in 30 years).
Posted by: Elvis Dingeldein | October 02, 2007 at 03:15 PM
Those photos look funny. Do you know which catalog it was from? Someone mentioned JC Penney but im not sure.
Posted by: Anne | January 17, 2008 at 02:16 PM