Brewed VS Instant

COFFEE  

         

          Going thru the old magazine ads of the 50’s opens many memory drawers.  A look into the not so distant past, that is kind of fuzzy.  It seems coffee has been forever, yet it is a fairly recent beverage, just a few centuries old.  Well for the old world.  With the discovery of the America’s, came the discovery of coffee.  For many in the old world, coffee did not replace tea.  Tea was so important to the English that they taxed it to any end and it resulted in a Revolutionary war. 

          With the end of the war, resources were now directed to new products.  One of them was instant coffee and a variety of ways to roast the coffee bean.  Brewed coffee was the standard and instant was the upstart.  Instant coffee had an uphill battle with satisfying the taste buds of coffee drinkers but the makers of instant pushed on.  Still today, brewed coffee is the preferred method of making a cup of coffee.

          The makers of instant coffee did not give up.  They reformulated the way they made the instant brand.  Exotic flavors were added, claims of tasting like fresh brewed were plastered across the media extolling the virtues of their instant coffee. 

          This was but one step in America wanting the instant gratification.  It took time to brew a pot of coffee.  The percolator had to be put on the stove after the right amount of water and coffee grounds were added.  Then sit there and wait for the water to boil, not letting it perk over and then turning it off at the right time.  Then to keep it warm or heat it up, took a bit of effort.  There were no nuclear ovens back then, one had to use the stove to heat things.  With all this work in making coffee is where instant coffee got some inroads into the coffee drinkers table.

         

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          Life magazine along with their counterparts, Look and the Saturday Evening Post, chronicled this emerging new American middle class.  Back in the 50’s, the news was not real slanted and the agenda of a few was not apparent.  The advertising set the tone for the changes and reflects life of the transitional decade.  Technology of the day, was the television and the Atomic Bomb, both impacted how people lived during the 50’s. 

          I will be taking ads from the magazines, along with stories and writing my impression of life back then.  I’m old enough to of been a wee lad back then and I remember a few things from way back then.