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Vanishing: Making of an Extinction Crisis

Flit insecticide cartoons, 1929

Item

Title

Flit insecticide cartoons, 1929

Caption

Long before his success as Dr. Seuss, Theodore Geisel (Dartmouth Class of 1925), designed advertisements for Flit, Standard Oil Company’s wildly popular spray-pump insecticide which later contained DDT. Over the course of 17 years, Geisel’s humorous advertisements helped make Flit a household name throughout the 1930s and 1940s. At the time, liberal spraying of pesticides around people, animals, and crops was highly encouraged with little regard to potential environmental impacts.

Creator

Theodore Geisel

Containing Publication

MS-1100: Theodor S. Geisel collection

Date Created

1929

Publisher

Stanco Incorporated

Rights

No Known Copyright

Bibliographic Citation

Flit insecticide cartoons, 1929. MS-1100: Theodor S. Geisel collection, Box: 1 "Contains examples of Seuss' advertising artwork, including work done for Standard Oil subsidiari..., 1929 - 2004", Folder: 2 “Book of Flit insecticide cartoons, 1929"

Filename

exh-vanishing_Geisel_001.pdf

Case Number

Causes and Consequences of Extinction

Item Number

4