Tale of Two Factories

This week: a cotton mill and a perfume factory meet different fates;  and, at the movies, an alien octopus threatens mankind.

First, these ladies are standing in front of a gigantico Mexican sugar cookie!  

A lot of different companies came together for this, including a slew of defunct department stores listed in the small print at the bottom of the ad (Bullocks!).  Avondale Cotton - a company that appears to have been known for both its progressive "corporate welfare" and its exploitation of workers -- no, we're not getting away from this.  Briefly - founded in Alabama in 1897, boomed after World War I and into the 1920s, partly because of extensive use of women and children night workers.  In early 1930s, labor unions got the work week down to 55 hours for day shifts and 50 hours at night.  Still better than being a sharecropper.

The problem in the 1950's for the American cotton industry was cheap imports from Japan.  (What happened to the Japanese cotton industry?)  Also - makers of unnatural fibers seemed to do to cotton what the oil industry did to the Red Cars and other city trains.  We'll see a lot more mention of Dacron, etc. than cotton.  

The Avondale company went thoroughly defunct in 2008.  In June 2011, its factory in Pell, Alabama burnt:

 But, hey - let's party!

"Terrifico!  Magnifico Fiesta De Mexico by Sportmasters of California"

"Fiesta fashions -- bellas, inspiradas!  En pic 'n' rib cotton de AVONDALE (little-or-no-iron).  Con embroidery por Joseph Aarons.  Isobella wears:  Pant-alons y Mexican wedding shirt.  Carmen wears:  peasant skirt y Caballero camisole. . ."  

Worst gringo Spanish ever.  One of the worst ads, so far.  But not as strange as this:  

    

When I look at that picture, my first thought is not she is a "woman who wants to be loved;" but that she is a woman casting  a spell on David Bowie's older brother - note the one blue eye!  

I have a vague awareness of DuBarry, but know nothing about it.  Oh, hey!  It's British - or was.  Good call, that.  Many people have fond memories or reveries of the DuBarry factory in Hove, which has been turned into flats.   

The factory is lovely:  

From "Hove Daily Photo" at blogspot

The DuBarry motto:  For Loveliness That Lasts.  And it has.

Let's Go to the Movies!

* Something is wreaking havoc under the North Pole!
* Atomic submarine warfare, a UFO, an octopus from outer space - none of it adds up to anything. Good poster, though.
* I had a little plastic submarine that you put baking soda in and it cruised around the bottom of the bathroom sink.  And it starred in this film!