The Naughty Springmaid Girls of Esquire Magazine
Back in February I shared a cheesecake-filled gallery of advertisements for South Carolina-based Springmaid Fabrics, most of which featured racy illustrations of women and their poorly-concealed panties. What I didn’t know at the time was that two of those ads actually first appeared as front covers for Esquire magazine. It’s always interesting to me to see how illustrations like this get re-purposed for things like magazines, ads, or album covers.
The first piece, “Protect Yourself” by Frederick Smith, depicts a trio of comely young lasses waiting backstage at a skating show. Here is the original work:
(via South Carolina State Museum)
Smith’s illustration was first used by Esquire for their April 1946 cover, like so…
(via Esquire)
… and was picked up by Springmaid Fabrics a few years later:
The second work is called “How to Kill Two Birds” and was drawn by E. Simms Campbell. Here’s the original…
… the ad…
… and the February 1948 issue of Esquire, which varies ever so slightly if you look at the man on the left.