Kids Are Little Idiots: Ten Comic Book Ad Rip-Offs

Say No to Crack has a great tribute up to the indefatigable gullibility of the small, snot-nosed children who read comics in the 50s: ten rip-off products from the back pages of funny books. Who knows how many millions of dollars of moist, sweaty sock money was spent upon such products as Kryptonite Rocks?

This one never made sense to me. Be a friend to superman by buying Kryptnotastic rocks? Kids were supposed to buy them to keep the rocks out of the hands of villains. Makes a tiny bit of sense, but why wouldn’t the government just destroy them all or send them into space?

I convinced a couple kids on the school bus to buy them for protection in case Superman was exposed to red Kryptonite and came after them. They felt this was a logical reason, and received this upon ordering: Painted green rocks.

Don't laugh too merrily at these children: Superman coming after my squishy, organ-filled body was a serious concern of my youth. I suspect I'm not the only one: in one of Chris Ware's Jimmy Corrigan books, Ware taps into the boyhood Superman terror scenario when Superman pushes his eyeballs through the sockets of a gaggle of helpless children, one by one.

The Strange World of Comic Book Ads [Say No To Crack]