Back in the days when sex was spoken of behind cupped hands, american businessmen, used pictures of a bull to sell tobacco, of horse to sell beer. But last year, when U.S. companies shelled out a record $7 billion for advertising (1952 - my annotation), they had lost most of their inhibitions and come to rely more and more heavily on feminine face and figure. Whether selling cigarets or autos, businessmen have found that sex appeal is sales appeal.
The models shown here have the best selling faces and figures in the world. They are also the world's best paid models. They have been used more consistently than any others by top 50 U.S. advertisers who in a single year have sold nearly $90 billion in products with their help. What constitutes these girls' sales appeal is not just glamour or bosoms but the identification that housewives feel with them when deciding whether to buy a new broom or a new refrigerator.
"Paper dolls", who do high fashion and "pin-ups", who pose for underwear ads, make the most money, up to $70 an hour. But the others, who are called "hard-goods girls" because they pose with merchandise like brooms and frying pans, sell the most products. Pat Burrage who was 1952's top "hard-goods girl", proved her versatile appeal last year by posing with beer, soap, TV sets, mattresses, paints china and gingersnaps.
Top models, shown with the artists and photographers who have done most to make them famous, fall into three categories labeled by the trade: pin-up, hard goods and paper doll. Annlee Danels at top, left, is a pin-up who poses for items like underwear. The next four are hard-good girls who sell almost anything but underwear and fashions and who must be pretty and wholesome and not too obtrusive. They are Jane Cartwright (with broom), who appeared on LIFE's cover (Jan. 12, 1948) when she was working as a paper doll, Leila Hyers (in swing), Connie Joannes (in wrapper) and Alice Wallace (with pan). The paper-doll group, which sticks to high fashion and glamour and is more apt to show up on magazine covers, is represented by Jean Patchett (peeping through fingers). The artists are John Whitcomb (left, with brush) and Steve Dohanos (right, at easel), famous both as magazine and avertisement illustrators - Dohanos has done 100 Saturday Evening Post covers. The photographers are Victor Keppler (left, with camera) and (right, at camera) Ruzzie Green.
Pat Burrage, well-known as Miss Rheingold 1950, was top model of 1952.
Top auto models who appear on television as well as in magazines are Detroiters Margaret Girardin (left) and Ardis Kenealy. Behind them are the cars they publicize: Lincoln, Plymouth, Chevrolet, Buick and Chrysler.
A top Chicago model is Joyce Thoresen who sits a lot for Sunbeam appliances like toaster shown above. She also presides over Sunbeam equipment at events like National Housewares Show, gives away presents on TV.
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