Tobacco Goes to College

This is the first book to document the history of cigarette advertising on college and university campuses. From the 1920s to the 1960s, such advertisers had a strong financial grip on student media and thus a degree of financial power over colleges and universities across the nation. The tobacco industry’s strength was so great many doubted whether student newspapers and other campus media could survive without them.
When the Tobacco Institute, the organization that governed the industry, decided to pull their advertising in June of 1963 nearly 2,000 student publications needed to recover up to 50 percent of their newly lost revenue. Although student newspapers are the main focus of this book, tobacco’s presence on campus permeated more than just the student paper. Cigarette brands were promoted at football games, on campus radio and through campus representatives, and promotional items were placed on campus in locations such as university stores and the student union.

Elizabeth Crisp Crawford is an assistant professor in the Communication Department at North Dakota State University in Fargo. Her research has been published in Journalism and Mass Communication Educator, Social Marketing Quarterly, and the Journal of Health and Mass Communication. She lives in Fargo.

Elizabeth Crisp Crawford
Format: softcover (7 x 10)
Pages: 240
Bibliographic Info: notes, bibliography, index
Copyright Date: 2014
pISBN: 978-0-7864-6819-5
eISBN: 978-1-4766-0365-0
Imprint: McFarland

Table of Contents


Acknowledgments  ix

Preface and Introduction  1

Part I: Cigarettes and the Campus Press: History and Regulation

1. The History of the Cigarette: The Birth of the Industry and Its Opposition  7

2. The Tobacco Industry, the University and the Campus Paper  20

3. The FTC’s Role in Regulating and Ending Cigarette Advertising in Campus Newspapers  34

Part II: An Analysis of Cigarette Advertisements Appearing in Campus Papers and Student Media

4. Researching the Campus Paper: Methodology, Evaluation and Implications  54

5. The First Page: Cigarette Advertising in Student Newspapers During the 1920s  63

6. Cigarette Advertising Becomes an Institution on Campus: Cigarette

Advertising in Student Newspapers During the 1930s  78

7. Targeting the Efforts to the War Front: Cigarette Advertising in College Newspapers During the 1940s  91

8. An Advertising Boom: Cigarette Advertising in Student Newspapers During the 1950s  103

9. The End of the Campaign: Cigarette Advertising in Student Newspapers from 1960 to 1964  120

10. Support Media: Campus Cigarette Advertising in Broadcast and Sports Programs  134

Part III: Conclusion

11. Cigarette Advertising Themes and Regulations Spanning Five Decades  170

12. Promotions Targeting Young Adults and Youth After Cigarette Advertising Was Discontinued at Colleges and Universities  186

Chapter Notes  203

Bibliography  223

Index  22

Choice Outstanding Academic Title
“a tremendous amount of insight and detail. Highly recommended”—Choice.