Tuesday, October 15, 2019

#20 - Narragansett Bleg

I no longer need to ask where to find more of these as I have found others.  These will get you started, however.  The comments section turned interesting.  Light nostalgia can very quickly go to "Whatever happened to?" which often leads to tragic updates.  I published Narragansett videos in both 2008 and this one in June 2009.  They are making it again, and while it has a cult following, especially in RI and SE Mass, it's a pretty standard American lager.  Rather like how PBR had a resurgence.

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I remembered another commercial, of a guy gleefully asking a woman questions about whether Narragansett Beer is good, growing in mirth until he is hugging himself with joy, then revealing that he is Fred Narragansett. (Note to non-New Englanders. Narragansett is a bay in RI. There was no Fred Narragansett.)

I linked to two old Narragansett Beer commercials over a year ago. If you watched Red Sox baseball in the 60's, these Nichols and May commercials were part of your culture.





There are two others here and here.

Here's where I beg for information. I remember several other Gansett commercials in the series, but I'm sure there were many more. (Punchlines only, for brevity)

1. "How do I know you're not a person in a kangaroo suit?"
"Well, how do I know you're not a kangaroo in a people suit?" (Nichols and May reused this old joke for a JAX beer commercial)

2. Papa Bear: "Yuchh, Goldilocks! Porridge and beer?"

3. "Birtinder! Birtinder! Ir yu meeking fun of me?"
"Nooo, I wis meeking fun of hir."

4. "So why did you go to all that trouble to make one bottle of beer?"
"I only made one pretzel."

5. (After an agonizing speech by a guy holding a steak over the grill so the meat doesn't get grill marks, his wife asks) "Well why don't you at least switch hands?"
"I'm using the other hand to toast the marshmallows."

6. There was one with a talking dog with the old punchline "You think I should have said Coolidge?"

More, please. I'm going to ask specifically over at Maggie's Farm, which I think will have the highest concentration of New Englanders.

18 comments:

cigardad said...

My dad, a died hard RedSox fan died last year. As a kid we would watch the games announced by Curt Gowdy & brought to you by Narragansett & Carling Black Label.
Thanks for the stroll down "memory lane."

cigardad

Gringo said...

The benefits of collective memory: I had forgotten about the kangaroo suit ad, but now it rings a bell.

I wonder if Gansett will replay/recycle any of those ads.

While Gansett ads were of a superior quality, one's memory of long ago ads is not necessarily an indication of their quality. Case in point: I remember the Ballantine, Carling Black Label, and Rheingold jingles. Not to mention cigarette ads.

Unknown said...

You simply cannot write about Narragansett beer without invoking the name of Irene Hennessy, she of the speech defect - particularly cruel, since like Baabwa, she could not pronounce the name of the beer or even her own name correctly - who became a spokesperson for a beer on Red Sox broadcasts at a time when women were nowhere near the game.

I can hear her voice in my head now.

"Hi neighbaw" - she couldn't pronounce the "r" in neighbor either - "have a 'gansett" (which got around that tricky double "r" problem, too. Curt Gowdy always seems to have a soft spot in his heart for Iwene, I thought.

Assistant Village Idiot said...

Such are the oddities of memory. I don't remember Irene at all, even when cued with your information, BUT...

Whenever I think of Narragansett I always think Nawwagansett in the back of my mind, imagining a female voice saying it that way. Never for the place, only for the beer.

Gringo said...

emmccabe: thanks for jogging our memories. Not only was Irene Hennessy the ‘Gansett Girl, she was a friend of Ted Williams. What happened to her?

Michael said...

"My uncle? I thought he was your uncle?"

jjmcgo said...

Irene Hennessey and her husband, Tom, were killed March 20, 1971, when the plane he was piloting crashed in Huntington Ravine on Mt. Washington in New Hampshire.

Roy Prescott said...

As a kid growing up, I remember Dr. Tom & Irene Hennessey had a summer camp in Centerville, MA on Cape Cod. Their son Jeff was a good friend. They taught all of us kids at the Wequaquet Lake Yacht Club to water ski. They were great & patient with all of us. I still ski at the age of 54 & think of them often. Irene would take us to the penny candy store. I remember her being beautiful, even in this young kids eyes! Tom was a dentist, and repaired Tony Conigliaro's teeth after he was hit.
I remember hearing of the plane crash on the shoulder of Mount Washington by Nelson Crag, just a couple of hundred feet shy of the 6288' summit. They had dropped Jeff off at the airport in North Conway (where I now have lived for 32 years), and were on their way to Montreal. All of us kids went to the funeral. It was a sad moment in our lives!
I have hiked the Presidential Range many times over the years & always stop at Nelson Crag to reflect. They had promised to take me snow skiing. Ironically, I moved to the mountain area that they loved.
I have tried to find someone that may have been working at the Mount Washington Observatory or helped with the recovery. The official Observer on duty has passed away. I haven't seen Jeff since the funeral.
With that, I'm off to pick up a rack of Nasty Narry.

Assistant Village Idiot said...

This is a well-buried post at this point, Roy, but I at least saw it.

I know NorthConway moderately well. My job used to take me all over the state and they have a mental health center there. We used to go to Camp Calumet on Lake Ossipee, and my daughter-in-law's parents live in Jackson. Interesting story on that. The "Wedding Picture" covered bridge in Jackson was actually the scene for my son's wedding pictures. When I went to Romania and started working in the medical clinic there, they had a few unframed calendar pictures stuck up on the wall - one was of that bridge in the fall. On a return trip to Romania in 2005 with all my sons (including two Romanian sons we had acquire in 2001) my son and his wife brought a wedding picture and had their picture taken in front of the calendar picture. We enjoyed showing it to the clinic staff.

Anonymous said...

To Roy Prescott and anyone interested in connecting with Ihrene Hennessy's son: Thomas Jeffrey Hennessy was 15 when his parent's died and yes was an only child. He has a 21 year old son Jeffery Charles Hennessy from Sudbury Mass. and a 2 year old son Max. He is on facebook and his son is also. Mr. Hennessy studied martial arts his entire life and is currently running programs in California and Poland.

AndreaK said...

I knew Jeff when we were young in Wellesley. He and my brother were friends and went to school together. He was skiing with my family when we learned of his parents' plane crash. I'd like to be in touch with him- could not find him on facebook.

AndreaK said...

ps. Irene was also one of the featured models for Deerskin Trading post, in addition to being the Hi Neighbor 'Ganset gal.

Unknown said...

Andrea - His facebook is under Thomas Hennessey. He is living in Los Angeles.

Unknown said...

My husband and I were the climbers who reported that plane crash in a storm on Mt Washington. It was very difficult to be prevented from getting high enough to help once we heard the plane hit. Weather was severe up top.

Unknown said...

My husband and I were the climbers who reported that plane crash in a storm on Mt Washington. It was very difficult to be prevented from getting high enough to help once we heard the plane hit. Weather was severe up top.

sykes.1 said...

Now, if they would bring back Pilot crackers.

Unknown said...

I am writing this as the cousin of Jeff Hennessy, living in Tamworth, NH. It was my Father and Mother (John and Louise Hennessy) that took young Jeff, age 15, in when his parents died on Mt. Washington. We are trying to connect with Jeff and our cousins on the Hennessy side of our family. It was Uncle John, my Dad, who was the life long aviator of the family .. an original Flying Tiger and 28 year veteran of Pan American Airlines. If you have any info please message me on Facebook, Jacqueline Baker ...

pwsawyer@verizon.com said...


Sawyer

Some time ago I wrote my cousin, Diane Sawyer, and told her that my favorite ad of all time was one by Nichols and May created in about 1960-- the one aboout the guy with the talkng dog. A few weeks later we were invited over to Mike and Diane's apartment and she tells Mike about my love for his commercial about the talking dog. "Oh?," he says, "Let's hear it." So I recite the ad to all who are in attendance. Just as I'm about to repeat the punchline, Mike takes a sip of his wine, and I deliver the punchline -- and he bursts into laughter, wine spilling out of his nose in a beautiful mess on the table cloth. I thought that was a great testament to his talents: His joke was so funny even he thought it was hilarious 40 years later. . .