Women Make Policy Not Coffee Green

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Text on Button WOMEN MAKE POLICY NOT COFFEE
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Yellow text on a green background

Curl Text FERNE SALES & MFG. CO P.O. BOX 113 T C B WEST ORANGE, NJ 07052
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In 1971, the National Women's Political Caucus was founded by a group of feminist pioneers to address the limited roles women held in public office. Instead of being constrained to addressing envelopes and serving coffee at political functions, this slogan encouraged women to seek more active roles in politics and elections by playing on those social expectations and stereotypes.

Click on https://buttonmuseum.org/buttons/women-make-policy-not-coffee or https://buttonmuseum.org/buttons/women-make-policy-not-coffee-0 to see additional variations of this button also held by the Button Museum.

Sources

Johnston, L., (1972) Women’s caucus has new rallying cry: ‘Make policy, not coffee’. The New York Times. Retrieved from https://www.nytimes.com/1972/02/06/archives/womens-caucus-has-new-rally…

Catalog ID CA0902

Yield It's More Fun

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Text on Button YIELD It's more fun!
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Black text on a yellow triangle over yellow text on a brown background

Curl Text ©ART EXPRESS . 3158 U.S.A.
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The phrase “Yield, it’s more fun” featured on a downwards facing yellow equilateral triangle was a popular visual in the 1970s. It was most frequently seen on iron-on patches and buttons. The yellow yield sign was introduced to American streets in 1950 to assign right of way and encourage caution when merging. In 1971, the sign was updated to white with a red border and text, similar to the aesthetics of a stop sign.

Sources

Moeur, R.C. (2017, September 13). Were Yield signs ever yellow? Manual of Traffic Signs. Retrieved October 30, 2020, from http://www.trafficsign.us/yellowyield.html.

Catalog ID IB0636

Go Naked

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Text on Button GO NAKED
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Blue text on a white background

Curl Text HIP PROD., 153 NORTH, CHGO.
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In response to the cookie-cutter, conformist lifestyle of the 1950s, an emerging generation of post-war youth decided to turn American culture on its head. The 1960s and 1970s saw the counterculture unfold as new music, films, and recreational drugs helped shape the new era. Peace-loving hippies and the creative beats of The Beatles were all the rage at this time and helped fuel the counterculture movement. People were even famously urged to “turn on, tune in, and drop out” by psychologist Timothy Leary.

In addition to the hippie lifestyle, the counterculture was also characterized by the sexual revolution. Old behavioral codes related to sexuality saw a drastic change-up as more people were accepting of contraception, abortion, and public nudity. Though the United States generally condemns public nudity today, it fit the prevailing attitude of the 1960s that called for sexual liberation.

Sources

Organization of American Historians. (2015, October 6). Naked: A cultural history of American nudism. Process. https://www.processhistory.org/hoffman-naked-a-cultural-history-of-amer…

PBS. (n.d.). The pill and the sexual revolution. https://www.pbs.org/wgbh/americanexperience/features/pill-and-sexual-re…

University of Virginia. (n.d.). Sex, drugs, and rock and roll: Music in the counterculture. https://pages.shanti.virginia.edu/CYOU_Project/executive-summary/

Catalog ID IB0633

Go Fly a Kite

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Text on Button go fly a kite
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Red text on a white background

Curl Text Go Fly Kite Store 1434 3rd Ave NYC
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The Go Fly a Kite Store is a hobby store based in New York City. The name of the store references an idiom meant to tell someone to go away who is being annoying that gained popularity in the 1940s and has been used in pop culture decades later.

The 1964 Disney classic film Mary Poppins put a spin on the action of flying the kite as an enjoyable family enterprise and something that should be done to take a break from work, in an iconic scene influenced by the book, but not directly taken from the text of P.L. Travers original story.

Kites were invented in Asia with the oldest known depiction of the act of flying a kite dating to the mesolithic period 9500-9000 years B.C.E. In the modern age, kites are flown as a recreational hobby, scientific and military apparatus, and for sport.

Sources

What Does Go Fly a Kite Mean? (n.d.). Writing Explained. Retrieved July 26, 2020 from https://writingexplained.org/idiom-dictionary/go-fly-a-kite

Forbes, J. B. (1977, June 11). Kite Sellers Find Fun, With Strings Attached: Kite Business Called Fun, but Strings Are Attached. TimesMachine [Clipping from New York Times, newspaper]. Retrieved April 20, 2023 from https://timesmachine.nytimes.com/timesmachine/1977/06/11/75086692.html?pageNumber=26.

Catalog ID AD0885

From All Walks of Life

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Text on Button From All Walks of Life
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Black and red text around an illustration of shoe prints on a white background

Curl Text MORRIS CHAITT & SONS INC. YEADON, PA
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AIDS Walk Philly was established in 1987 when volunteers from Penguin Place, a Philadelphia lesbian and gay community center, recognized a need to raise funds for local agencies and increase public awareness of AIDS. The first walk raised $33,000 and in the following 33 years the annual event has raised over $16 million dollars with proceeds funding disease prevention, HIV/AIDS public awareness campaigns, and services for those living with HIV/AIDS in the Philadelphia region. Initially the branding for the first three walk-a-thons used only the phrase “From All Walks of Life” due to the stigma at the time surrounding AIDS, though by 1990  “AIDS Walk” was added to the walk-a-thon’s promotional materials.

Sources

AIDS Walk Philly. Retrieved 3 June 2021, from https://www.aidswalkphilly.org/

Reichard, R. (2021). AIDS Walk Philly logo query [Email].

Catalog ID IB0632

Caffeine Addict

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Text on Button CAFFEINE ADDICT
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Black text on a white illustration of a mug on a black background

Curl Text ©1981 EPHEMERA
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Since 1980, Ephemera, Inc. has made buttons, magnets, and stickers out of their San Francisco, California headquarters. The company started out by producing pin-back buttons for local punk rock bands but later branched out to manufacture a variety of small trinkets. Today, they are located in Phoenix, Oregon and consider themselves a “maker of funny, sarcastic and offensive” buttons.

Coffee became a common beverage in the West after the mid-seventeenth century. From England to Italy, hundreds of coffee houses sprang up and became places where people could socialize all while sipping a cup of the new drink of choice. Many enjoyed it for its energizing effects, which quickly catapulted coffee into popularity. But before it replaced beer and wine as a breakfast favorite, coffee was initially viewed as the “bitter invention of Satan.” It was not until Pope Clement VIII decided to try a cup for himself that coffee was given papal approval, quelling the unfounded fears of the Catholic masses. Today, coffee is still in fashion. The variety of flavors and additives that individuals can choose from are only multiplying as the demand for personalized brews increase. Phrases like "insert coffee to begin," "but first, coffee," and "caffeine addict" are widely circulated and recognized.

Sources

Ephemera, Inc. (n.d.). About us. https://www.ephemera-inc.com/aboutus.asp

National Coffee Association. (n.d.). The history of coffee. https://www.ncausa.org/about-coffee/history-of-coffee

Catalog ID IB0630

Bull Shit

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Text on Button BULL SHIT
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White text on a black background

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A curse word used to express disbelief in an event or piece of information presented as true when it is false. Literally, the feces from the animal, a bull. The first attested use of the term bullshit appears in a piece written by T.S. Eliot entitled "The Triumph of Bullshit." It's a comic ballad in which Eliot preemptively criticizes himself and his works before his critics could. The term bullshit only appears in the title.

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Catalog ID IB0629