White text on a black 

Black illustration of a Pekingese dog with black text and a red heart above and black text below

The Pekingese is a toy dog breed. Their existence is traced back to 200 B.C. China, where they served as court dogs and prized objects of trade. They were a symbol of elite China, as seen in the diplomatic gifting of Pekingese pups to figures including Queen Victoria and Alice Roosevelt. The breed has seen a resurgence recently with Wasabi the Pekingese winning "Best in Show" at both Westminster and the American Kennel Club in 2022.

Red text on a white background surrounding an anthropomorphic illustration of a red meatball. The meatball has eyes, a nose, a mouth, white hands and legs, and red high-top sneakers. 

Morty the Meatball was the short-lived mascot for the Mission Macaroni Company. Mission Macaroni was founded by Italian immigrant Guido Merino in San Francisco during the Great Depression. Morty was featured in 1970s commercials for the company saying his signature catchphrase "I'm a luva-luva you."

White background divided into sections: the top has a blue union bug, the middle has blue text with red starred banners above and below, the bottom has green text with a green circular outline

The Green Duck Metal Stamping Company was founded by George G. Greenburg and Harvey Ducgheisel in 1906 in Chicago, Illinois. They initially provided metal stamped medals, tokens, badges, and even casino chips, but also specialized in pinback buttons, advertising signs, and key tags.

The tab-style button was a Green Duck promotional product for "Election '72"—the 47th United States presidential election. In that election, the Republican incumbent president Richard Nixon and vice president Spiro Agnew faced off against Democratic nominee George McGovern and his running mate Sargent Shriver. Nixon won the election in a landslide victory with about 60% of the popular vote and was elected for his second term. However, his term was cut short in 1974 when he was forced to resign before facing impeachment for the Watergate scandal. 

Illustrations of five child characters plus anthropomorphic bird, turtle, hippo, dog, and ant illustrations on a white, brown, blue, and yellow background with tan text on a brown background at the top. On top of the illustration are four star stickers plus one empty sticker spot

Created to improve childhood literacy, Book It! is a popular reading program created by Pizza Hut that encourages children to read books for the promise of a free pizza. Beginning in 1984, Book It! runs every year from October to March through elementary schools with the reading goals being established by teachers for their students individually. 

Many of the Book It! buttons featured spots for stickers that readers could use to track their progress. Once they had enough stickers, they would receive a voucher for a free personal pizza from Pizza Hut. 

A white star design  in the foreground and bold, multi-colored text with thick black outlines on a blue wavy background fill the majority of the space. Additional small white text is in the top right corner. 

BOOK IT! is a literacy outreach program hosted by Pizza Hut since 1984. The restaurant chain encourages pre-K through 6th-grade students to plan, reach, and record monthly reading goals. As a reward, each student receives one free one-topping pizza.

Two illustrated green monsters—one pushing the other down so only its eyes and nose are visible—in the center on an orange background with black text around them. A white speech bubble with black text is on the left directed towards the bigger monster.

Hi Brows was a line of greeting cards produced by American Greetings starting in 1956. The irreverent and off-kilter art style and sense of humor was intended to appeal to the growing counter culture in America. A small number of buttons were also produced for the line, including this one.   

Blue background with red text on top of white vertical and horizontal lines that cross each other in the lower right quadrant. An illustration of a typical 18th century American Patriot holding a flag that reads "LHS" sits Lincoln Patriots Back in the upper left quadrant on the white horizontal line. 

Lincoln High School was built in 1965 in the southeast area of Sioux Falls, S.D. Until this time, there had been one high school in the district, Washington High School. However, residential neighborhoods in the southeast part of the city were growing and Washington High became overcrowded. Lincoln High School opened its doors to 1300 students in October of 1965. As of 2023, Lincoln’s student enrollment is 1,833 and has been included on the list of top 1200 public schools in the US. Lincoln offers a variety of extracurricular activities including Speech, JrROTC, DECA, sports, and marching band. The Lincoln High School Patriots Marching Band has performed in the Macy’s Thanksgiving Day Parade, the Rose Parade, has earned a spot as finalists at the Bands of America Super Regional in St. Louis, and was the first band from S.D. to win first prize at the BOA Iowa Regional. 

White background with black text in the upper right-hand corner and a color photograph filling the foreground of Annie Lennox with her arms raised up, bent at the elbow and hands making fists

Eurythmics was a UK-based synth pop duo that consisted of singer Annie Lennox and Dave Stewart. The image on this button is from the band's third studio album, Touch, which was released in 1983 to critical acclaim.  

Black background with photograph of Michael Jackson wearing a white suit with a black shirt on the right and white cursive text on the left 

In 1982, Michael Jackson released his sixth studio album and his best-selling album of all time, Thriller. The iconic photoshoot that accompanied the Thriller album cover features Jackson reclining casually in a white suit. The suit belonged to the credited photographer: Dick Zimmerman. Not visible is the full display of Jackson which features a tiger playfully balancing on his leg. According to Zimmerman, Jackson was afraid that the tiger would scratch his face.

Click on this link to see an additional variation of this button also held by the Button Museum.