A black illustration of a beaver kicking between black text on a yellow background. 

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A brown beaver sits in a grassy area with red berries surrounded by brown text on a white background. 

This is a button from the Beaver Defenders, a beaver protection group started in 1970 by Hope Sawyer Buyukmihei in Newfield, New Jersey. It is unclear what this button is celebrating, but the "bravo beaver" may be celebrating the nomination of the beaver as New York's official state mammal in 1974. 

By 1972, the Beaver Defenders reached across the country with over five hundred members. They fought throughout the 1970s and 80s to keep beaver dams and habitats safe from human intervention and dynamite by writing letters to government officials. 

An illustration of a beaver next to a tree near a dammed river with a brown city skyline on the horizon surrounded by brown text on a white background. 

The button is to commemorate the centennial of Beaver Dam, Wisconsin. Settled by Thomas Mackie and Joseph Goetschius in 1841, the city was named after the Beaver Dam River. The Centennial celebration was marked by a pre-Centennial dinner and community activities. 

A blue and white illustration of a crying man in formal wear sitting and drinking at a bar below blue text and encircled by a red border on a white background. 

The origin of this button is unknown, however the saying “crying in my beer” has been used in common language and country songs for decades. The phrase means to generally feel sad or sorry for oneself, or to lament or complain in a foolish or embarrassing manner.

Color Illustration of the back of a balding man's head with a few black hairs on the bottom and top of his head. Black text curves on the bottom portion of the button. The illustration and text lie on a white-blue dotted background.

Thomas E. Powers (1870-1939) was born on the Fourth of July in Milwaukee, Wisconsin. Powers was a nationally recognized cartoonist who worked at the New York Evening World, a William Randolph Hearst (1863-1951) newspaper.  Powers's most famous comic strip was "Joy and Gloom."  The figure drawn for the button looks like it could be the back of Gloom's head.  Both Hearst and Theodore Roosevelt (1858-1919) considered Power to be their favor cartoonist.  

Green button with white text on top and bottom portion of button. Illustration of a beige colored alien face with large black eyes. 

To promote the 1988 paperback release of the novel Communion: A True Story by American ufologist and author, Whitley Strieber, publisher Avon Books gave out these promotional buttons, stating above an alien’s likeness, “We are here.” The book is based on the author's personal account, who experienced "lost time" and terrifying flashbacks, which was linked to an encounter with aliens during his hypnosis sessions with a therapist. The book was later made into a film starring Christopher Walken as Strieber and Lindsay Crouse as his wife, Anne. 

Avon Books was founded in 1941 by the American News Corporation (ANC), and was established by brother and sister Joseph Meyers and Edna Meyers Williams. Originally named Avon Publications, it was an American paperback book and comic book publisher. As of 2010, it became part of HarperCollins, publishing primarily romance novels.

Color illustration of a smiling woman with a colorful scarf tied around her head on an orange background. Black text wraps around the top and bottom of the button.

Aunt Jemima pancake flour, the first nationally distributed ready-mix food and one of the earliest products to be marketed through personal appearances and advertisements featuring its namesake, was created by combining advances in manufacturing and distribution with popular nostalgia for the antebellum south.The product was originally named “Self-Rising Pancake Flour” and sold in bags.

In the fall of 1889, Rutt was inspired to rename the mix after attending a minstrel show, during which a popular song titled “Old Aunt Jemima” was performed by men in blackface, one of whom was depicting a slave mammy of the plantation South. The song, which was written by the African-American singer, dancer and acrobat Billy Kersands in 1875, was a staple of the minstrel circuit and was based on a song sung by field slaves. The pamphlet, as included in the text. The sentence reads as follows: "New ways in which millions of women are using it to make delicious pancakes, waffles and muffins"

Rutt and Underwood sold their milling company to a larger corporation owned by R.G. Davis of Chicago. He transformed the local product into a national one by distributing it through a network of suppliers and by creating a persona for Aunt Jemima. Davis hired Nancy Green, a former Kentucky slave and cook in a Chicago kitchen, to portray Aunt Jemima in that city’s 1893 Columbian Exposition. She served pancakes from a booth designed to look like a huge flour barrel and told stories of life as a cook on an Old South plantation. Her highly publicized appearance spurred thousands of orders for the product from distributors. Davis also commissioned a pamphlet detailing the “life” of Aunt Jemima. She was depicted as the actual house slave of one Colonel Higbee of Louisiana, whose plantation was known across the South for its fine dining –especially its pancake breakfasts.

An illustration of a building with red text above and below it on a white background. 

The Y.M.C.A. Hotel Chicago was built in 1916 and was located on Wabash Avenue. The hotel provided simple and inexpensive lodgings to young men, at daily rates, without membership fees. Starting during the 1930’s the Y.M.C.A. Hotel began to market the hotel to a broader audience that included men, women, and families. Besides offering low cost rooms the Y.M.C.A. Hotel also operated a cafeteria, restaurant and soda fountain as well as offering daily programs and entertainment.

A photo of football player William Perry holding his hand up on a background that is a mostly white but has three horizontal lines (blue, orange, blue)  behind Perry's head. 

William Perry was born on December 16, 1962 and is best known for his years as a defensive lineman for the Chicago Bears. He was nicknamed "The Refrigerator" for his large, rectangular frame. He was a first round draft pick in 1985 and won the Super Bowl with the Chicago Bears his rookie year. His Super Bowl ring is sized 25, the largest ring in Super Bowl history.

Illustration of a nut with black text inside it and above it on a white background. 

The Chicago White Sox are a professional baseball team located in the south side of Chicago, Illinois. The White Sox are members of the Central Division in the Major League Baseball's American League. The White Sox are one of two major league clubs based in Chicago, the other being the Chicago Cubs of the National League. The club was established in 1900 and originally called the Chicago White Stockings, after the nickname abandoned by the Cubs, and the name was soon shortened to Chicago White Sox, believed to have been because the paper would shorten it to Sox in the headlines. The White Sox have won the World Series three times, the last time occurring in 2005.