By Joann M. Ringelstetter
Ruth and I just returned from a 10-day photography trip on the backroads of Ohio (which is why this blog post is a day late). When we catch our breath, we will be sharing some stories from this trip.
As you can probably guess, meandering along the backroads to capture rural scenes, and anything else that strikes me, always makes me smile.
And, sometimes, my subjects smile back!
Sometimes, a smiley face will pop out unexpectedly, like this smiley face we discovered on the day after Christmas while doing the Christmas Bird Count.
The simple yellow smiley face was created in Massachusetts in 1963 by commercial artist Harvey Ball for the “smile campaign” of the Worcester Mutual Insurance Company. It was an internal program to teach employees to be more pleasant when dealing with customers.
In the 1970s, two brothers, who owned a card shop in Philadelphia, marketed the smiley face (which was never copyrighted) on various products, along with the slogan “Have a Happy Day!” Ruth and I were in high school in the early 70s and we had smiley face shirts and smiley face curtains in our bedroom.
Next year will mark the 50th anniversary of the smiley face. How will you celebrate?
Happy Shunpiking!
Joann
No comments:
Post a Comment