BRADENTON, Fla. -- When a reader tipped us off that the Johnson Smith Co. catalog is alive and sassy in Bradenton, I shot from my chair like the victim of one of the novelty company's infamous Whoopee Cushions.
As a kid, I pored over its comic-book ads for joy buzzers, disappearing ink and books promising to reveal the secrets of jiujitsu or kissing or finding lost treasure.But the ad that is forever etched in my memory featured the cartoon of a smiling man carrying a steamer trunk. "Let me out of here!" a voice from the trunk cried.
"Boys! Boys! Boys!" the headline shouted. "Throw your voice into a trunk, under the table . . . into a desk at school or anywhere." For 35 cents you got a "Ventrillo" reed that, when placed under the tongue, was supposed to make such feats possible. An instruction book was included.
My dad, ever the skeptic, told me not to squander my 35 cents "on that hooey."
Hooey? Hardly, according to Sam Varco, 66, of Ocean Ridge, Fla., who grew up with a Johnson Smith catalog tucked under his mattress.
"The Johnson Smith Co. is right up there with Daisy air rifles, Lionel Trains and Lincoln Logs," Varco wrote. "How about getting their newest catalog and spreading the good news?"
I did better than that. I journeyed even unto the mail-order Mecca of all that is weird and wacky, the Johnson Smith Co. headquarters on Florida's west coast, and met 62-year-old Paul Hoenle, president of the novelties and gadgets company established in 1914 by Alfred Johnson Smith.
Smith, an Australian, sold a similar business in Sydney and set up shop in Chicago, hoping to tap the vast North American market with its tens of millions of rural males just aching for some gag or gadget or naughtiness to wow the boys over a cracker-barrel.
His 96-page catalog quickly exploded to 576 pages of beguiling illustrations and zippy prose that read like a carnival barker's patter. "Mystery of love-making solved," began an ad for a pamphlet that for 10 cents promised to share the secret.
But if your problem in the romance department was a fickle lady love, Johnson Smith had you covered, too: "If you fear your best girl is flirting with the other fellow, place the Seebackroscope to your eye and catch her in the act."
Yes, Sears & Roebuck may have ruled the outhouse, but it was Johnson Smith's catalog that was hidden in every corn crib between Keokuk and Kokomo. (Mothers didn't always approve.)
"We have fourth- and fifth-generation customers, some going back as far as 1914," said Hoenle, a Canadian marketing graduate who joined the Johnson Smith Co. in 1966. "Our client list has included Winston Churchill, John F. Kennedy and Johnny Carson. Carson used to do two shows a year on gadgets from our catalog."
When Smith started his business, Hoenle explained, "there was nothing like it in America."
But novelties are hardly novel anymore. "By 1966, there were 400 mail-order companies," he said. "Now, there are over 10,000."
To survive in an ocean of mail-order competition and yet remain true to the founder's insistence that the catalog be a fun read, Johnson Smith now offers its catalogs in two flavors: Things You Never Knew Existed, aimed at men, and The Lighter Side, unusual gifts pitched to female gift-buyers. The catalogs are updated 14 times a year with 25 million mailings worldwide in 1998.
For the Things You Never Knew Existed (TYNKE) catalog, Hoenle and his buyers comb the world with one goal in mind: "We want our customers to say, 'Aha, I didn't know about that.' "
A slightly different reaction is sought for shoppers who browse The Lighter Side. "We want our female customers to say, 'I will be remembered for giving this gift,' " Hoenle explained.
As for former comic book readers who still look to Johnson Smith for their rubber chicken needs, the company will always be there for them, Hoenle promised.
"We feel a great deal of loyalty to our customers, so we still carry many of our old gag merchandise. "
And here Hoenle directed me to a page of ads, the illustrations and text unchanged since I first read them 40 or 50 years ago.
Disappearing Ink: "It looks like any blue mess . . . Gone in 5 minutes, yet causes 5 minutes of howls. Great gag -- sure fire."
Itching Powder: "The more they scratch, the more they itch. Ever wonder what a billion mosquito bites would feel like? Just a little bit on the skin & the torture starts."
And there, near the top of the layout of reprised favorites, was the original Whoopee Cushion ad, complete with a drawing of an embarrassed woman sitting down as the cushion beneath her sighs.
And how many of the Bronx cheer bladders does Johnson Smith sell every year?
"About 2,000. We carry them as a salute to the past," Hoenle said, turning now to an ad for a state-of-the-art electronic flatulator. "You would do much better with our electronic Whoopee Cushion."
Certainly, the company does better with the $14.97 electronic noisemaker. I told Hoenle, in all honesty, that I had trouble understanding why anyone would pay real money for high-tech gastrointestinal noises.
And here, Hoenle explained that America's love of the low brow and high tech has merged.
"Now, something like itching powder or stink bombs is not always funny to some. But our Whoopee Cushion has been around for many years, and now with remote control, you have so many more options."
"Just think," he said, his eyes crinkling with merriment. "You can put the device under your editor's chair and press a button, and nobody knows you did it."
I said that I was sorry, but I was much more likely to buy Johnson Smith's carbide salute cannon for $119 or their nifty horizontal steam engine for $114, or even the $59 die-cast 1948 American Indian motorcycle before I would spend $14 to make electronic Whoopee.
Hoenle studied me doubtfully, then asked a personal question. Had I, as a youngster, ordered anything from a Johnson Smith Co. comic book ad?
"I wanted the Ventrillo reed," I admitted. "But my dad said it was hooey."
And here, Hoenle placed a gentle hand on my shoulder and told me that the 35 cents would have bought me much more than a tin reed for playing voice tricks. It would have brought to my mailbox the marvels of the Johnson Smith Co. catalog, twice a year.
"I am afraid," Hoenle said disconsolately, "that your father did you a disservice.
For a free Johnson Smith Catalog write Johnson Smith Co., Dept B 910, Box 25600, Bradenton, FL 34206.