If you're old enough to remember or have ever thumbed through a vintage comic book, you've most likely seen those classic advertisements for X-Ray glasses, Sea Monkeys, and a wide assortment of useless trinkets from the Johnson Smith Company. The old comic book ads were great, and the most prominent of these was by far the ones for the Charles Atlas exercise books.
The swim trunk clad Charles Atlas advertisements first appeared in the 1940's and ran for several decades. They were done in comic book style and typically featured a skinny young man, the infamous "97 lb weakling", sitting on the beach with his girlfriend. In the first panel he's seen getting sand kicked in his face by some bully. Adding insult to injury, the girl eventually walks off with the muscle-bound aggressor in the next couple of panels, or some variation of this basic theme. Stopping the story there, it is clear that the king of the beach has made his presence felt, and it is a really buff dude. (The skinny guy eventually gets his revenge through the advice offered in the books, but I digress...)
This was one of the most successful print ad campaigns of all time, but despite the Herculean physique, the antagonist in the story is a mere mortal. We were wondering, who truly reins supreme at the beach? Is it man or beast? A giant squid, sperm whale, or maybe one of those mail order Sea Monkeys? We decided, it's gotta be the Chondrichthyes, a.k.a., the shark. We don't know if sharks can technically really be called "King of the Beach" or not, but we're really, really glad that they aren't amphibian.
If you're a fan of the shark, can't wait for "Shark Week" each year, then this vintage shark design is for you. This black and white declaration of the shark's supremacy makes for great shirts, luggage tags, housewares and more.
