Pacific Coast Biscuit Company magazine

[FrankWakefield]

I recently acquired a January 1925 issue of The Swas Tika. It was the company paper, company magazine for the Pacific Coast Biscuit Company.

Below are a few scans, the front page, part of the masthead, a column about the 6 locations they had at the time, and an image that shows Miss Emma Kemp wearing a work hat that has the Swastika on it. I have to imagine that by the late 30's the company had changed their company logo and the name of their 'paper'. There are 12 pages inside the cover. It has an image of inside a merchant's store showing a PCB display case, and a PCB delivery van.

[Leon]

I love that kind of stuff...Thanks for sharing!!

[Jacklitsch]

Pacific Coast Biscuit Store Tins:

Top one in my collection. Bottom one offered on eBay year or so ago. Until I saw this post I was under the impression that the symbol was a Native America symbol for "Good Luck".

[Jacklitsch]

Little Wiki research.

Referring to the symbol:

"By the early 20th century, it was widely used worldwide and was regarded as a symbol of good luck and success."

[V117collector]

It's just to bad that some groups of poeple used the Swastika for there own
personal agenda, truly a shame! For this reason I find this thread somewhat offensive.

A more detailed LOOK!
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Swastika

Nazi Party 1919 - 1945
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Nazi_Party

[FrankWakefield]

I detest what the swastika came to symbolize. And I apologize to anyone offended by my posting of the images of this company newsletter.

[tbob]

Frank- There is no need to apologize. Every time a person with a conscience sees that symbol he is reminded of man's inhumanity towards his fellow man and I believe will recall the words on the front gates of the Holocaust memorial I saw in France, "We will forgive but let us never forget."
Adolph Hitler was once asked if the world's perception of the Holocaust when it was in its earliest stages would cause dire fallout for Germany and Hitler said, "Who remembers the Armenians?" Today most Americans have little knowledge if any at all about the first mass genocide, the Turkish slaughter of hundreds of thousands of Armenian men, women and children during World War 1. Hitler foolheartedly thought the Holocaust would be as easily forgotten.
When I see that symbol I don't think of "good luck," I think of the horror and the tragedy and the utter inhumanity. It is good we remember. Let us never forget.

[rhettyeakley]

It is pretty sad when a symbol that meant something good for so long has been destroyed.

Anyways, here is a pretty cool postcard from 1907 I have and it's description on back...


-Rhett

[canjond]

And Troppicana thought it had problems when it had to rework its artwork earlier this year.

[FrankWakefield]

In that 3rd image that is a close up of text mentioning the location of the 6 Pacific Coast Biscuit facilities, it mentions that president Moritz Thomsen is also president of Centennial Flour Mills. Centennial Flour distributed those PCL cards about 1943 - 1947. Before that I never perceived a connection between Pacific Coast Biscuit cards and Centennial Flour cards.

[joeadcock]

To tbob

Thanks for your words.

Right now, I am in the middle of reading a book called THE BOY WHO DARED, based on the true story of a Hitler Youth who hated what it meant to be part of the Third Reich and how he tried to stop them. If you get to read it, it is a great read. It was actually written for older children, my daughter had to read it for her private and school and gave it to me.

Sorry to get off topic, but I am afraid that we may revisit what occured at World War II, based on the way parts of our world are acting.

Frank L.

[J.McMurry]

My memory may be faulty,but wasnt the swastika also an ancient Hindu religious symbol?

Personally, I am offended when I see an American citizen dressed in a Nazi uniform,but I'm never offended by talk of History. To be easily offended by words is to empower them.

[V117collector]

Words and symbols can be extremely powerful if you use them wisely. It is the unwise how try to manipulate “thought” for there own personal gain.. This concept has been repeated through world history which continues today. Why? People fear the unknown and would rather be controlled by the unwise.

[J.McMurry]

cool, I love profound statements.
I think for the word unwise, you could substitute evil.

[ChrisStufflestreet]

Frank, I have been reading about both World Wars since I was 8 years old and never lost the sense that there can always be another global conflict because of the simple fact that we are human beings and don't always understand the power we wield. As long as there are at least two people on this planet, there is the possibility of conflict.

Those who came home from France after fighting what they called "The Great War" in 1919 told enough horror stories about what went on "Over There" that they were sure nothing like that could ever happen again...and look what happened just 20 years later. It is similarly naive (or hubristic) to assume that it won't happen again. Especially when those who remember those lessons from personal experienceare beginning to die off from old age.

Switching gears and returning to the thread topic...what a neat newsletter. I never knew that PCB used a swastika in its corporate identity. And viewed through the prism from 80 years later, it looks odd but is nonetheless a piece of history. And I'm guessing that a lot of the PCB stuff with swastikas on it were quickly discarded and destroyed because of the later events of history; it's neat to see something from a time where the symbol had an entirely different meaning.