COMEDY MAY EVOLVE, BUT THE WHOOPEE CUSHION IS FOREVER
BRADENTON, FL, February 28, 2007 – Ah, the whoopee cushion! Is there any more timeless example of simple, unsophisticated humor? The joy buzzer has its devotees. Fake dog poo has its fans, and some even prefer "X-ray Specs" or the ubiquitous rubber chicken. But the whoopee cushion occupies a special place of honor among icons of pop culture humor.
Since the whoopee cushion erupted onto the cultural scene around 1940, it has played something of a coming-of-age role in the lives of many American children. In fact, the cushion and other humor and novelty items – and their enduring appeal to generation after generation – have a lot to say about our culture.
"Mark Twain said that humor is mankind's greatest blessing," says Kim Boyd, whose family business, the Johnson Smith Company, has been selling thousands of different novelty items – including the whoopee cushion – since 1914. "We now know that laughter not only feels good, it's good for us. I think things like the joy buzzer and whoopee cushion have endured – and continue to delight us as at any age – because they appeal to our inner child."
"Many of us remember hiding under the covers at night, catalogue in one hand, flash light in the other, hoping our mothers wouldn't catch us before we could finish filling out the order form," Boyd says. "The anticipation of waiting for your order to arrive was almost as much fun as the items themselves."
"Our society and level of technology have become increasingly sophisticated with every new year," she notes. "Yet these very simple gadgets and others like them continue to sell well because they remind us of what it was like to be a child."
Sure the whoopee cushion has evolved. You can now purchase a high-tech, battery-operated remote controlled version as well as the more mundane, posterior-powered traditional type. But the belly laughs it elicits remain the same, regardless of the level of technology involved in the surprise, or age of the cushion's victim.
The ability to evoke those belly laughs has helped Boyd and her family build something of a novelty item empire with the Web site www.ThingsYouNeverKnew.com.
"We say you'll find 'Things you never knew existed but that you can't live without,'" said Boyd. Now the classic icons of humor share cyberspace with movie memorabilia and items from the heyday of tacky TV, surveillance gadgets, magic tricks, slogan-bearing T-shirts, gag items, hard-to-find toys, and collectibles.
"I think what the continued popularity of these items says about our collective sense of humor is that we all enjoy a simple joke, something that doesn't require a lot of thought but pays off with big laughs," Boyd said.
And with everything seeming to cost more and more these days, it's good to know some things, like laughter, remain virtually free. At www.ThingsYouNeverKnew.com, you can order a spanking new classic whoopee cushion for the bargain sum of 99-cents. Plus shipping and handling, of course. |
