I do wonder if these sets were made *for* Mercury or if if there is more to the story. I of course cannot prove such.
Mercury offerd cars, TVs, cash...
I can see offering fancy pens, and I get the cult-of-celebrity thing, but offering Ed would seem to be a distraction from the Mercury thing. Could Mercury have bought leftover stock at good price? I'll never know...
-d
I suspected that Mercury was probably a major sponsor if not the main sponsor of the Ed Sullivan show. I did a couple minutes of searching and found an article that stated that Lincoln-Mercury was the main sponsor of the Ed Sullivan show. To viewers, Ed Sullivan and Lincoln-Mercury would have gone hand in hand. So I would think they would not find it odd for them to go together.
Here is the article from 1974 I read.
http://www.nytimes.c.../bday/0928.htmlHere is another paragraph talking about how strong the bond between Ed Sullivan and Ford-Lincoln- Mercury was.
"On June 20, 1948, Sullivan hosted his first television show on CBS, Toast of the Town, sponsored by Emerson Radio. The show brought vaudeville to the small screen in living rooms across the country. It was an instant success. The sponsor was not convinced, however, and quickly dropped the show. The show continued when Lincoln-Mercury agreed to sponsor it. Sullivan is rumored to have been so grateful to the Ford Motor Company that he would send postcards to dealers when he was traveling."
-Preston
Edited by plmadding, 23 October 2012 - 07:39 PM.