Local Ads From “The Day After” — November 1983

This is one recording I’ve been hunting for a LONG time. It finally turned up in the form of a 40-year-old Beta tape with shaky tracking — there’s no telling where it was stored all this time, but it’ll do. ABC aired no ads after the point where the bombs dropped, which was smart on their part — the objective was to scare people and early 80s advertising was pretty darn goofy. Heck, locally there was an ad for toilets.

A fascinating cultural artifact, and we’re all lucky that it worked. The last message, added by KATU, was the final thing aired before the bomb scene. I LOVE HOW OMINOUS IT FEELS. “You’re about to see some ****, people.”