Anacin is the trade name of several analgesics manufactured by Insight Pharmaceuticals. Its flagship product contains acetylsalicylic acid (aspirin) and caffeine. It is primarily used for headache relief but it can also be used to calm minor pains due to sore throat, toothache, muscular aches, a cold, backache, arthritis, and menstrual cramps.
In 1939, Anacin sponsored a daytime serial called Our Gal Sunday. Their sponsorship spanned 18 of the program's 23 years on the air. Anacin is one of the earliest and best examples of a concerted television marketing campaign created for them in the late 1950s by Rosser Reeves of the Ted Bates ad agency. Many people remember the commercials advertising "tension producing" situations, and the "hammers in the head" advert with the slogan "Tension. Pressure. Pain."
A later Anacin advert (in 1962) featured a mother trying to assist her grown daughter with various chores, such as preparing a meal. "Don't you think it needs a little salt?", mother would say, only to have her nerve-racked daughter shout, "Mother, please, I'd rather do it myself!" As the mother wilted, the daughter would emote and rub her head, with her inner voice saying, "Control yourself! Sure, you're tired, you have a headache, but don't take it out on her!" Another commercial had a wife greeting her husband as he pulled into their driveway in his car; the husband responded by yelling "Helen, can't you keep Billy's bike out of the driveway?!?" These advertisement scenarios became popular and were parodied a number of times, including in the Allan Sherman song "Headaches," the 1966 film The Silencers and the 1980 film Airplane.
16mm film to video transfer by Gerald Santana