mr clean

[joanna bujes]

At 06:13 PM 01/16/2003 -0500, you wrote:
>When I was growing up there was a detergent ad for a
>product called, I believe, Mr Clean, that showed a
>bald buff guy riding through the 'burbs on a horse
>holding a  lance, he would zap stuff drying on the
>line and make it sparkle, and the slogan was "Whiter
>Than White!" I am not making this up, as Dave Barry
>says, other ancient participants on the list can
>confirm this for you kids who don't believe me.
>Anyway, maybe Hitch got the idea from Mr. Clean. jks

I think you're getting your commercial iconography mixed up. Mr. Clean was 
the "whirling dervish" genie in a bottle. The knight in shining armor, was 
an Ajax knight who zapped stuff clean. An interesting iconographic story: 
where women are not seen as cleaning anything...just consuming cleaning 
products whose "force/strength/power" is associated with male figures. Go 
figure.

Joanna