Change of Hearth: Magic, Marketing, and Modernity in the Odelin Stove Le Rustique Postcard Series

Abstract

ABSTRACT Ten 1904 postcards, marketing the Odelin Le Rustique stove, spin a fanciful, magical tale, an early example of branded storytelling, within the little–studied medium of Belle Époque advertising postcards. A self–contained series, part of a broader multi– and intermedial campaign, the cards emerged in a fluid media and marketing landscape, as companies experimented with promoting their products. Conveying a world in flux, the series interweaves narrative, cultural, ideological, socioeconomic, racial, and technological threads, to cast this crucial kitchen appliance as a vestige of ancient enchantment, harking back to the prehistoric conquest of fire, and as a key vehicle of modernization.