For Camel shows, ‘Lucky’ was verboten

“Sponsors [of television shows in the 1950s] paid particular attention to anything they thought would boost the competition….

“On the ‘Camel News Caravan,’ in an interview with ‘Lucky’ Luciano, only the mob­ster’s first name, Charles, could be used, so viewers would not confuse it with an ad for Lucky Strikes. The word ‘lucky’ seemed to pose a particular problem for American Tobacco’s competitors. Scriptwriters regularly combed through thesaurus to dredge up synonyms like ‘fortunate’ or ‘providential’ whenever the forbidden ‘L word’ popped up. How bad could it get? This bad: even the word ‘American’ was proscribed on one show….”

— From “The Box: An Oral History of Television, 1920-1961” by Jeff Kisseloff (1995)

h/t delanceyplace.com

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