/ Burma-Shave A 1944 advertisement in Life magazine ran: TOUGH-WHISKERED YANKS / IN HEAVY TANKS HAVE JAWS AS SMOOTH / AS GUYS IN BANKS 1963 was the last year for the signs, most of which were repeats, including the final slogan, which had first appeared in 1953: Our fortune / Is your / Shaven face / It's our best / Advertising space / Burma-Shave Special promotional messages Free offer! Free offer! / Rip a fender off your car / mail it in / for a half-pound jar / Burma-Shave A large number of fenders were received by the company, which made good on its promise. Free – free / a trip to Mars / for 900 / empty jars / Burma-Shave Arlyss French, owner of a Red Owl grocery store, did submit 900 empty jars; the company at first replied: "If a trip to Mars / you earn / remember, friend / there's no return." Then Burma-Shave, on the recommendation of Red Owl's publicity team, withdrew the one-way offer and instead sent Mr. and Mrs. French on vacation to the town of Moers (often pronounced "Mars" by foreigners) near Duisburg, North Rhine-Westphalia, Germany. Cultural impact A number of films and television shows set between the 1920s and 1950s have used the Burma-Shave roadside billboards to help set the scene. Examples include Bonnie and Clyde, A River Runs Through It, The World's Fastest Indian, Stand By Me, Tom and Jerry, M*A*S*H and the pilot episode ("Genesis") of Quantum Leap. The long-running series Hee Haw borrowed the style for program bumpers, transitioning from one show segment to the next or to commercials. The final episode of the popular television series M*A*S*H featured a series of road signs in Korea "Hawk was gone, now he's here. Dance til dawn, give a cheer. Burma-Shave". Roger Miller's song "Burma Shave" (the B-side to his 1961 single "Fair Swiss Maiden") has the singer musing that he's "seen a million rows of them little red poetic signs up and down the line", while reciting rhymes in the manner of the ads. Tom Waits' song "Burma-Shave" (from his 1977 album Foreign Affairs) uses the signs as an allegory for an unknown destination. ("I guess I'm headed that-a-way, Just as long as it's paved, I guess you'd say I'm on my way to Burma-Shave") Chuck Suchy's song "Burma Shave Boogie" (from his 2008 album Unraveling Heart) incorporates several of