When candidates and causes used matchbooks to fire up passions

Stick with Ike for peace and prosperity.

Save our Land, Join the Klan, Draft George Wallace for President.

Aunt Sam wants your support for the ERA.

The pint-size, pithy, and often punchy political advertisements on exhibit at the West Deptford Free Public Library have a special place in Richard Greene's enormous collection of matchbook covers.

"They encompass every aspect of American culture, including politics," says Greene, 62, of Collingswood, who curated the display.

Indeed, from Calvin Coolidge to Bill Clinton, from Libertarianism to Zionism, the matchbook messages showcased at the library attest to the cornucopia of candidates, campaigns, and causes that utilized the minuscule but powerful medium during much of the 20th century.

Wendell Wilkie - America Needs Him.

Free Huey - the Black Panther Party.

Nixon Now.

Politics has long been associated with smoke-filled rooms, of course. And in the days when all sorts of people smoked all the time all over the place, matchbooks enjoyed the "ubiquity and reach" prized by advertising campaigns of all stripes, including political.

"Matchbooks had one of the highest pass-along rates," notes Greene, a graphic designer, marketing consultant, and student of history. "That's an important factor in advertising."

Mass production and distribution of matchbooks got underway in the 1890s, and by the turn of the century, big companies like the Pabst brewery had recognized the potential.

"This is one of the first times a president's image was used in advertising, as far as I know," Greene says as he removes a 1910 "Washington Crisps" matchbook cover from a display case at the library.

"At the time, it was considered questionable," he says, adding that politicians nevertheless followed suit.

Printing a likeness of George Washington on a matchbook in order to pitch breakfast cereal seems quaint compared to using Snap - Snapchat's new name - to promote, say, a campaign party at a brewpub.

But a 1932 matchbook featuring both Herbert Hoover and Franklin D. Roosevelt was not merely bipartisan, but was interactive, even meta: It included a straw poll to be filled out and dropped off at the Hotel Edison in Manhattan.

One of the questions asked whether Prohibition ought to be repealed.

"The hotel and bar used the inside cover as a ballot, and as a business promotion," says Greene, who began amassing his collection in the early 1970s "because I was fascinated by the graphic design, cleverness, and history" of matchbooks. He has 250,000 of them, organized by categories such as sports, movies, and politics.

Strike out the New Deal!

Dewey in '48.

Elect Ross Perot.

Although some national and local advertisers still utilize matchbooks, public health concerns seem to have snuffed out their use by mainstream politicos. One piece of the collection on display proclaims "Dixie Loves Clinton" and features the Confederate battle flag; it suggests how dramatically times have changed with regard to that symbol, and is one of just a handful of 1990s political matchbooks Greene has found.

"I didn't see any during the two Obama campaigns, or in the current campaign," he says. "It used to be that if one candidate put out a matchbook, the other one had to. If a candidate did that now, they'd be accused of promoting the evils of smoking."

But matches remain a practical and widely used tool not only for lighting cigarettes, but for less controversial purposes, such as igniting barbecues or birthday candles.

Matches are still useful - and, Greene insists, as usable for political pitches in a social media era as they've ever been.

If he had the job of designing a political match cover for this year's presidential race, "I'd use something like, 'Don't get burned,' " says Greene, who describes himself as "proudly" liberal.

"Or, 'Don't let your future go up in smoke.' "

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