"...and four ounces of...grandfather's overcoat...finally, I add in three shoelaces and a hubcap..."
Those desperate housewives would never get that secret recipe out of Crazy Colonel Harlan Sanders. I don't think even Dick Cheney could've tortured it out of him.
I don't know how I'd never seen this commercial, but here we are, back in 1967, the heyday of the Mad Men of Madison Avenue.
But, if this spot is dated accurately, it was produced before KFC hired their first national agency of record — Leo Burnett in 1969.
By that time, Kentucky Fried Chicken had already exploded to become the largest fast food operation in America (yes, at the time, larger than McDonald's).
According to Wikipedia, Sanders placed much faith in astrology. So in 1964, on the day Financier Jack C. Massey made an offer to Sanders to buy his company, he first checked the daily horoscope to make sure that the Colonel had a positive write-up. When Massey made his offer, Sanders opened up his desk drawer, read his Virgo paragraph, and signed the offer: $2 million (about $15 million in 2013 money).
Sanders also received an annual salary for life, and stayed on as the company's "quality controller" and of course its trademark.
Crazy stuff.
NOTE: If anybody out there knows if this is in fact a Leo Burnett ad, or if not, if you know the responsible ad agency — please comment.
Thanks much to Dangerous Minds for posting this. They have three more crazy 1967 KFC commercials to check out, including a very funny Cleopatra spot.