Referenced By / Burma-Shave

Comic Books

• One Futurama comic has Leela (sent back in time) climbing up Mount Olympus, to find signs that read...
  Turn back now!
  Go no more!
  Or you'll face the wrath of...
  The Minotaur!

  Burma-Shave
• During Alan Moore's run on Swamp Thing, when Matthew Cable gets into a car crash while drunk, the caption boxes soberly declare: "The night can make a man more brave...but not more sober"...and then finish with a Burma-Shave sign next to Matt's smashed car.
• From American Gods (the comic version thereof):
  He undertook to overtake
  The road was on a bend
  Form now on the undertaker
  is his only friend

  Burma-Shave

Comic Strips

• Newspaper comic B.C. managed an indirect version, albeit set to a limerick meter:
  There once was a young man named Peter
  Who spoke with a definite meter
  He drew up some signs
  And he wrote out up his lines
  And now Peter's meter is neater.
  • "Guess what I've invented." "Shaving cream?"
• Science cartoonist Sidney Harris once drew an astronaut encountering one of these, with the signs posted on individual asteroids:
  SPACE IS BIG
  SPACE IS DARK
  IT'S HARD TO FIND
  A PLACE TO PARK

  Burma-Shave

Film

• In Bonnie and Clyde, Burma-Shave signs can be briefly glimpsed in one car-chase scene as the titular duo are pursued by the law.
• In the movie The World's Fastest Indian there is a sequence where Burt and the Air Force pilot he's travelling with read aloud the Burma-Shave poems they pass, showing the distance they cover.

Literature

• The Time Traveler's Wife: One of Claire's journal entries in her childhood begins with her helping her mostly-blind grandmother complete a Crossword Puzzle.
  Claire: Ten letters, the clue says, "Don't stick your neck out too far."
  Grandmother: BURMASHAVE. Before your time.
• Lake Wobegon Days: Referenced in a sketch about a character's Aunt Mary, who is notorious for reading billboards aloud on car trips.
  Don't drive so fast
  Among the pines
  Aunt Mary likes
  To read our signs

  Burma-Shave
• In the Diesel Punk short Rolling Steel: A Pre-Apocalyptic Love Story, Topper is on a mission to steal some steel for his Awesome Personnel Carrier.
  "W-74," Topper sang out. "Tungsten steel. Hard as a shield, cuts like a blade, keep it sharp, never be late... Burma Shave!"

Live-Action TV

• Sam encounters a Burma-Shave ad in the Quantum Leap pilot.
• Hee Haw occasionally presented gags in the form of Burma-Shave signs — filmed out a slowly-moving car window for that genuine experience.
  • Every episode of Jean Shepherd's America began that way, possibly with actual Burma-Shave signs.
• One of the "driving-to-California" episodes of I Love Lucy originally had a scene where Lucy reads some Burma-Shave signs aloud. This was excised from the syndication cut, although it's included as a bonus on the season 4 DVD.
• The final episode of M*A*S*H has Hawkeye placed in a mental hospital after suffering a severe emotional breakdown. After counseling sessions with Sidney Freedman, he's reassigned to the 4077th; as he's being driven back by jeep, the driver points out a series of homemade signs that the rest of the staff have put up along the road to welcome him back:
  Hawk was gone
  Now he's here
  Dance 'til dawn
  Give a cheer

  Burma-Shave
  • Also referenced in the episode "C*A*V*E". When Hawkeye and Houlihan prepare to drive from the cave where everyone is bunking during heavy shelling to the main camp to perform a life-saving operation on a patient, Hawkeye quips, "Don't drive too fast, I wanna read the Burma-Shave signs."
  • And in "Deluge". After B.J. recites part of a poem during a break from surgery, Hawkeye notes that he knows a lot of poetry, to which B.J. jokes that he "went to school on a scholarship from Burma-Shave".
• The Marvelous Mrs. Maisel: In the fourth episode, during Red Skelton's comedy set, he riffs on the size of the Fontainblaine Hotel: "From your bedroom to the bathroom, they've got Burma-Shave signs!"

Music

• Roger Miller did a song (later covered by The Everly Brothers) about the adverts called, of course, "Burma Shave".
• "Burma-Shave" is the title of a song from Tom Waits' album Foreign Affairs telling the tale of two urban runaways searching for someplace to escape to. The verses are set up to always end on name the titular product, as if tracking their progress down the lonely highways. It doesn't turn out well.

Theatre

• The Flying Karamazov Brothers' production of William Shakespeare's The Comedy of Errors references these signs;
  Adriana: Come, I will fasten on this sleeve of thine:
  Thou art an elm, my husband, I a vine,
  Whose weakness, married to thy stronger state,
  Makes me with thy strength to communicate.
  Antipholus of Syracuse: Was that Rod McKuen?
  Dromio of Syracuse: Burma-Shave, I think.

Video Games

• Avernum 3 contains the following series of billboards, which doesn't quite follow the meter.
  Before they send us
  To the grave
  Alien beasts use
  Burma-Shave
• One of the video games for the Color Computer emblazoned with the Game Over screen with a short poem:
  Ashes to ashes
  Dust to dust
  Your game is over
  Replay if you must

  Burma-Shave
• Enchanter: The road leading west from the starting point has signs along it writing out a message one word at a time in the style of Burma-Shave billboards.
  Why
  are
  you
  going
  west
  when
  the
  castle
  is
  east?
  Burma
  Shave
• Glider PRO has a series of rooms whose titles are a Burma-Shave poem... with the last one being named, of course, 'Burma-Shave!'(complete with exclamation mark).
• Sandcastle Builder has one in the description of the 'Panther Glaze' boost, which doesn't really rhyme:
  Early cat
  Takes the blocks
  But the late
  Brings the chips

  Panther Glaze
• The messages in Brick Road's dungeons in EarthBound (1994) are reminiscent of this campaign, as they are short and he ends each one with "...Brick Road".
• Kingdom of Loathing has a spirit speaking in rhyme, ending its Fetch Quest request with a "Burma-Shave".

Webcomics

• xkcd has a reference:
  On Twitter feeds
  An odd regression:
  Ancient memes
  Find new expression

  Burma-shave
• Square Root of Minus Garfield has a version of the signs:
  Beware of Dog
  He'll eat your kitten!
  You Must Be This Tall to be Bitten

  Burma-Shave
• When Cyanide and Happiness did one with grave stones, it was flagged as being too old a reference on the blog Comics I Don't Understand.

Web Original

• Gaia Online's online RPG zOMG! has a series of trash cans in the Bassken Lake area with lines written on them. Put together, the lines say:
  To kiss a mug
  That's like a cactus
  Takes more nerve
  Than it does practice

  Burpa-Shave

Western Animation

• In an episode of Rocky and Bullwinkle, Rocky is lured into a trap by a series of signs:
  Do not turn back
  Go on instead
  Your friend the moose
  Is just ahead

  Boris-Shave
• The Looney Tunes classic "Rabbit Seasoning" begins with Daffy putting up "rabbit season" signs, starting with this:
  If you're looking for fun
  You don't need a reason
  All you need is a gun
  It's rabbit season!
  • In Fastest With The Mostest the Coyote plants similar signs to lure the Road-Runner into a trap:
    Anxieties and ulcers
    Come from excessive speed.
    Slow down!
    Live longer!
    Use Tranquilized Bird Seed!
• In the Tom and Jerry short "Sleepy-Time Tom," Jerry lures Tom to a bed towards the end with these signs:
  Are you sleepy?
  Want a bed?
  Solid comfort
  Straight ahead
• The Tex Avery short Northwest Hounded Police has this when Droopy, as Sgt. McPoodle, begins to chase the wolf down.
  Don't look now—
  Use your noodle—
  You're being followed—
  by Sgt. McPoodle
• In the 1940s Popeye short "Shape Ahoy," Popeye and Bluto moved to a deserted island to escape the perils of women, and put up the following warning signs:
  No dames
  No hens
  No skirts
  No wrens
  This island is only for mens!

  Durma-Shave
• One episode of Garfield and Friends had Garfield and Odie do this to Jon:
  Your cat and dog
  Are getting thinner
  Stop your work
  And go make dinner
• In The Flintstones episode "Divided We Sail", while a sea serpent is dragging the houseboat that the Flintstones and Rubbles are on, Fred and Barney spot signs on buoys on the lake. It doesn't quite follow the traditional pattern, but it's in the same spirit.
  If you're queazy
  Sailing on the wave
  Just open your mouth
  Shout Terra Firma Shave^note "Terra firma" is "solid land" in Latin

Theme Parks

• The Worlds of Fun theme park near Kansas City, MO had an ride with rail-guided cars called Le Taxitour which featured one of these along the route (spaced quite closely together, because the cars didn't go very fast).
  On winding roads
  And steep inclines
  Please watch the road
  And not the signs

  Burma-Shave

Real Life

• The House on the Rock in Spring Green, Wisconsin has a large collection of these somewhere inside.
• Real Life: Commuters who walk from the 1, 2, 3 train station to the A, C, E train station at Times Square in New York City has a Burma-Shave inspired poem called The Commuter's Lament that hangs on the ceiling of the underpass:
  Overslept,
  So tired.
  If late,
  Get fired.
  Why bother?
  Why the pain?
  Just go home
  Do it again.
  (Picture of a bed with two pillows)
  • The installation was made in 1991 and was supposed to be temporary - it's still there. The artist, Norman B. Colp, passed away in 2007.
• Advertisements for Florida's SunPass system (where you pre-pay tolls and get a little doohickey to speed you through booths) is done in the style of Burma-Shave signs, spaced so that they're not too fast to read even on the high way.
• Humor columnist Lewis Grizzard wrote an article about Rosie Ruiz, who was accused of cheating in the Boston Marathon by slipping into the race shortly before the finish line. He suggested several tests to prevent this, including a set of these signs at five-mile intervals. After the race, each finisher would have to recite the rhyme. For example:
  Here sits Rosie
  Brokenhearted
  She finished fine
  But she never started

  Burma-Shave
• A lot of British readers were first introduced to the adverts by Bill Bryson's books about America. Additionally, due to the passage of time and regional differences, a lot of Americans were first introduced to the adverts by the same.
• The village of Sublette, Illinois has a modern reproduction set of these just outside the south end of town on U.S. Route 52, posted by Reminisce Magazine:
  WELCOME TO SUBLETTE'S Burma-Shave MEMORY LANE
  Reminisce MAGAZINE
  "FIVE HUNDRED BUCKS
  FOR A BIKE?" GRAMPS ROARED
  "PAID LESS THAN THAT
  FOR MY '39 FORD"

  Burma-Shave

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