A Unique Back Cover Advertisement Variant

[George Thomas Wilson]

A Unique Back Cover Advertisement Variant

On the back cover of the February 1984 National Geographic Magazine there is a variant in the advertisement.  Most issues contain an advertisement for Canon Cameras while the rarer variant is an ad that Nathan described as the first ever Liquor advertisement in the magazine.

Photo by Jeff Persons

As can be seen in the next photo there is no difference to the front cover of this issue.

Photo by Jeff Persons

The final photo shows the spines of the two variants.  Specifically, the rarer variant has a sticker across it stating that it is the Atlantic Edition.  I don't know what that means (I live in Baltimore and my copy is the Canon ad).

Photo by Jeff Persons

I'd like to thank Jeff Persons for providing the photos and information about this variant.

Tom Wilson

[George Thomas Wilson]

Stephen Zamarin posted this to the Group bulletin board instead of this discussion:

Comment by stephen zamarin 20 hours ago
The February 1984 back cover with Campari was probably an overseas edition meant for Great Britain and Continental Europe. I have Several Geographics from 1983 that came from overseas that have Campari ads on the backcover as well as at least one in the inside of the magazine. National Geographic overseas copies have radically different advertising pages than what United States issues have. The Geographic had been doing this at least since 1971.

Also, I forgot to mention that Jeff Person stated that this "Atlantic Edition" has several addition ads in the front of the magazine.  This also hints that this wasn't the US/Canada version.