Carnation Milk poster of Tigner quadruplets

Collection

Identifier: Coll 947

Staff Only

Scope and Contents

The collection consists of a single color poster advertising Carnation Milk and featuring images of August Joe Tigner, Beatrice Jopsephine Tigner, Carole Jessie Mae Tigner, and Dee Jerry Tigner, Black quadruplets from Portland, Oregon. The poster says that the Tigners are four years old and "still thriving" on Carnation Milk.

Dates

1950

Creator

Carnation Milk Products Company (Organization)

Conditions Governing Access

Collection is open for research.

Conditions Governing Use

The Oregon Historical Society owns the materials in the Research Library and makes available reproductions for research, publication, and other uses. The Society does not necessarily hold copyright to all materials in the collections. In some cases, permission for use may require seeking additional authorization from copyright owners.

Biographical Note

On August 23, 1946, Lucille Tigner, a Black woman from Portland, Oregon, gave birth to quadruplets, whom she and her husband, L. D. Tigner, named Joe, Josephine, Jessie May, and Jerry N. Soon after the quadruplets' birth, the Carnation Milk Company secured a contract with L. D. Tigner and Lucille Tigner that provided an estate of $25,000 for the quadruplets and a five-year supply of Carnation Milk, in exchange for use of the children's image for advertising. The contract also required that the children drink Carnation Milk exclusively; that the parents could use only 10 percent of the funds for their own needs or the needs of their other children; and that the quadruplets be placed under the guardianship of attorney Alton J. Basset, who was white.

A month after their birth, the quadruplets' names were changed to August Joseph, Beatrice Josephine, Carole Jessie Mae, and Dee Jerry. This led to local newspapers referring to the siblings as the "ABCD babies" or "Alphabet babies." They were featured in a Carnation Milk ad in Ebony Magazine in 1949, and on a Carnation Milk poster in 1950; no other known advertisements featuring the Tigners were produced.

Despite the sponsorship from Carnation, the Tigner family faced financial difficulty. Following the divorce of L. D. Tigner and Lucille Tigner, August Joe and Dee Jerry lived at St. Mary's Home for Boys in Beaverton, Oregon, while Beatrice Josephine and Carole Jessie Mae lived at Marylhurst College's Christie School. They reunited once a year for their birthday, and for a two-week camping trip in 1955. By 1964, August Joe and Dee Jerry were living with their mother again, while Beatrice Josephine and Carole Jessie Mae shared an apartment.

Beatrice Josephine Tigner died in 1988; Dee Jerry Tigner died in 1994; and Carole Jessie Mae Tigner died in 2001.

Sources: Articles in the Oregonian, 1946-1964; "Skimmed: Breastfeeding, Race, and Injustice," by Andrea Freeman (Stanford, Calif.: Stanford University Press, 2020), pages 66-72; vital and family tree records on Ancestry.com.

Extent

0.15 Cubic Feet (1 oversize folder (20x24) in shared flat box)

Language of Materials

English

Additional Description

Abstract

Carnation Milk poster showing the Tigner quadruplets of Portland, Oregon, at age four. The Tigners were Black fraternal quadruplets born in 1946; they were sponsored by Carnation Milk for advertising purposes, though only two known advertisements featuring them were produced.

Immediate Source of Acquisition

Gift of Rosalie Schmitz, July 2021 (RL2021-067).

Related Materials

Photographs of the Tigner quadruplets are included in the Al Monner news negatives, Org. Lot 1284, Oregon Historical Society Research Library; three of these, taken in 1947, 1949, and 1958, are available online in OHS Digital Collections.