The name "Coppertone" signifies the copper-colored skin tone sun worshippers strive to obtain.

Dr. Benjamin Green, a physician from Miami, Florida, helped the United States military develop sunscreen to protect soldiers stationed in the South Pacific during World War II from getting severe sunburns. After the war, he noticed that tourists in Miami used all kinds of home-made concoctions to bronze in the sun. He began experimenting with different formulas, using his own bald head as a testing ground, until he came up with the recipe for Coppertone suntan cream with the essence of jasmine in 1944.

A picture of an Indian chief was on the first bottles of Coppertone, accompanied by the slogan "Don't be a Paleface." Little Miss Coppertone replaced him in 1953.

To figure out how many hours of protection you can expect from a sunscreen, take the number of minutes it takes your skin to start burning without sunscreen, multiply by the sun protection factor (SPF) printed on the bottle of Coppertone, and divide the result by 60. For instance, if you usually burn in 30 minutes, an SPF 8 lotion should protect you for approximately 4 hours.

The higher the SPF of a sunscreen, the higher the price.

The higher in the sky the sun is, the higher the SPF number you need. Also, the closer to the equator you are, the stronger the sunscreen you need.

Never use a sunscreen that is more than a year old. Abide by the expiration dates.

As a child, actress Jodie Foster appeared in Coppertone commercials.

I remember Sea And Ski suntan products back in the 60's; they used the old Charlie Rich tune "Mohair Sam" to hawk it on TV. Nowadays stuff such as Bain de Soleil and Hawaiian Tropic give Coppertone competition. And despite warnings about the risk of skin cancer from sun exposure people still go out to get tan! (or go to tanning salons!) tjoeb};>

I teach and translate in a research laboratory that makes these products, and the employees constantly come back from vacation with sunburns! Go figure!