 Elsie first appeared as one of four cartoon cows (with Mrs. Blossom, Bessie, and Clara) in a 1936 magazine advertisement series featured in medical journals.By 1939, she was featured in her own advertisement campaign that was voted "best of the year" by the Jury of the 1939 Annual Advertising Awards.The first living Elsie was a registered Jersey heifer selected while participating in Borden's 1939 New York World's Fair "Rotolactor" exhibit (demonstrating the company's invention, the rotary milking parlor).