Old Timer Memories

Was talking to my coworkers the other day about my childhood and thought it might be interesting to get others memories. Anyone remember when:

Cigarettes were a quarter in the machine and there was two cents change wrapped in the cellophane?
Vending machines

Root beer floats were a dime at the soda fountain…all you could drink.
Soda fountains…

Telephones had a dial but you dialed “0” to get the operater to place a call

Yo Yo tournements (sp) at the local corner store
corner store

Buster Brown show on sat morning tv

Real cartoons on sat morning tv

A half hour of cartoons before the main feature at the sat movies

That should be enough to spark some memories, huh?

And YES I do have the shack nasties and am awaiting the Pa Fish- in…

Bernie

How bout the X-ray shoe fitting machines . I have a few more but don’t want to “hog” the topic. After all memory and old-timers are a mild OXYMORON.

Mark

When I go to: http://oldtimefishinggear.com/ and see fishing stuff I used to use as a kid it brings back memories. Do you remember buying split shot in little metal tins that slid open? Some of those tins we used to discard are now selling for 10 bucks a pop.

Tim

Well, I recall that when I was a little kid, back around the early 1870s, we had a fair in town and my daddy, who was a gambling man when he wasn’t an officer at one of the banks, had our family portrait done, then went out and had himself a couple gunfights in the street that day. This is one of three or four photos in existence of me wearing any sort of tie. That is me in front on the right.

I remember grape and strawberry Nehi in the pop machine across the street. First in the courthouse building (background of the photo), but my sisters had to take me over there. Second place was across the street at a service station (remember SERVICE at stations?).

The first fishing car I recall was Dad’s '63 Chrysler, with the canoe rack. My oldest sister’s boyfriend at the time, Claire Hoblitzer, backed it down the boat ramp into the lake when the brakes failed one day. I think Dad still misses that car. I don’t think my sister misses Claire, tho, but you never know.

“Gas wars” at the gas stations with gas at .09 a gallon. And that isn’t a typo–9 cents a gallon!!

I remember…

When we had no television, and Mom played the radio in our kitchen every Sunday after church while she fixed our biggest weekly meal

walking a mile each way to elementary school, which never closed for a snow day

Collecting and returning pop bottles for the $0.02 deposit, so I could buy the biggest candy bars in the store for $0.05 each

Watching Negro league baseball games when “coloreds” lived in the Quarters on the other side of town

The Ed Sullivan show

How about these…

Polio Shots.
“LSMFT”
The Atomic Bomb drill “duck and cover”
A Davy Crockett Coon’s Skin Hat
A Ballentine Blast in Ebbet’s Field
May’s playing center field at the Polo Grounds on a sunny day
“Irene Good Night”, Shrimps Boats Are A’Comin", When The Moon Hits Your Eye Like A Big Pizza Pie"…Hit Parade
Stick Ball
My Dad’s pay stub for a weeks wages…$24.64
Dad’s bamboo fly rod with the automatic fly reel

The list goes on.

Delivering 100 newspapers for a buck a day - six days a week, on a bike, in any weather, and Saturday’s paper was a BIG one.

I spent a lot of time hanging around the one store in town that sold fly tying materials (about 1956). It took hours to decide on the necessary material for that week and how to best spend my one dollar allowance. The dollar actually bought a pretty good amount of material at those prices.

Universal Vise Co. 10 cent card of Chenille

Stanley’s Fly Tying Wool 10 cents.

Pack of 12 saddle hackle 15 cents
Pack of 24 saddle hackle 25 cents

Tying Wax 10 cents

Spool of Tying Thread or Tinsel 15 cents

Hooks 10-15 cents a dozen

Then there were the things that we just dreams like half a jungle cock neck for $5, well out of my price range for years. 8T :slight_smile:

BTW John, I earned 15 cents a bushel picking apples after school. A kid my size could manage about 7 bushels in an afternoon.

Listen to the “SHADOW”,all we had were bamboo fly rods and later a hollow steel rod. BILL

John: You made me remember my employment as an ice cream salesman. I spent all day pedaling my cart around a designated section of Salt Lake City and I got 20% of the sales. I pedaled until I made $1.20 for the day. I used the 20 cents for bus fair and the buck to make payments on my latest sporting good buy at Al’s Sporting Goods in downtown SLC. I really thought I was big time having a charge account at the age of 12. Later on I realized that my dad had set the whole thing up with Al and was my backer. We laughed about that for years.

Tim

Bill, I listen to the Shadow almost every week. Satellite radio.

J.J. Newberry’s

“Who knows what evil lurks in the heart of man …”

Your making me feel young,

How about this one

Purchases from a store, in paper and tied with string.

Eric

Yup, my wife and I each had the collapsible hollow steel fly rods. They twisted. We then each bought the upgrade, square or hex, not sure, but they didn’t twist. We met many years later, but seem to have had similar roots.

Worked at a Texaco gas station after school and during the weekends. Pumped gas at 32.9 cents per gallon and checked the oil, cleaned the windshields, headlights and tail lights while the gas was pumping. People would drive up and say, “give me 5”, which meant they wanted 5 gallons not dollars. At noon I would go to the soda shop and have a cheeseburger, large milkshake (made with milk and ice cream) and a large order of fries. All would cost me 75 cents.

TV shows:

Sugarfoot
Johnny Rebel
Have Gun Will Travel
Gun Smoke
Wagon Train
Red Skelton
Lone Ranger

and on, and on, and on…

Here’s one for the “mature” generation. I remember Gunsmoke on the radio. Does anyone know who played Matt Dillon? Think rotund and detective years later.
Bernie

How about Lash Larue…the cowboy on saturdays that brought the bad guys down with his whip.

First 3d movie I ever saw was some western that starred Randolp Scott. Don’t remember the name but that flaming arrow was coming right for me.

The milk was delivered to the house and the cream would rise to the top of the bottle…my Grandmother would always pop the top and stick it to my cheek.

Bernie

And the milk delivered in the winter would freeze and pop the top…

Farley, that was William Conrad, wasn’t it? He was on a lot of series back then.

Family legend has it that my maternal grandmother was the justice of the peace who presided at Tom Mix’s wedding in Medora, ND. Back when.