Do You Remember When

[TheWolfPaq82]

Rexall Drug, Candy dots on paper rolls. Cold pop in the cooler at the mom and pop grocery store. Bottle opener on the side. Jackie Gleason on Saturday nights. Nothing open on Sunday.

[Librarianocnj]

Various memories. Gas lights and lamplighter on street. Pretzel vendor pushing cart in summer, roasted chestnuts in winter. Organ grinder with his monkey. Sticking one butt cheek in front of fire hydrants (turned on illegally) to spray the other kids. Pimple balls. Party line phone. (Remember DoDo in “Pillow Talk.” Serials at the movies with a bag of N... Babies. Friend in iron lung. “Duck and Cover.”

[rsdata]

On a lighter note I remember when people went to the movies on hot days because the theaters were often the only place in town with air conditioning.

Late 50's...

Saturday matinee at the movies. Cheap entertainment with a double feature on hot summer days. 50 cents got you admission, popcorn, a drink and a nickle candy bar. You could walk to the theater at noon and be home by supper time. Watch some Vincent Price scary movie, a cartoon, and a travel log.

[Cb25 Joe]

Red Skeleton, Bonanza and free Saturday morning matinee with RC cola bottle caps.

[Oaklevel]

Our phone was on a party line. Had to wait if someone else was using.

Went to Nelson's for a 10 cent snow cone, they added the cherry flavor to a Cherry Coke.

LPs were $4, 45s were 50 cents.

Gas was 39cents, a complete brake job was $40 A new Mustang cost around $2500.

Walked to school, movies, the hobby shop, the grocery store.

Built plastic models, balsa wood planes. flew gas planes on a cord (round and round). Rode bike across town with no worries.

Sat on the front porch and listened to the high school game with Grandpa, on the radio. AM only. 3 TV chanels in black and white.

Returnable glass coke and milk bottles.

[Oaklevel]

One big thing I remember Grandma and Grandpa going to the basement to shovel coal into the furnace. And the coal man delivering the coal. Had a coal room in he basement.

Did not have AC until the 1970s in the car either.



Our first camper did not have AC or an awning. Lights were on a seperate 12V or 110V system. One waste tank the gray and black were combined.

[railroaderone]

gas filler behind the license plate gas tanks behind the seats of trucks, kressee, all the shopping was downtown every railroad had passenger trains, no seat belts in cars, no car seats for kids, cutting hay with a mowing scye, paddles in school and prayer in school

[HangDiver]

I had to get up off the couch to change the channels. I could also dial a phone number and get the time and temperature.

[cc102bob]

Originally Posted by wmtire

As a child though, my favorite place was Burger Chef. Another place in memory only.

ZOIKS! Your Burger Chef must have been waaaay better than mine! We had one right next to our house for a few years when I was a kid. We could go place an order, go home, cook up a burger, eat it, then go back to the Burger Chef and our order might be ready. We were never sure how that place lasted as long as it did.

I remember having family TV night every Saturday evening. Wonderful World of Disney, Carol Burnett, Hee Haw... I don't really remember if they were all on Saturday, but I know we watched them regularly.

[Iwannacamp]

Originally Posted by HangDiver

I had to get up off the couch to change the channels. I could also dial a 7-digit phone number and get the time and temperature.

You can still dial the time and temp here

870-774-8463... of course you have to dial the whole number

[mikenkyle05]

I remember Western Auto, Ben Franklin and TV's going off the air at night. Sunday nights were Walt Disney movies.

[emm-dee]

We had a seven digit phone number, but the first two were letters.

[Platokidd]

Originally Posted by emm-dee

We had a seven digit phone number, but the first two were letters.

Yup x2. And drank from the garden hose and survived

[dbledan]

Best night of my life was when the transformer got struck by lightning frying many things in the house. With that I was no longer the tv remote (except for power), we got a microwave (one of the first ones), a new stereo, and that god awful tube organ stopped working so I no longer had to practice.

Back then all the phones in the house still had dials and my best friends number had four 8s in it....took forever to call him. We had to answer with more than just hello..._____ residence, dan speaking.

My parents used to put us to bed, call the neigbors house and leave the phone in the hallway to "babysit". We rode bikes all day with no protection anywhere we wanted and just had to be home for dinner. Carpool for school was 17 kids (private school no busses) sitting in the back of the station wagon or floor of a van not even enough seats let alone belts.

Now some things are coming back like sitting in the driveway with neighbors having beers and letting kids play. Family dinners and activities, walks with the family and hanging out on the porch front or back and stores closed on Thanksgiving.

[TitanMike]

Originally Posted by Platokidd

Yup x2. And drank from the garden hose and survived

Drinking from the hose was just one of many things we survived. How about taking off with your friends after lunch on your bikes and not showing up back home until dinner.
When asked where you all went you just said "out riding". As kids we knew the town better than a taxi driver.

[wmtire]

I wasn't necessarily the tv remote, but being the youngest, I was the one sent outside to turn the antenna, while my siblings yelled at me when to stop. I can remember us getting an electric motor that that you could control from inside the house to do that job.

Originally Posted by cc102bob

ZOIKS! Your Burger Chef must have been waaaay better than mine! We had one right next to our house for a few years when I was a kid. We could go place an order, go home, cook up a burger, eat it, then go back to the Burger Chef and our order might be ready. We were never sure how that place lasted as long as it did.

I guess it was, as we had more than one.


I can remember my mom timing her grocery shopping to get double S&H green stamps.

[Wattsworld]

Talking of Burger King, does anyone remember Burger Queen? It wasn't around very long. The first phone I remember had only 4 numbers to dial. You could dial the operator and she would give you the time and temp.
At gas stations if you bought so many gallons of gas you got a free glass.
Grocery stores if you bought so much groceries you could get a free plate, cup, bowl, or what ever was being offered at that time. My wife and I have a set from when we first got married.
You could use a clothes pin to hang a card from a deck of cards to rub against the spokes to make your bike sound like a motor cycle.
Saturday Mornings watching tv with Howdy Doody, the long ranger, Cisco Kid, plunk your magic twanger froggy from Andy's Gang with Andy

Devine.

Listening on a crystal radio at night to radio shows like Amos and Andy, The Shadow, Abbot and Costello, so many others from funny to scary you could let your mind take you where ever you wanted to go.

You could get anywhere from 2 cents for a pop bottle to a nickel for a milk bottle. We use to collect coat hangers and sell them to the local dry cleaners for a penny each. I remember milk being delivered by a horse drawn milk wagon and the milk man would leave the milk on your front porch. The cream would be at the top of the milk bottle and you had to shake it to get the cream to mix with the milk.

Shoe stores had machines called

fluoroscopes that when you tried on a new pair of shoes you stood with your feet in the front of the fluoroscope and it would x-ray your feet where you could see your bones of your feet inside of the shoes to let you know if they fit. Never mind having your feet x-rayed a number of times in a short time.

We didn't have school buses where I went to school but sometimes if I was good, Mom or Dad would give me a dime to ride the city bus.

Going down town to do our shopping was a big thing back then. All the name stories had big ceiling fans hanging down to cool off the shoppers. Later as the store got air-conditioners the fans were removed. We returned to the town of my childhood on a visit 10 or 15 years ago and some of the stores were going back to the fans to help cool the shoppers.

In the 1950's the largest tv screen was a 16 inch tv. Our family had one of the first in our neighborhood and it's screen was 11 inches. When we first got the tv there was only 1 station but 2 more stations started up soon after we got our tv.

[nomad297]

McDonald’s apple pies when they were deep fried.

My sister told me they still do it that way in Hawaii.

Bruce

[nomad297]

You could have a fight at school and not go to jail or get expelled.

Bruce

[whirledpeaz]

Originally Posted by nomad297

McDonald’s apple pies when they were deep fried.

My sister told me they still do it that way in Hawaii.

Bruce

That's it!!! I'm going to Hawaii!