How many of these things can you remember?

[Cliptin]

1. Candy cigarettes
   
2. Coke-shaped bottles made of wax with colored sugar water inside
   
3. Soda pop machines that dispensed glass bottles
   
4. Coffee shops with tableside juke boxes
   
5. Blackjack, Clove and Teaberry chewing gum
   
6. Home milk delivery in glass bottles
   
7. Party lines
   
8. Newsreels before the movie
   
9. P. F. Flyers
   
10. Butch wax
    
11. Telephone numbers with a word prefix
    
12. Peashooters
    
13. Howdy Doody
    
14. 45 RPM Records
    
15. Green Stamps
    
16. Hi-fi's
    
17. Metal ice cube trays with levers
    
18. Mimeograph paper
    
19. Blue flash bulbs
    
20. Beanie and Cecil
    
21. Roller skate keys
    
22. Cork pop guns
    
23. Drive-ins
    
24. Studebakers
    
25. Wash tub wringers
    
26. The Fuller Brush man
    
27. Reel-to-reel tape recorders
    
28. Tinkertoys
    
29. The Erector Set
    
30. Lincoln Logs
    
31. 15 cent McDonald's hamburgers
    
32. 5 cent packs of baseball cards with pink bubblegum inside
    
33. Penny candy
    
34. 35 cent-a-gallon gasoline

 

[The Giver]

Too many. I recall McDonalds advertized the 47 cent meal of a hamburger, fries and a milk shake when they first appeared when I was 15. Believe it or not when I was a kid there was no such thing as "fast food".

 

[jtr1962]

1,2,3,15,16,17,18,19,21,27,28,30,34

 

[Mercutio]

1, 2, 3, 4, 8, 16, 18, 22, 23, 28. 29, 30, 33

 

[mubs]

1, 2, 3, 6, 8, 12, 14, 15, 16, 17, 18, 19, 22, 23, 24, 27, 29.

Some of these are culture-specific and so don't apply to me; I grew up in another country.

 

[Buck]

1,3,4,5,6,7,9,12,14,16,17,18,19,21,22,23,27,27,29,30,32,33

Many of the items listed I was not able to partake of as a young lad, but I remember them just the same. Drive-ins really aren't that old or outdated, are they? The best thing about 45s is that they last - they've outlasted many cassette singles and all of my 8-track recordings. Peashooters were nice, but if you want to inflict pain, a straw, rubberband, and a toothpick makes a kid look like North Korea.

 

[P5-133XL]

1, 3, 4, 6, 9, 11, 12, 14, 15, 16, 17, 18, 19, 20, 21, 22, 23, 27, 28, 29, 30, 32, 33, 34

 

[Dïscfärm]

If #9 was a crappy form of canvas shoe (as we called 'em way back when) then... ALL OF THEM!

But, then again, I can remember back to when I was 1 ~ 1-1/2 years old without much problem.

 

[Dïscfärm]

Excuse me, NOT #8. But, I have seen them before. However, I believe newsclips at the beginning of motion picture films were already done with by the mid 1950s.

 

[JSF]

All except 2, 9, 20, 21 and 31.

The consumer items in this group were not available in British Columbia when I was a child. My home town at this time did not have a MacDonalds Hamburgers.

Last September I gave to charity a working, electric, washing machine with wringers. It belonged to my aunt in B.C., who had recently died.

Joe.

 

[Mercutio]

I actually know where to buy candy cigarettes and wax "sodas". Those things are still around.

The $1 second-run theater in the town where I live appends a short-subject to every feature it shows. The old man who runs the place collects them. Go to the late night showing and it'll be something like a US Navy VD education film, but it can be anything from NFL films to newsclips from the Korean war to driver education movies. My favorites are the 50s-era shorts about dating and manners that get shown on Friday nights.

 

[Cliptin]

1,2,3,4,7,8,14,15,16,19,23,25,27,29,30

 

[Cliptin]

1,2,3,4,7,8,14,15,16,19,23,25,27,29,30

and 18
Didn't know it was called that.
I seem to have left out 28 too.

 

[Dozer]

1,2,3,4,7,8,14,15,16,17,18,19,23,25,27,28,29,30

 

[Jake the Dog]

although this is obviously directed at our resident 'mercans; and despite the fact that I'm an Aussie in my early 30's, I thought I'd give it a go anyhoo.

4, 6, 17, 19, 22, 23, 27.

did I score well dad?

 

[Cliptin]

did I score well dad?

You are funny. It's hard to tell what and how fast stuff makes it outside the states especially in enough quantity to be culturally signifigant. Oh, and TTBOMK among the respondents to this thread only Merc is younger than me, son.

 

[Mercutio]

What's your point old man?

I'm a very crotchety 27. Ask anyone.

Actually the worst is finding out that most of my students have been working longer than I've been alive. Especially when I start referring to something that happened five years ago as "...in the old days". Dog years and Computer Years have a lot in common, I think, but it drives them nuts.

 

[Buck]

Speaking of old and cranky, Tannin hasn't responded to this thread. Tea is too young for any of this.

 

[blakerwry]

1, 2, 3, 5, 7, 14, 16, 19, 22, 23, 28, 30

I'm 20 years old... am I the newborn here?

 

[time]

How embarassing. Have we driven all the young whippersnappers away?

 

[Buck]

How embarassing. Have we driven all the young whippersnappers away?

Twenty is certainly young, as is 30 and maybe even 40. Well, okay, maybe 40 isn't exactly young-young, but it sure isn't old by any means. Don't forget we have Tea, she is only 3 (if my memory is working properly).

 

[Bartender]

Tea is not to young for any of this. She may be only 3 or 4, but she is very experienced.

 

[jtr1962]

Twenty is certainly young, as is 30 and maybe even 40. Well, okay, maybe 40 isn't exactly young-young, but it sure isn't old by any means.

40 is still very young as far as I'm concerned. I turned 40 this past November 30 and frankly, I still feel the same as I did in high school. I don't look much different either other than that my hair is slightly different now(a bit longer than it used to be and combed differently).

My mom's 64, my dad's 68. I don't think of my mom as old by any means. She still has hardly any gray. Until she needed hip replacement she could just about keep up with me walking, and I don't walk slow. She just had the second hip done, so once she gets out of rehab and heals a few months hopefully she'll be back to normal.

My dad's another story. He acts like the proverbial old fart, although he always did, even when he was younger than me. He could also stand to lose about 100 pounds. Carrying around that much extra weight will slow anyone down.

 

[Fushigi]

#24, Studebakers are not dead: http://www.studebakerdriversclub.com/NewsPapers/BusinessWeek/Default.htm

Looks like a Tonka to me.

- Fushigi

 

[mubs]

I'm having difficulty remembering (too old :wink, Studebakers were notorius for something, weren't they? Failing gearboxes, I think. IIRC, chronic gearbox problems tarnished the company's otherwise stellar reputation and killed 'em off.

 

[.Nut]

The vast majority of that list is Americana, circa the 1960s.

 

[blakerwry]

How old are Black and white TV's? Anybody here currently own or ever own one?

 

[Dïscfärm]

How old are Black and white TV's? Anybody here currently own or ever own one?

You can still buy black-and-white (monochrome) television sets. I bought a new one just last year (RCA).

 

[Cliptin]

There is one at my parent's house. One of those TV/Radio combination jobs.

 

[blakerwry]

I was just wondering if full size B&W tv's were still around... I should have mentioned full size... however, even in the sub 13" catagory color seems to be more popular than B&W here in the midwest US....

 

[jtr1962]

How old are Black and white TV's? Anybody here currently own or ever own one?

We didn't get color until I think 1967 or thereabouts. I think it was the second season of Star Trek because it really was a big deal at the time for me to watch that show in color. Before that we had a huge B&W console with a 21" screen, I think. The thing broke quite a bit, too, and the picture quality was nothing to write home about by today's standards. I remember going with my father to use the tube testers in the local drug stores and buying replacements. TVs have come a long way. The one in my bedroom is 21 years old and still working well. In fact, I just opened the back last week and fixed the focus and a few other settings that you can't change with the dials on the side.

You can still buy small B&W TVs. They're around $20 or thereabouts right now. I have a 5" one in my work room downstairs. Unfortunately, my reception stinks since the WTC fell down. Damned terrorists.

 

[Mickey]

[*]Candy cigarettes

Yep. Elementary school.

[*]45 RPM Records

Had to wait till I got to college before I saw them, as my folks didn't have records in the house.

[*]Hi-fi's

Dad had a nice one.

[*]Mimeograph paper

If it's that stuff with purple printing, with that "ditto paper" smell that teachers handed out for homework, then yes.

[*]Drive-ins

Seen one, live near one, never been to one.

[*]Reel-to-reel tape recorders

Dad dug one out when cleaning house a while back.

[*]Tinkertoys

Used them in grad school for a robotics class.

[*]The Erector Set

Wanted a set, but they were too expensive. Got Lego instead.

[*]Lincoln Logs

Yep. Friend had them.

[*]5 cent packs of baseball cards with pink bubblegum inside

They were 25 cents when I was 5.

[*]Penny candy

They still existed, but the candy wasn't very good.