Who Remembers?

[Eric]

Who remembers when there vacuum tube testing stations in supermarkets and convenience stores? There would be a tabletop area with dozens tube sockets, of different configurations. If your old radio or TV or amplifier broke, you would pull out the tubes you thought most likely to be bad and you went down and plugged them into one of those test stands. There would be cubbyholes full of new tubes, on the back above the test board and/or under the top. Remember those?

Who remembers the artists' renderings of scenes from court cases that they always used to show on the news? That was back before cameras were generally let into courtrooms and people were capable of applying a little personal imagination to the artist drawings, to paint a picture i their heads of what was happening.

Who remembers when you used to turn on the TV and then went to the kitchen to get a snack or something, while the tubes heated up? If you timed it right, you would make it back into the living room and get comfortable in your favorite chair, before the image appeared.When you turned those old TVs off, the picture would shrink to that one bright point of light in the center of the screen, which would take a little while to fade. Remember that?

Let's wax nostalgic. What are some things you remember, that the youngsters here have probably never seen?

 

[Batesmotel]

I remember those well. Dad was an electronics technician. I still have a couple of his tube pullers. Look like skinny spaghetti tongs. 

 

A couple of years ago I restored a 1950s Grundig cabinet radio. The first time I turned it on was a blast from the past. 

Click

Humm

Smell Ozone

Tubes light up

Radio slowly gets louder

[Eric]

Just now, Batesmotel said:

I remember those well. Dad was an electronics technician. I still have a couple of his tube pullers. Look like skinny spaghetti tongs. 

 

A couple of years ago I restored a 1950s Grundig cabinet radio. The first time I turned it on was a blast from the past. 

Click

Humm

Smell Ozone

Tubes light up

Radio slowly gets louder

I love that. Remember what the transformer of an electric train set used to smell like, when it had been running a while?

[Batesmotel]

Yes.

I remember putting oil on the heater in the smokestack of a 3 rail O Gage to get it to puff smoke. 

 

 

Do you still expect a gap in the music even when listening to digital files, because that's the way you first heard it on 8 Track?

[Eric]

Just now, Batesmotel said:

Yes.

I remember putting oil on the heater in the smokestack of a 3 rail O Gage to get it to puff smoke. 

 

 

Do you still expect a gap in the music even when listening to digital files, because that's the way you first heard it on 8 Track?

You bet. Remember the cassette tape adapters for 8-track players?

[Smith10]

Orange hot wheels track. Used for 100s of things, like swords.

[Eric]

6 hours ago, Smith10 said:

Orange hot wheels track. Used for 100s of things, like swords.

I Got my butt whipped with those, many times. It was one of my mother's weapons of choice. Those were fun tracks though, otherwise.

Remember ripcord racers?

[Eric]

Who remembers when every self-respecting hotrod on the road was sporting a set of Cragar SuperSport mags?

[Eric]

Who remembers when the largest container you could buy soda pop in was a glass 32oz bottle and was intended for a whole family? I think those bottles weighed more than their contents and they had a good deposit value on them? When I was in third grade, my oldest brother (Who was eleven or twelve) went to the store, to buy a 32oz bottle of Dr Pepper for everyone. On the way back home, he dropped the bottle on the concrete. As the bottle broke, the soda foamed up forcefully enough to launch a piece of the glass into the back of his leg, hitting a small vein or something. He was only about half a block from home when it happened, but by the time he got in the house and removed his shoe, there was enough blood accumulated in his shoe to poor out. AND we didn't get any damned soda!

Who remembers spending summer days on the hunt for soda bottles that paid a deposit, so you could blow the money on more soda and candy? An enterprising kid could keep himself in snack money all summer, if he put some effort into it.

[Smith10]

6 hours ago, Eric said:

I Got my butt whipped with those, many times. It was one of my mother's weapons of choice. Those were fun tracks though, otherwise.

Remember ripcord racers?

I do remember those, and Yep we got whipping more than once with the tracks, 

[Eric]

Who remembers when TVs were furniture?

 

[misterfox]

We had an old black and white TV  --  Tubes.   There were only three channels.

Sometimes the picture would start rolling.....   An enthusiastic stomp on the floor would fix it.  Sometimes.  Or make it worse.

I still have the tube radio I got for my 8th birthday.  AM only.  Maybe, I should get it out and see if it still works.

 

In the summer, us kids would be turned out of the house in the morning.  "It's a nice day  -  get outside".   We would stop home for lunch, then out again.   Our folks didn't ask where we went, or what we did.  

The jungle gyms at the school had concrete under them.  We learned early that bad decisions had immediate and painful consequences.  

 

In the summer, I thought it was very unfair to be sent to bed before it was dark.  Sometimes I could hear my parents and their friends outside talking and laughing.  I couldn't wait to be a 'grown up' so I could stay up late.

Well - being a grown up isn't all I thought it would be.

Sometimes I think my life peaked when I was about six. 

 

 

[Batesmotel]

1 hour ago, Eric said:

You bet. Remember the cassette tape adapters for 8-track players?

I remember 4 Track

I still listen to 78s

I still run a wet darkroom

I remember resetting gas pumps with those big keys after each customer 

i remember those little vacuuming machines with the rotating brush to clean chalkboard erasers at school 

Who remembers Fizzies? The little drink tablets you dropped in water to make flavored soda. Remember when they announced they were toxic?

Remember skates that used a skate key? Remember trying to use them on Keds instead of dress shoes? Remember pounding skates flat to nail them to a 2X4 scooter?

 

[Eric]

2 minutes ago, Batesmotel said:

I remember 4 Track

I still listen to 78s

I still run a wet darkroom

I remember resetting gas pumps with those big keys after each customer 

i remember those little vacuuming machines with the rotating brush to clean chalkboard erasers at school 

Who remembers Fizzies? The little drink tablets you dropped in water to make flavored soda. Remember when they announced they were toxic?

Remember skates that used a skate key? Remember trying to use them on Keds instead of dress shoes? Remember pounding skates flat to nail them to a 2X4 scooter?

 

I remember some of that. I remember those old skates. I only rarely skated and then only at roller rinks. Remember those? That big wooden oval track, surrounded by rib-bruising, teeth breaking rails, with the obligatory disco ball in the center of the ceiling. I don't know if I ever heard a song at a roller rink growing up that wasn't disco. I was never very good on skates, but I managed to roll in straight lines, turn corners and mostly keep the spinning parts under me. Mostly.

Where I was REALLY dangerous was on a skateboard. It is no small wonder that I survived that phase of my childhood. I had some spectacular wipeouts on those damned things.

[limeylad]

I liked lawn darts!  And banana seats and sissy bars!

 

[Eric]

9 minutes ago, limeylad said:

I liked lawn darts!  And banana seats and sissy bars!

 

I wonder why they stopped making bikes with banana seats? They looked cool and it made it a lot easier to take a passenger.

[misterfox]

Fizzies   -  They were pretty awful.  Except Root Beer was kind of OK.   They were fun to use, and even more fun if you just put one in your mouth.....

[limeylad]

Just now, Eric said:

I wonder why they stopped making bikes with banana seats? They looked cool and it made it a lot easier to take a passenger.

and jumping from ramps!  Evil effing Knievel!

[Eric]

5 minutes ago, limeylad said:

and jumping from ramps!  Evil effing Knievel!

Yep. I did that one time on a bike with a regular seat and no rear fender. I ended up bouncing off the seat and landing on top of the spinning rear tire, which caused friction burns and a deep and abiding pain, to places you don't talk about in polite company. I cringe just to think of that afternoon!

[Eric]

Who remembers potholes? I know that we still do get some potholes sometimes and some towns/areas may have it worse than others, but by and large, the pothole scourge in the US has been put to bed. Growing up, freaking potholes were EVERYWHERE. Those things where often deep enough to rip the suspension out from under your car and cars back then were built like tanks, compared to most cars today. Imagine what the roads in 1960's or 1970's America would do to a Prius? I don't know what specific advances or changes were made to make roads so much more durable, but the difference between then and now is huge.

[Speleothem]

1 hour ago, Eric said:

Who remembers when TVs were furniture?

 

And the TV repairman came to yer house.

Just don't take my tube away.

 

 

[Eric]

Who remembers the sound and the smell of coffee brewing in a percolator? Do they even still make them? I used to love the sound and coffee just doesn't smell the same when brewed any other way. My father always leaned toward instant coffee at home, but when we would visit my grandmother, the smell of her coffee percolating away was always a dominant one. Her house always smell like that and Palmolive soap and like sunshine. The place always smell clean and all the kitchen windows allowing the sunlight to warm the linoleum floor and kitchen table gave it a wonderful smell. I always loved those visits.

Me, I'm not a coffee drinker. Never have been. I enjoy a cup of hot black tea once in a while, but not coffee. I do love the smell of coffee. The smell of it roasting and being ground and being brewed. It is a great smell. Unfortunately, it tastes like someone left dirty gym socks steeping in hot water. I'll drink a cup of coffee with enough sugar and cream, but then, what's the point? The smell brings back a lot of fond memories though.

[Walt Longmire]

I remember visible gas pumps where you pumped the fuel up into a glass tank on top with markings for gallons, then gravity fed it into your car. Last one I used was in 1973 when I honeymooned at Spirit Lake on Mt St Helens.

[Eric]

26 minutes ago, SmokeRoss said:

I remember visible gas pumps where you pumped the fuel up into a glass tank on top with markings for gallons, then gravity fed it into your car. Last one I used was in 1973 when I honeymooned at Spirit Lake on Mt St Helens.

My parents used to manage a car museum, when I was a kid. Scattered throughout the collection were a dozen or two of the old gravity pumps like that, beautifully restored. There was also a collection of the old gas pump lighted globes, in three rows on the back wall. The wall was seventy or eighty feet long. There must have been a couple hundred globes. There was a huge number of different oil companies and gas station brands back then and most of them had some beautiful logo graphics on their globes. I used to be the one that had to drag out the ladder and change the bulbs in those globes, when they burned out. There was a row of antique/classic cars right along the wall, right where I was on the ladder, so I had to be damned careful not to damage anything.

Something else that we had there that I absolutely loved were three restored and operational nickel Coke machines, each one a different type. One of them was basically a machine with a tub full of chilled water inside. An aluminum wheel with holes for the Coke bottles sat in the water, along with the bottles. The mechanism would rotate to move the bottle you just purchased under the door above the bottles. The other two were interesting designs as well. The machines were plugged in and working. They were kept stocked with the little 6 1/2oz glass bottles of Cokes and visitors at the museum could drink their fill of them, a nickel apiece.

One of my chores used to be stocking the machines. We had an old, old Studebaker wagon that we used to drag out the wooden cases of Cokes and drag back the wooden cases of empty glass bottles, for turning back in to the Coke delivery guy. The wagon was really something. The Studebaker company actually predated the advent of the automobile by decades. They got their start making horse-drawn wagons and coaches of different types. They also made pull wagons like the one we used to stock the Coke machines. The wagon was made of wood, with metal hardware that provided the framework for it. The axles and such were metal as well, of course. The wheels rode on ball bearings and they were smooth as silk. The wagon looked a lot like the one pictured below, but with side panels about six inches high, with a couple of slats on each, like you would see on an old stake-bed farm truck. I would love to have that wagon today. It would probably be worth a little.

[Walt Longmire]

How about cash registers that had the buttons you pushed like a typewriter, then cranked the handle on the side. yeah, checkout was much slower then.