The Garage of the Nobodies

One summer morning, the doorbell rang, and I jumped up from my coloring book to answer it.  I was 8 years old, but it was 1959, back when no one would have thought that something so simple might possibly be dangerous for a child.  Besides, my mother was in the basement doing the wash.  The neighbor man, I think he was a neighbor man, said, "The dog is getting out from under the gate." 

My natural response to the one-sentenced stranger was to let him into my house.  We walked through, out the kitchen door to the back yard, and into the garage, where he looked around, opened boxes, looked under things, looked on shelves, and looked on the floor.  Fifteen minutes later he walked out our front door with parts from three broken rakes and a plan.

We were a typical family of the 1950's.  Mom stayed at home, and Dad worked at Westinghouse, which always seemed to be on strike.  They bought a row house in Southwest Philadelphia when I was born.  We were in heaven - the American Dream!  But we were nobodies.  We never had much money, but we had as much as the families around us, at a time when people could very publicly live within their means. 

We had a garage in the back yard that could be accessed from the back alley.  It was too small for an actual car, so it evolved.  Its first inhabitant was a large wooden ladder, destined to be loaned out every weekend for it's natural life.  A push mower appeared, then a weed whacker, then an older weed whacker.  One of my earliest memories is sitting on the cool cement garage floor watching him take apart the old weed whacker.  "You never know, someone may need a nut or bolt some day," he explained.  Every screw and switch went into an old peanut butter jar.  The silver metal shaft with the plastic handle on top was hung on a nail. The inventory steadily grew.  In the summer when I was little I used to sit on the glider on the front porch, still in my jammies, and watch him when he left for work in the morning.  It was a tough walk to the corner to catch the bus on trash days, and more than once, he'd return with a golf club, broken rake or hubcap that someone had put out in the trash.  He'd often come home from work with things that were going to be thrown away.  One day I watched him dragging a big can down the street with him on the way home from work.  It was a half-full can of grey paint.  You never know, someone might be able to use it some day.

Occasionally my father would think up a use of his own for something in the garage.  We had many conversation pieces, which is what we called things that my Father and I got in trouble for.  I recall one beautiful Fall Saturday when he and I parked the family car under a nice big tree, and spent the day painting it.  He had the easy part - he used the roller, I had to trim around the edges, and I was not yet very handy with a brush.  We hoped that Mom wouldn't comment on the texture, but would have been pleased that you couldn't see the masking tape we put over the rusting fender.  It was an improvement!  And it was now the only gray car on the street.  She'd have to like that!  But we were wrong, so the car became a "conversation piece". 

Now we're not talking Sanford and Sons here, but the garage grew to house a large stock of metal, pieces of lamps, furniture, tools, wood, and of course jars and coffee cans of nuts and bolts and buttons and hooks.  While it was a place for him to go, the attraction was the sharing.  It was important to give what he could to others - it was what made the street a neighborhood - it was what people did for people.  I think he was a happy person because he had neighbors.  He was a nobody, but when he was in the garage looking for some used 2x4's for Mrs. Taylor, he was, for just a second, somebody, and someone good.  He knew what family meant, and for him, everyone was family. 

The reputation of the garage grew.

It had become not just a junk house, but junk church, and a busy one on weekends.  The priest was there to listen to your problems.  You had someone to talk to, someone who wanted to help.  It was what he did, and I was apparently second in command.  (It had to be me; my mother would never set foot in the garage for fear of being captured and disassembled by it - fingers in one jar, toes in another!)

He could come up with a fix for just about anything, usually a stretch of the imagination, but a noble try.  Someone would have a toilet problem and leave with a weed whacker part.  They could be having a problem snoring - weed whacker part.  Pet problem?  They'd leave with a brick and an idea.  As the neighborhood grew older, questions changed.  "What can I use to make an extra railing for the steps going to the basement?"  One day I saw a set of louvered doors leave - neither of us knew remembered how we had gotten them! 

As he got older, he got to the point where he often didn't recognize the people around him.  Every day he'd go out to the garage.  Maybe he was looking for something - something that he could use to fix himself.   That's what kept him busy every day until the end, patiently looking for a thing and an idea that would make it all better.

If you ever find yourself driving around Philadelphia, and you have a good eye, you might find this street.  Probably the people who live there now can't even tell you why their downspout is held together with copper wire and a golf club, or where the Christmas wreath made from a hubcap in their basement came from, or how long the bird feeder made from a coffee can has been in their back yard.  If you find this street, you'll know.  He took care of them all with the riches he had - all lovingly kept in the garage of the nobodies.

© 2012 John Allison

The Moon is a Watchful Eye

A shaft of moonlight barely smaller than the row house itself

shone through the dusty blinds into the empty narrow back bedroom

Empty save for one large plastic bag

filled with musty furry faces and an occasional intact eye.

I think I got Andy Panda, my first, a stuffed bear, when I was born.

The crowd quickly grew.

My animal friends.

They slept in bed with me

on me, beside me, circling me

until I was in my pimply teens. 

Mother would casually 'put them away' when friends came over-

to "make room"

we both knew I was too big for them.

But I was taught to value family and friends

playmates and advisors

trained listeners.

The moon would shine onto us as I went to sleep.

She'd close the blinds to hide the moon

and I, or Andy, would open them back up

Because the moon is a watchful eye.

Permanent, reliable, constant, so pure

a whiter light does not exist

A friend as well.

            (In Sunday school they would tell us about going to heaven

            and being able to gaze on the countenance of God.

            I only understood a few words of the phrase but thought that

            God must be the moon

            You never grow tired of looking.)

Sun light would come into the window

But not moon light.  We called it the moon.

The moon is coming in the window.

An important distinction.

They both died in their 80's and it took a hot

Philadelphia summer

to empty the house. 

I did what I had to do. 

Empty is harsh as a verb.

So we were down to this.

One bag of 50-year-old animal friends. 

Their faces were familiar.

Was mine?

They hadn't aged well

about as I had

I thought of hiding them all above the ceiling

in the basement

where they'd probably be with the house for another hundred years.

I sat with them in the dark room of the dark house

All the lamps, everything, all gone.

I sat there

alone

envious that they were not.

Tomorrow was junk day.  We all knew. 

The realtor was impatient.

Each friend - Andy, Teddy, Rex, Lambie, and a dozen others

lined up on the wood floor

of that same bedroom

each in the moon.

I left that Sunday night, not being able to return

for a week

to decide.

For now, they can air-out their fur,

wonder (and wander) about the empty house

Consider that things change and you can't usually go back

To decide amongst themselves

about the realities of living forever

And to talk, as they always had

when the moon was full

Happy and safe

because the moon is a watchful eye.

© 2012 John Allison

My Weekly Reader: The Children's Newspaper

In elementary school, I always looked forward to "our newspaper".  This one is dated February 1959.  I was 7 years old.  What could be better for a young coin collector than a front page story on the new pennies!  The new pennies were very cool, don't you think?

© 2012 John Allison

Tough Crowd/Funny Girl/Bye Ma

It was a tough crowd -                                                                

old, teary-eyed, hard-of-hearing, a little wobbly,     

bobbing, weaving, shaking.                                              

(Our bodies animate us when we get old

so passer-bys can tell

we’re still alive.)

The job was a challenge.                                                 

Their memories of her,                                             

dominated by the past few years,                                                           

concerned them -                                                                                             

short phone calls, frustrated visitors -

the end of participation, the brutality of Alzheimers.

She had grown small.

She once filled a neighborhood

     walked, patrolled, was recognized

then just a street

then she only filled a single house.

Awareness shrunk to just one room,

then to dimensions no larger than her.

Then less, inside,

just a little tiny space

somewhere, we hoped, between her head and heart.

It looks to us like a reflective space, a serene place to be,

but it’s not.

It seemed like a good idea at the time

“to celebrate her life”

(a well-worn line used at funerals

that are never anything of the sort.)

So I decided that my job would be

to remind them, that

the body lying behind me,

now stopped at 86,

the woman whose teeth were still in my Jeep,

the shell of a girl with lips superglued together,

had been a funny girl.

Neither Florence nor John finished high school.

Both had smiles that were more than authentic -

something that just couldn’t be held in.

This little light of mine, I’m gonna let it shine.

Don’t hide your light under a bushel basket.

They had that light, that I learned about in Sunday School.

My parents were an oddly but surely matched set.

In the factory, he worked

and in the John he read.

He read the Philadelphia Inquirer.

He read the Evening Bulletin.

He read the candy bar wrappers -

Snickers, Almond Joys, Hershey Bars,

He read money in his pocket, writing on his pencils,

cereal boxes, scrapple wrappers, toothpaste tubes,

Look magazine, TV Guide,

the lawnmower owner’s manual.

Write it and he’d read it.

Then he’d come home.

His hand, touching the chair at the dinner table, clicked him on

like the transistor radio in his shirt pocket

it’s dial peeking out at me as he ate

and talked.

“Did you know that Chervrolet

is coming out today

with a new color?”

“Robin Roberts hit two homers

against Cleveland!”

He seemed well-informed!

Then it would begin.

“The President was in Brazil.

He met with their President, Juan Valdez.”

My father talked.                                                      

It’s what he did.

A man who never paused mid-sentence                                   

to try and remember a name or place or fact;

they were of little immediate use.

He talked to make you smile.                                                    

He worked to make you laugh

even if it took hours.

My mother and I were in training -

to learn his timing -

to learn his mission.

Opportunities to speak were few

unless you participated,

so, as mother carried in the green beans, she engaged.

“Actually these beans came from Brazil.”

(an interesting coincidence when you’re five).

He agreed, informing me

that they were picked by a good friend of his

Fat Albert Valdez.

(again, an interesting coincidence when you’re five).

And off he’d go,

or off they’d go

in extended conversations that I’ve since to learn

most other families weren’t having.

We were being tutored

a fact not understood by any of us

but when he died, our training was complete

and our mission was clear.

The crowd bubbled with continued concern

But it was an old bubble, not like coke.

More like soup.

I was obligated to report that while she was alone, confused

mostly deaf and old

in her last days,

it was OK;

she was confused but she was OK, because

she was well-trained.

A few weeks before, we were at Antonio’s Pre-Mortem Pizza Shop,

a place where she felt comfortable being at, because she remembered it.

“Why do you eat so fast?” she asked, as she always asked.

“I don’t.  Glue your teeth in before we come

and you could keep up.”

Ten seconds later:  “Are you done already?”

“Yes, you’re slow.” I said.

“You eat fast.”

“Yes, Mom, I think it’s relative.”

“Who’s a relative?  Done already?”

“Yes.  Yes.”

Then, she looked me in the eye

lowered her voice

and leaned across the jagged circle of pie crusts

that we always assembled on the pan as we ate,

to inform me that, when we leave,

in the parking lot,

she intended to beat me up.

It was a funny line.

Perfect timing.

The waitress would have been puzzled.

He would have been proud.

I reported to the tough crowd

of a night not long ago

Lawrence Welk, thankfully, signed off.

An 8-second short term memory make attempts to follow Survivor useless.

The same is true for the rest of us.

Animals make few demands, so when I visited, we’d watch the Animal Channel - monkeys on TV.

“Oooooh - monkeys!” she said.

Her eyes wide with childish excitement-

a well-rehearsed move

“Do you like monkeys?” I asked, in my straight-man mode.

“Oh yes I do!”

each word was given center-stage

“Remind you of anyone?” I asked.

“Uuuummmmm . . .

Well you used to be a little monkey!”

I sat in silence, looking away blankly

from her one ‘good ear’

my best feigned hurt face.

“Oh, I’m just kidding.

You’ll always be my baby.” She said as she put her hand on the back

of my neck.

“Thank you mom.”                   

. . .           

. . .           

. . .           

“You little monkey.”           

It was perfect - the timing of a 20 year old,

the timing of him.                                               

           

So we continued

a family having a conversation.

Small talk,

exceedingly small talk,

with a timing and topic that was part of a conversation

that was decades long,

as long as a family was permitted to remain a family.

It was a conversation not crafted to communicate

but to create in another

a continuous

inner

smile.

Perhaps others would have found it curious.

But then, she was a very funny girl.


© 2012 John Allison

Not S&H Green Stamps, The Other Ones

Many may be familiar with the green stamps that used to be collected, usually at the grocery store and gas station, which would be stuck into books, which were then traded for merchandise.  In Philadelphia, when I was young in the 1950's and 60's, my mother focused on Top Value Stamps, "yellow stamps", that we got from the Penn Fruit grocery store chain. 

The mechanics of the stamps were simple - the benefits amazing.  At the checkout counter you would get a stamp for every ten cents you spent.  One would take them home, and lick & stick them into a saver book, a 30 page book which held 50 stamps per page.          

                          

I'm sure many young boys and girls spent many hours dreaming about the contents of their catalog.  A catalog of free stuff!  All you needed to do is fill books of stamps, each lovingly licked and put into place, and you can go to a "redemption store" and get anything!

Now, the Sears catalog was much bigger than the Top Value Stamps "Family Gift Catalog", but the differences were substantial.  This was a book of dreams. 

My mother was always bringing home stamps, and I was always licking them for her, watching books get filled and kept in the dining room until that day when we could buy something.  I know my mother bought a toaster oven with Top Value stamps. 

I still have our catalog from 1968, and many pages are dog-eared because they contained things I wanted.  You could get a very respectable Schaefer Pen and Pencil Set for only 1 book!  You were officially an adult when you had a Schafer Pen and Pencil set!  As a growing boy, I was well aware that one could get ladies' underwear, since the catalog had the pictures (Lycra Spandex Bra, 1 book).  There were Swank cuff links for 2 1/5 books, that were actual "gold"!  Obviously for real men!

If you wanted to get serious household items, a Haviland "Fontenay" China 5 pc. Place Setting went for only 6 2/5 books.  Expecting parents could get a Wooden Crib for 12 3/5 books or a Whirlpool electric clothes dryer, full size, for 40 books.

I had my favorite set of items in the catalogue.  I could get a rifle - a Remington .22-caliber bolt action, single shot rifle for 7  1/5 books.  A rifle!  What I wanted even more, and actually got (thanks Mom) was a Harmony Classical guitar for 14 books.  Those took a while to save up for!  There were grills, and cameras, small Harleys, sofas, TV's, even mink coats!  I wanted to get a Delta 10" bandsaw  (40 4/5 books) for my father, and a 23" Magnavox Color TV (194 books) for my mother.  I spent hours staring at two pages in particular, reading the descriptions.  Which would I try to get first?  You could get a boat!  They showed a Chris Craft 30 ft Futura Boat for a whopping 2664 books, one of the most expensive things in the catalog.  While I loved boats, I would have been perfectly happy with, are you ready for this?  They listed three cars in the catalog I had.  You could get a 1968 Ford Mustaang Fastback for only 926 books!  It was like a free car!  You have to love a country where you get cars because you bought food at the supermarket!

© 2012 John Allison

the other guys

You Bought Him WHAT for Christmas?

I'm sure parents don't always think through the whining, the never ending begging of children for certain Christmas presents.  I, of course, was never one of those kids, but still I did get a bicycle the year we had a bad Christmas snowstorm.  My father shoveled a path out the door and past many row houses on our Collingdale street so I could ride it that day.  As parents, they worked hard for me. 

Yes, I did get a drum set one year!  They made a mistake.  They didn't think it through.

In 1961, people were very interested in Indians, as well as cowboys and Indians.  I always was sympathetic to the Indians myself, and thought Tonto seemed to be the smart one.  I was so excited to see, under the tree that year, a long, long wrapped package.  It had to be what I wanted!  My first bow and arrow set!

I remember the feel of the bow, the feel of the split end of the arrow around the wire, the excitement of pulling it back, the disappointment of not letting one fly through the house.  So, that Christmas day we packed up our black 1951 Chevrolet and drove to our favorite park, called at the time League Island Park.  It was a remnant of the 1926 Sesqui-Centennial International Exposition, essentially a world's fair that was held in Philly.  It was a great little park, near the Philadelphia Naval Yard, that had lots of lakes, places to picnic, a museum (The American Swedish Historical Museum) and lots of fields to play in.  So, on that cold December day, my mother and father and I bundled up and went out to League Island, to make some arrows fly.  They kidded that it should have been a 4th of July gift, but the photographic data suggests that they may have had at least as much fun as I did.

© 2012 John Allison

My Indian Friend

As a child in the 50's and 60's I had no idea that there was both local programming and national shows on the television; we assumed that the people who were hosts on all of my favorite kids shows were being seen by kids everywhere.  Not so.  In Philadelphia we had a superb collection of characters who would host cartoon shows on daytime TV - Sally Starr (the beautiful blonde cowgirl/lady) Pixanne (who lived in a magic forest and flew), Bertie the Bunyip (who defies description), Captain Noah (who had an ark), and my favorite, Chief Halftown.  He was an amazing presence. He was gentle and warm and seemed to be able to calm kids down.  Traynor Ora Halftown was a real Seneca Indian, born in 1917.  He taught us all to speak Seneca! "Ees da sa sussaway" was how he started every show.  It probably meant, "let's get going!"

Chief Halftown was on Channel 6, WFIL-TV, later on WPVI, from 1950 until 1999, making his show the longest running local TV children's show in history, anywhere.

On his show, he always dressed in character, including a big feather headdress.  There was considerable interest in Indian cultures at the time, so he would often teach us, his "tribal members", a phrase or a chant or show us how to make something.  He always had a live studio audience of kids.

I wrote to him, probably with the help of my mother, in 1957 (I was 5), and included a picture of me in one of my Indian outfits I'd gotten for Christmas.  Of course, I got a prompt reply.  It was so great to see his face in the mail, and it was a post card to me!  It said, "Dear tribal member, I really enjoyed seeing your picture.  Thanks for sending it to me.  I sincerely hope you have a happy holiday and keep watching my shows - both week-days and also my new Sunday Pow-Wow.  Chief Halftown" 

So Nya-wey (thanks!), Chief Halftown.  Thanks for being my friend and letting me be part of your tribe.  His smile still makes me grin.  He was a true gentleman.

© 2012 John Allison

Echos you could see: Echo I and II

In my second decade, the 1960's, a great evening activity for several summers was satellite watching.  The satellites were called Echo I and II, and every day in the Philadelphia Evening Bulletin there was a little box below the fold on page 2 that reported when they would be passing overhead.  My dad and I would check the paper after dinner, and you could always find us on the back porch watching it cross the sky.

NASA launched these satellites in 1960 and 1964.  They were aluminum-coated Mylar balloons, roughly 100 feet in diameter, which were placed into orbit about 1000 miles above the earth.  These were the first communication satellites.  They acted as reflectors from which radio signals could be bounced off.  Their size and coating allowed them to be seen from all over the earth.

Both reentered the atmosphere and burned up by 1969.

These were times when JFK had instilled in us all a healthy interest in science and space travel, so watching real satellites was a daily thrill.  I remember two particular occasions that kept my interest in Echo.

Since all boys (including me) seemed to have collected coins and stamps in the 1960's, I was thrilled when the U.S. Post Office issued a 4-cent stamp commemorating Project Echo, on December 15, 1960.  It was great timing; I got a whole sheet of them from my father for Christmas!  I was 9 years old.

The second surprise came the next summer with my family on the boardwalk in Seaside Heights, NJ.  One of the things I enjoyed doing in one arcade (in addition to skee-ball) was to collect black and white post cards, which were distributed from a machine, for two pennies each.  When we were on vacation at the shore, I always came prepared with a can of pennies.  I had a big collection of these cards showing experimental cars, rockets, and the occasional celebrity, and was so excited to get a card showing Echo I, which I still have, as you can see!

© 2012 John Allison

The Things We Used To Sing!

I look back on my years in the public school system in the burbs in the 1950's and 60's as fairly conservative years.  I wonder if our parents knew what we used to sing in school, and whether they would have been pleased.  I'm sure there would be someone today who would have a problem with just about every song we enjoyed singing together.

Singing in Harmony (by L.B. Pitts, M. Glenn, and L.E. Waters; Ginn and Company, Boston 1951) seemed to be the book we used from the time we could read, through the end of elementary school (6th grade, 1962)).  There were old standards, like A Bicycle Built for Two, Home on the Range, and Kookaburra.  There were songs we needed to know, like Auld Lang Syne, The Battle Hymn of the Republic, and America the Beautiful.  There were songs that my father knew and loved to sing - good songs to sing in the car - like O Sole Mio, Ay, Ay, Ay, Blow the Man Down, and My Old Kentucky Home.  There were (Christian) songs of worship and Christmas songs, such as Ye Watchers and Ye Holy Ones, The First Noel, and Joy to the World.  There were songs about people from other cultures such as Cielito Lindo, Dawn in Hawaii and Little Mohee.  We sang many "negro spirituals" although there was only one African-American girl in our entire class of 85 kids - Cotton Needs Picking, Short'nin'  Bread and Swing Low, Sweet Chariot. 

For us, it was music class, and sometimes we sang what we were told, or learned something new, or begged for our favorites.  Looking back, the collection of songs had an agenda, and it was a good one.  The music did a lot to create well-rounded people, who perhaps learned something from the music, and learned to love the music of those different than us.  More than once, in my advanced years, someone will begin singing a song and I'll know it too!  I didn't think anyone else knew that one.  I hadn't heard it in years.  But then, we had probably all used Singing in Harmony.

Over the years I constantly enjoy returning to this book, especially when I started taking piano lessons, and when I would play piano in Sunday School.  I'd just rather not explain how I have it in my possession.   It was a gift.  Really!

© 2012 John Allison

The City of Brotherly and Sisterly Love

Philadelphia has always been thought of as a shabby town, and perhaps not a very safe place to be after dark.  I always found it to be a friendly area, and I have two favorite stories to convince you that the town has earned its title over and over.

While I grew up in Philadelphia and the burbs, and am currently living in New Jersey, I did spend 25 years teaching at Michigan State University - technically out of the area.  Both of these stories took place during that time - well more than a decade ago.

MOM

My mother happened to tell me, in a phone conversation one day, about having car problems.  She was probably pushing 80 and my father had already passed away, so she was on her own.  She trusted people - she had no reason not to.  When she would drive up MacDade Blvd. heading for the Acme, she would look for people.  Sometimes she would spot a woman from church walking home with her groceries, and give her a ride.  She often noticed an older black gentleman who would carry his groceries home as well, and pulled over one day to offer him a ride.  They became Acme friends.  I think she even gave him some furniture of ours because he needed it.  So, she casually told me about the car problem she had.  Her car died.  She was sitting at a red light and her car died.  Now that is not a surprise, but what happened next is.  A car full of teenage boys was behind her.  Realizing her car stalled they all jumped out of their car, ran up to her, pulled open her door and told her to get out.  Now perhaps for some people, in some places, this would be the beginning of something very bad.  But this never occurred to her.  One of the boys jumped behind the wheel and closed the door.  Again, not something that sounds very good.  The other boys pushed the car through the intersection to the gas station on the other side.  She talked to the mechanic about taking a look at the car.  The boys lurked nearby.  Why were they still hanging around?  Well to give her a ride home, of course!  She would have expected nothing less.  Such nice boys.  Brotherly love.

Carlos

A Chemistry graduate student at MSU by the name of Carlos was somewhat of a bicyclist, and decided that he was going to ride his bike from mid-Michigan to the Jersey Shore (which may have been where his parents lived) one summer.  When he finally returned, he told me this story.  He had planned the eastern leg of his trip around going over the relatively new Commodore Barry Bridge, close to Sunny Chester.  He arrived at the bridge very late at night, and was told that bicycles were not allowed to cross the bridge, so he had no choice but to turn back, dreading the thought of having to make his way up to the Walt Whitman.  This time it wasn't my mother's car of white boys, but a beat-up old van full of black-boys.  Chester boys.  As he stood at the side of the road with his bike, he watched the van make a U-turn and approach him.  A few of the boys jumped out, took his bike, and threw it in the van.  Not a surprise to get robbed in this part of town at this time of night.  They sat there with the door open, staring at him, and finally said, "Well, are you getting in or not?"  He took a chance and got in.  The van drove over the bridge up to the tollbooths, where it made an illegal U-turn to head back to the PA side.  They got Carlos and his bike out and ready to continue his trip, and with that, they were off.  Midnight Zorros.  Robin Hoods, every one of them.  Brotherly love.  Kinda makes you feel proud, doesn't it?

© 2012 John Allison

Television - What Were We Watching?

Television - What were we watching?

Let's pick a year, and a network.  What were we watching during the 1964-5 season on NBC?

Sundays

            7:30 Walt Disney's Wonderful world of Color

            8:30  The Bill Dana Show (better known as Jose Jimenez)

            9:00 Bonanza

            10:00  The Rogues (with David Niven, Charles Boyer, Gig Young)

Mondays

            7:30 Ninety Bristol Court

            9:00 Andy Williams Show

            10:00 The Alfred Hitchcock Hour  ("Good Eeevening")

Tuesday

            7:30 Mr. Novak (with James Franciscus)

            8:30 The Man From U.N.C.L.E.

            9:30  That was the Week That Was

            10:00  Bell Telephone Hour

Wednesday

            7:30 The Virginian

            9:00 Wednesday Night at the Movies

Thursday

            7:30 Daniel Boone

            8:30 Dr. Kildare.

            9:30 Hazel

            10:00 Kraft Suspense Theatre

Friday

            7:30 International Showtime (Don Ameche, host)

            8:30 Bob Hope Presents the Chrysler Theatre

            9:30 The Jack Benny Program

            10:00 The Jack Paar Program.

Saturday

            7:30 - Flipper

            8:00 The Adventures of Mr. Magoo (cartoon)

            8:30 Kentucky Jones (Dennis Weaver in the title role)

            9:00 Saturday Night at the Movies

Monday-Friday daytime

            10:00 Make Room For Daddy

            10:30 Word for Word

            11:00 Concentration

            11:30 Jeopardy!

            12:00  Say When!

            12:30 Truth or Consequences

            1:30  Lets Make a Deal

            2:00 The Loretta Young Theatre

            2:30 The Doctors

            3:00 Another World

            3:30 You Don't Say!

            4:00 The Match Game

© 2012 John Allison

Growing Up in the 50's and 60's in Philadelphia and Delaware County: Things were different back then

Growing Up in The 50's and 60's in Philadelphia and Delaware County

Things I remember:

1.  Tastykakes

2.  soft pretzels

3.  steaks and hoagies

4.  people who sold roasted chestnuts on the street in the winter

OK, those are the ones you were probably expecting.

Looking back, our lives were different in the 50's and 60's, at least to me.

1.  Cars had a single, front seat. These were a make-out heaven.  One hand was for driving and one was for holding.  Why did we go from a bench to bucket seats?  Shouldn't we have voted or something?

2.  It was a time when I knew how to talk about music.  If someone recorded a dozen songs and made those songs commercially available, they would have "made a record".  Apparently use of the word "record" for such a collection confuses people now.  Records came in albums and albums had album cover art, and text on the back and text, occasionally, on the paper sleeve that the record came in.  When you bought a dozen songs, you used to get so much more than what you get now when you download.

3.  If you heard the word Cappuccino, you would assume it was a good Italian family name.

4.  It was a time when the only air bag in your car was when Uncle Elmer was driving.

5.  It was a time when cars were works of art - fins were in, and if your friend's parents had a Hudson Hornet, you got to ride in a cross between a hearse and a mechanical beetle.

6.  It was a time when vocabulary was rich - sampling history, entertainment and politics in daily analogies.  This unfortunately has all gone out the window like high button shoes. 

7.  There were formal battles everywhere, and you had to choose.  These were more important than whether you were a Democrat or a Republican!  Which side were you on?  The Beatles or the Dave Clark 5?  Pepsi or Coke?  Arco or Texaco?  Chevy or Ford?  Catholic or Protestant?  Ivory or Dial? American Bandstand or Aquarama?  Penn Jersey or Pep Boys?  The Bazaar or Jerry's Corner?  Thom McAn or Father & Son?

8.  People actually felt good about putting a tiger in their tanks.

9.  There was ABC, NBC, and CBS.  That was really it. 

10.  Newspapers were great, there were lots of them, and they were a part of our daily lives.  We got the Philadelphia Inquirer (the morning paper), The Philadelphia Evening Bulletin (the evening paper) and the Delaware County Daily Times (on Thursdays).

11.  Radios were AM.  You listened to the music on the radio out of a 2-inch speaker during the day, and an ear bud late at night or, if you were lucky, a bed speaker that you put under your pillow.

12.  Nothing was stereo.

13.  People drank everywhere - in bars, in cars, on porches, in yards. 

14.  The world was black and white - TV, magazines, newspapers, and photography.

15.  People owned clothing that was formal (and often wore it); men had ties, jackets, suits, and vests in their closets.  They were probably purchased at Robert Hall (when the value goes up, up, up / and the prices go down, down, down . . . (you can finish it))

16.  Comfortable shoes were called sneakers, and had no connection to tennis.

17.  People held doors for others.

18.  People let you cross the street, in the absence of laws.

19.  Central air conditioning had little meaning.  You can't cool a house down by running cold water through your radiators.   (FYI, radiators are in houses, not just in cars.)

20.  People ate hot breakfasts every morning.  One utilized a range to do this.

21.  "Drugs" meant aspirin or Alka Seltzer.

22.  Cars rotted.

23.  People made do with what they had, and were not ashamed of it.

24.  People liked stories about World War II, airplanes, and private eyes.

25.  You didn't fuck with grandparents.  You appreciated them.

26.  If you were going to take a trip, you'd likely get a map at the gas station.  People knew how to fold up gas station maps, and took the time to do so.

27.  If they looked like headphones, they were called earmuffs.

28.  Santa was real.  He had helpers who dressed up like him.  End of story.

29.  Snow fell deeper.

30.  Rain rained harder and longer.

31.  We wore lots of ties.

32.  Boys and girls went on dates if they wanted to be together.

33.  Clocks had hands.

34.  Clocks and watches had to be wound up daily.

35.  Church was mandatory.

36.  Family was everything.

37.  Just because you die, it doesn't mean your television show won't continue to air at the same day and time.  See Lawrence Welk.

38.  Money went a long way.  It seems like, while we had less money, we more often ate steaks.

39.  Billboards and ads for smoking and drinking were everywhere.

40.  People smoked and drank on airline flights.  Cigarettes were given to everyone, free, on flights.

41.  Cameras had flashbulbs, and you could only use them once.

42.  James Bond movies were based on Ian Fleming books that you had already read.

43.  People read.

44.  People shopped at the Food Fair or the Acme. 

45.  The Food Fair gave out Top Value Stamps with every purchase.  Some other stores gave out S&H Green Stamps.  We would lick stamps, fill books with them, and redeem books of stamps for everything from underwear to new cars.

46.  Mom's meals were threesomes.  If you had meatloaf and mashed potatoes, there was a corner of your plate that would be empty, so you also had corn or green beans too.

47.  "Big Brother" was part of 1984, the future.

48.  Barbie didn't have a job or much of a back-story.

49.  Fox was an animal, not a network.

50.  Dress shoes and black socks went along with shorts just fine.

51.  There were small stores that sold mostly milk, called Wawa.

52.  It was enjoyable to go to the movies.  You didn't have the urge to kill anyone near you.

53.  Drug stores sold ice cream and soda, but not radios and grills.

54.  You could walk to a corner store for milk, soda, ice cream, canned goods, bread, and candy.  Within 10 blocks there was probably a butcher store where you would buy your meat, as well as a barber shop, pharmacy, bakery, and hoagie shop.  You knew where a drive-in movie was.

55.  Men wore leather shoes, and when the heels or souls wore down, they were replaced by a shoemaker.

56.  A gallon of gas was 29.9.  That's cents.

57.  You weren't afraid to take a bus, trolley, or the El into town.

58.  If you said, "into town" you meant Philadelphia, if you said "into the city" you meant New York.

59.  You never needed exact change for anything.

60.  Most places didn't take credit cards, and most people didn't have them.

61.  People sent each other cards - you bought them at card stores, and sent them using U.S. postage stamps.

62.  You had to lick the back of a stamp to get it to stick.

63.  People stopped at red lights, and often at stop signs. 

64.  We didn't always make a distinction between local and national treasures.  Couldn't you get black cherry wishniak or Tastykakes anywhere in the country?  Didn't everyone know who Sally Star was?

65.  Ovens were things that were used weekly, and not just storage areas.

66. You knew not to buy a Dixie Cup unless you got the little flat wooden spoon too.

67.  Food came to you.  Mr. Softee (or the competition, some pirate guy) rode through your neighborhood every day in the summer.  Perhaps someone came to your street with a truck or a station wagon, and sold the things they grew on their farm.

68.  You bought a converter box to attach to your TV to get additional fuzzy channels, UHF channels.

69.  You could dream through catalogs.  Every house had the year's Sears catalog, probably a Penny's Catalog, a Top Value or S&H Green Stamps catalog, and perhaps a Radio Shack or Heathkit catalog.  So many dreams!

70.  Books had hard covers.

71.  Schools required students to protect their schoolbooks.  In addition to buying pencils and pens and paper to start a school year, you probably also bought paper book covers, which were wrapped around the books' hard covers, to protect them.  This was not an option.

72.  Your high school played football on Thanksgiving Day.

73.  Penn football and Eagles football were played in the same stadium.

74.  Ice could be purchased at Ice Houses.

75.  We ate liverwurst, and liver, and baloney.

76. A Volunteer Fire Company was an important, integral part of your neighborhood.

77.  Families found things to do on a weekend that were free.  We could walk around the feet of William (pronounced "Billy") Penn on the top of City Hall, or go see the Liberty Bell in Independence Hall, or tour the Mint, or go to the airport and watch airplanes take off and land.  (There were even observation decks above some gates at the airport where you could not only watch planes come in, but listen to pilots talking to the tower on the radio.) 

78.  At "Christmas time", you went to Wanamaker’s to hear the organ play and to watch the Christmas show.

79.  At Christmas, you went to 69th Street to shop, to see one or more Santas, and to let the kids slide down a two-story slide that was built inside of a big shoe. 

80.  Lawn mowers were muscle powered.

81.  The weatherman on TV was on the faculty at Drexel - Wally Canan the Weather Man.

82.  You couldn't have imagined that the boss with the hot sauce would last for many decades.

83.  The only really "coffee shop" you knew was one owned by Eight O'Clock, in Manhattan.

84.  If you really, really wanted to splurge, you drove into town to Bookbinders, to spend too much for some pretty good food.  (Get the snapper soup!)

85.  Cigarettes (and occasionally, cigars) were usually purchased from a vending machine (when a pack was 40 cents).

86.  In the summer, everyone would roll their car windows down just a little, and roll them back up every evening as the sun was setting.  If you didn't do this, your car would explode and your windows would blow out.

87.  The mummers.  Still drunk, still very difficult to explain to outsiders.

88.  There were department stores (not just Wanamakers) like Gimbels and Snellenburgs.

89.  Code for "going to Wanamakers" was "meet me at the eagle."

90.  They were Schmidt's, Schlitz, Esslinger's, Rolling Rock and Ballentine.

91.  The Mayfair!

92.  Matchbox cars were 50 cents or maybe more, but were worth every penny.

93.  There was a White Tower in Darby.  (I was shocked to learn that most were called White Castles!)

94.  "Real" Vanilla ice cream, from Dolly Madison and perhaps Breyer's as well, had black specks in it (vanilla beans) and little pieces of ice as well.

95.  "We" made train engines (so cool) at Baldwin-Lima-Hamilton.

© 2012 John Allison