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I remember getting THE CHRISTMAS CATALOG in the mail and arguing with my two sister's over whose turn it was to look at it and dream of the toys we would surely get if we were good enough. Of course my favorite was the train section! Back then there would be at least six to eight pages minimum, usually divided between Lionel and the HO offerings. I liked the size of the Lionel but come on...........three rails and three metal ties per track section!? I was just a kid but that bothered me to no end.
Me too. It required an enormous 'willing suspension of disbelief' even for my 9 year old mind. I never knew about the better Gargraves track but it would have been too expensive anyhow.
QUOTE: .three rails and three metal ties per track section!? I was just a kid but that bothered me to no end.
Didn't phase me at all .. I was so happy to have an electric train that I failed to notice. I'm 72 now, and it still does not bother me .. HEY! LOOK! It's a train, and it runs by itself, and you don't have to push it, or wind it up!
Still have my boxed MARX Set (25000 I think). Three cars, caboose, and #999 on the point. It will be going around the tree in another week. Loco is on its second motor and third pickup slide.
RedRyder77 posted in another thread about bubble lights for the tree, those where great! I remember them as being real big and maybe only ten of them but it was great to watch them bubble.
I remember buying model trains, mostly AHM/Rivarossi at the local Ben Franklin store, along with any craft supplies I needed for school projects. I remember when the Whitewater Valley RR museum had steam engines to pull the trains, and the museum in Noblesville still ran the North Shore interurban under live overhead a short distance in the park they are in. I remember no cell phones, the day cable TV went on the air where we live, Atari 2600 video systems, "trash" TRS80 radio shack computers, when young boys still wanted a train, usualy Lionel, for Christmas! And my truck still has the brights switch on the floor, where it belongs! Mike
For me in Kansas it was the Woolworth's store. And not the little wimpy one in the strip mall, but the big one down town. That was the highlight of my year. Trains at Christmas time in Woolworths.
My first hobby shop was at Har Mar Mall in Roseville (MN). One of the first malls in the state and the place I wanted to spend all my money, as a 12 year old. Mom would take us there about two or three times a year, they went looking for clothes and other boring stuff and I gawked at the model trains.
Time to put my 2 cents in again. How about a 2 holer out back. We finally got indoor plumbing around 1954. We would always keep a mason jar full of water in the pump room to wet down the leathers in the hand pump in the morning prior to running water. We had to build an addition on the house for the bathroom. At the same time, my mom got a gas stove, but still kept the wood stove because some things just tasted better cooked on a wood stove. We cooked and heated with wood. TV ??? We had a radio. Finally got a TV around 1959. Just a couple of hours of broadcasting each day on only 2 channels, one wasn't worth a darn unless the wind was blowing in the right direction. Milk ? We got it warm out of the cows we had on the ranch.
Telephone. It was a 2 piece set and didn't even have a dial on it. We were on a party line, our ring was a 3 ringer. (I actually still have that old phone in the train room). We were probably what you could call poor ranchers at the time, but we didn't know it. We always had food on the table and clothes on our back.
Almost forgot, my first car, a 1951 Hudson Hornet. I still have it. It was stored at my cousins place and I restored it back to new condition a few years back. Runs like a dream. Three on the tree with overdrive.
Lastly, back to my first post on this subject, the hours I spent riding in the cabs of locomotives on the Northern Pacific and the Milwaukee Road.
Time to put my 2 cents in again. Almost forgot, my first car, a 1951 Hudson Hornet. I still have it. It was stored at my cousins place and I restored it back to new condition a few years back. Runs like a dream. Three on the tree with overdrive.
I remember that hobby shop in Har Mar mall. My then girlfriend, now wife, took me there one of my first trips to the Twin Cities. Only got there a couple of times; usually ended up going to Scale Model Supply in St. Paul on those trips, and to Como Shops.
Hey - when I was in university I WAS a Fuller Brush man one summer. Going back quite a bit further, I remember the Shadow, Green Lantern, Sergeant Preston (and Yukon King), Jack Benny, Amos 'n Andy, Fred Allen, Fibber McGee and Molly, and lots more. Oh, Bold Venture and the Scarlet Pimpernel, and The Whistler (and I can still do the SIGNAL GASOLINE theme.)
I remember having a BUDDY L steam locomotive that one could ride as a kid. As I became older going towards Florida by the way of E.A. NY -East Aurora, NY and the FISHER PRICE Complex and heading eastward going by the FMC complex in GASPORT, NY outside of -MEDINA ,NY- not sure what FMC was called back in the mid 1970's of course with my parents.. my dad was driving. Also spending time with my Dad,Mom,Grandmother and Aunt who owned and ran this The WHITESIDE HOTEL on Chautauqua Lake see photo..
...a wishful desire to return in thought or in fact to a former time in one's life, to one's home or homeland, or to one's family and friends; a sentimental yearning for the happiness of a former place or time."
What is it then, if the time and place is before you were born and to places that you never been?
On every car ever made with Lucas electrics, turn signals were an option right up to 1990. At least, optional in the sense that they only worked now and then.
Going back to the 40's and early 50's, if you wanted turn signals, they were optional, and usually installed by the dealer.
One of my hobbies id restoring classic cars and I have a couple out in my shop that I had to add the turn signals to. Today I am pretty well out of the new car market. I can't find anything that I like that doesn't come with the touch screens that are being put in almost all new cars except for some basic models. I have ridden in and driven cars with this feature and hate the touch screens. I refuse to pay for features that I don't want or need, so I guess I'll save myself a lot of money. Here's one of my daily drivers, when the weather is good.
No touch screen in this one. Just a nice 350 with a five speed.
I remember going to a party with my dad and coming home with my mom.
I remember the milk man leaving milk in glass bottles in a box on the front porch. The empties always had to go back in the box.
I remember my mom carefully pasting S&H green stamps into the little booklets.
I remember having a cast iron John Deere pedal tractor, and a small kids bike with solid rubber tires.
I remember walking to school no matter what the weather or how cold it was. The only time my mom picked me up from school was when I had a doctors appointment.
I remember my friend Pete and I walking through town towards the woods to go squirrel hunting with our .22 caliber rifles and waving at the police as they drove past. They waved back.
I remember when a child calling an adult by their first name was considered rude.
I remember when my little brother and I would pore over the Sears Wish Book and carefully make our Christmas lists.
I remember when gas was less than a dollar a gallon, and milk cost less per gallon than gas did.
