I'm so old I've...

[SiouzQ.]

Selah, I remember Klines! I grew up in Ann Arbor; I remember doing our back-to-school shopping there. I think that is where I got my Buster Browns...oh wait, I maybe that was at Deitzel's down the street.

I loved my red buckle Buster Browns with the little pin-dot pattern 'round the toes!

[catherine]

Speaking of Klines: How about:
E.J. Korvettes
Best and Company
Alexander's
Jamesway
Crazy Eddie's
And unfortunately, we will soon add Border's to the list

Carvel's is still around, but I still think about Tom Carvel's commercials with the ice cream mold that he used for every occasion!

[pony mom]

Here in central NJ we had Klines and Korvettes too. Two Guys was like a Super Walmart in the 70s-they had everything! We had a mall that had Alexander's, and before that the building housed a Mongomery Ward.

I'm sad that Friendly's will be/is gone. Lots of memories of going there for ice cream after a movie with my friends.

Remember when movie theaters had only one big screen? No multi-plex cinemas back then. And no commercials or too many previews.

[Mrs-M]

You guys are GREAT! This is my official happy thread!!!

[Spartana]

My dw and I were just speaking of this the other day. Her and her older sister would ride the bicycles downtown to the Woolworths (or was it Newberrys?) and order at their lunch counter. She said she could not have been much older than 8 or 10 years old (and questioned why on earth would her mom let her do that?!). She said they felt so important sitting on the bar stools and deciding what they could afford to order! Life was simpler back then.

I remember both Newberrys and Woolworths lunch counters. Also K-Marts use to have a big lucnh place with full meals (chicken fried steak kind of things) as did Broadway's, Montgomery Wards (Monkey Wards) and JC Pennys. I think that the food courts that most malls have replaced all those old lunch counters type places. .

[catherine]

Remember when movie theaters had only one big screen? No multi-plex cinemas back then. And no commercials or too many previews.

Yes, sure do... They would switch to a new movie about once a week. I remember they cost $1 for adults/.50 for children. I think all the movies back then were pretty "G-rated" even though there were no rating systems then. The only rating system for my family was the Legion of Decency report that the Catholic Church published. I had to fight with my mother to get to see Beach Blanket Bingo because the Legion of Decency had given it a bad rating.

And there were not many previews, but they did have "shorts" before the "feature presentation." I still remember a bizarre one that played out to the words of the song "One Meatball." I have no idea why that still rolls around in my head from time to time.

[leslieann]

Did anyone else have W.T. Grant's? That store had a lunch counter. One of my good memories of childhood was my mother taking my sister and me to have supper at Grant's counter and then going to see the ONE movie at the movie theatre. I don't recollect the movie but I do recall that this big treat was because we had earned it with our good behaviour.

I didn't know I was THIS old until I sat here and re-read this thread. My parents gave me a portable typewriter for high school graduation; I had a hard-topped helmet style hair dryer to replace the one with the plastic cap, and both of them were blown out of the water in about 1973 when the first blow dryer arrived at our house....a Maxx....orangey red, as I recall. I remember wearing a "panty girdle" at age 12 to hold up my stockings, which I had to wear because girls had to wear skirts or dresses to school. By the time I got to high school, though, Joe Namath had invented pantyhose and those Leggs eggs became ubiquitous. I wonder how many millions of them are in landfills all over North America? "Pantsuits" were the first foray into pants for women. My mother bought a velour pantsuit as a dressy outfit. We got to wear "slacks" to school when I was in grade 12. Before that..freezing in Maine in the winter. Jeans? No way.

I wrote my doctoral dissertation in the early 1990s on a Commodore 64 computer. Man, I was cutting edge! Bought it as Toys R Us. You had to insert the program disk (a 5 1/2 inch floppy) into the drive, load the word processing program, then take that disk out and insert your data disk where the document was stored. It took significant time to load. The monitor was a green screen, with odd little boxy letters. It was still a vast improvement over preparing the document on a typewriter with tons of white-out at hand.

This thread is fun. Oh, and I am old enough on these boards to know Iris Lily's last two personae (or at least her names on the boards). I have no idea why that information has stuck for me...there are many others who have changed names and I don't remember but for some reason I recall hers!

[leslieann]

And when I got married, the men in the bridal party wore coloured tuxes and were we EVER cool.

[Mrs-M]

Spartana. The old Woolworths Luncheon Counter, will go down in history (in my mind) as being the best luncheon counter in the whole wide world!

Pony mom and Catherine. You know what else I remember about the old movie theatres? The funky red and blue lights that adorned the countless slender and tall alcoves that ran the entire length of the theatre on each side (outer sides). Maybe the theatres you guys went to had different coloured lights...

Leslieann. What a great memory you have! I remember those hard-topped helmet styled hairdryers! And the balloon plastic-cap ones, too! Very funky! If my mind serves me well, I think I posted an old Leggs, video commercial, somewhere near the start of this thread! I still love the jingle to this day! Yes, and I remember velour, too! So 1970's!!! Funny you mention Iris Lily, because although I don't remember her first persona (in context), I do remember it in thought.

[Mrs-M]

Couple of old 1960's pictures of shopping at Woolworths.