Posted on 09/12/2020 4:32:04 AM PDT by sodpoodle
The rag man with his mule-drawn cart. The ice man that when the kids gathered around was a bit sloppy in cutting the cubes that would perfectly fit the ice box (from memory) so the kids would have some cold ice shavings on a hot summer day. (”Growing up - we never had ice cold drinks!”)
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Born 1943. I remember all the above, only our rag man had a horse and so did the milkman, who also brought and cut the ice.
We did have cold drinks. They came out of a chest freezer-type dispenser filled with ice (often melted into cold water). You put in a nickle and guided the small bottle through a sort of maze to where it could be removed. You tried to get one long enough after the ice went in, that they were chilled, but before the ice melted into cold water, when they were only cool.
I think I was 5 when we finally got a refrigerator (war time shortages). But, we did have an ice box. No one bought bottled drinks for home consumption (ice boxes and then refrigerators were really small). You went across the hard road to the truck weighing station/general store for that. Home-made drinks were iced tea or lemonade with ice in them. You got the ice by using an ice pick from the block in the box (and not using too much) or, after we got a fridge with a tiny ice compartment, from metal ice cube trays that were difficult to release and mostly produced shards.
Clothes washers were belt-driven drums with paddles and a wringer. We all hung clothes up to dry. The vacuum cleaner was a huge horizontal tank that was difficult to move, but we had wood or linoleum floors, so a broom was used. Radios were as big as a 1950s TV, which hardly anyone had. Very few new cars right after the war, too.
The 50s and 60s were a literal golden age to us War Babies.
In the early fifties bread was wrapped in double wax paper. Finish the loaf of bread, shake out the crumbs, fold the wrapper in half, slice down the middle with a knife, wrap four sandwiches. Eat sandwich at school hours later after no refrigeration.
I survived! Had a few close calls. Thanks for the post. It was worth reading.
I can relate to all of these.
Live on the same dirt my ancestors kicked around in since the 1870’s. Built fence when I was old enough to hold a shovel. I think I was damn near horseback before out of diapers. Throwing calves that out weighed me and damn sure could kick harder. Snakes, ticks, cactus and brush have taken their toll but I would not wanted to grow up any differently.
Yes! Our school didn’t have a cafeteria - everyone brought their lunch. Just think of the horror!! Bologna sandwiches with MAYO sitting around unrefrigerated!
We also drank from the cooler hose.
Grandmother would lock us out of the house while she watched her “stories.” Even in the dead of summer in Phoenix. Today I’m sure that would get a visit from CPS.
I recall blue cheese dressing to be an 80s thing. .......................... Yup! With Buffalo wings.
I can remember running barefoot to the hill at the end of the street in Phoenix in the middle of summer.
Typical summer morning with friends:
What do you want to do?
I don’t know, what do you want to do?
How about we build a fort?
Cant no nails.
We could bike to dump and get some?
My tire is flat.
We could collect bottles to get money to fix get patch from store , fix your tire, then go to dump to get nails and start a new fort.
Okay, let’s go.
bump
I remember when the mosquito guy would come around the neighborhood spraying his chemicals and all the kids including me running after him because we loved the smell of it.
And riding on the running board of dad’s car with your arm wrapped around the window pillars.
Coal and wood furnace, iceman, milkman and the Goodie Shop down the street.
Us children if the sixties experienced the same. Born in 62 and survived all if it!
Had an older brother. He always took care of me. Even found a leech to suck out the poison on my cut up knee. LOL Boy, was I trusting. Never told mom.
I hope that she left you a little extra-something in her will!
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She was an artist. She left me a couple of painting I liked.
Grew up on a small lake in Minnestoa not far from the Twin Cities, and practically lived outdoors. When I wasn’t fishing from my dock or little rowboat, or swimming at a little beach not far from the house, I would be riding my bike down to the end of our road where there were a lot of great climbing trees, in which I could sit for hours without any “device” to keep me entertained.
Know of NO kid who “drownded” in the lake, or got badly hurt falling off a tree or the off the stairway, roof, or other part of the occassional new house being built on a vacant lot.
Soooo grateful for the FREEDOM I enJOYed!
And it took me many years before I stopped calling a refrigerator an ice box:)!
and gay ...
Well, do you call a refrigerator a frigidaire?
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