Most people these days won’t stoop down to pick up a penny in the parking lot and they usually donate any extra pennies to the cup beside the cash register. Some even suggest doing away with pennies entirely since they are considered a nuisance. But Boomers didn’t consider a penny a nuisance. To us they were nuggets of gold and what could we ever do with a couple shiny pennies. After … [Read more...]

    Somewhere around 1963, these polo shirts began to make their mark. The frat guys and preppies were all wearing them – knit shirts with little alligators embroidered on the chest. The coolest guys wore them with collars up, no socks, chino pants and a pair of Bass Weejuns, of course. It was the ultimate preppie uniform. I had to have one of these alligator shirts. Julian’s … [Read more...]

  You could hear him coming a block away - the engine chugging on the old, white truck and hundreds of glass bottles clinking inside. He was the milkman. Believe it or not, there was a time when you didn’t go to the store to buy milk. Rather, the milk came to you in the milkman’s truck. In the 1950’s and 60’s, most families engaged the services of the local milkman. With a note left in … [Read more...]

  Today, it’s hard to imagine a world without plastics. But plastic products really hit their stride in America after World War II. Before that, the war machine consumed many of the organic materials necessary to create plastic. In the 1950’s, plastics went viral. In the late 1950’s, a product called a practice golf ball hit the store shelves. It was a small, white plastic sphere … [Read more...]

  How do young people meet these days? There are no drive-ins! Not only are there no more drive -in movies, there are no drive-in restaurants. No place to circle the parking lot looking for girls – or boys. Boomers look back nostalgically at the days when a young lady called a carhop would take your order for a frosted mug of A & W root beer and an order of fries. You gave her two … [Read more...]

  Mama Ida was a second mother to me. When my father was shot down and killed over Burma in WW II just a few days before I was born, my young mother went home from the hospital broken hearted and most distressed. Her mother, Mama Ida, pitched in and cared for me like her own son. In fact, she was the first I called “Mama”, but they quickly changed that to Mama Ida. My wonderful, sweet … [Read more...]

    Know what’s worse than having to pay $5 or $6 for a gallon of gas? Not being able to buy gas at any price. There are many of us who remember when we couldn’t. It was called a Gasoline Shortage. Between about 1975 and 1980, gas was strictly rationed in this country. The shortage began in the Nixon years when OPEC decided to shut off the pipeline. When Americans sensed there … [Read more...]

  I once won a Blue Ribbon in a West Virginia Garden Club Flower Show. Therefore, despite what my golf buddies may say, I do have certain skills. This is how it all happened. My mother, Frances, was always involved with Garden Clubs and Flower Shows. She served as President in both the State and the National Garden Club. She judged shows across the country and was frequently called … [Read more...]

When I was a boy, we either played Army or cowboys. Both involved guns. In our imaginary Army battles, we found long sticks to serve as makeshift carbines. When we played cowboys, there was only one choice of firearms. A set of Roy Rogers six-shooters in a leather holster with holes for the bullets. And it was always Roy Rogers and never Gene Autry because, after all, Roy Rogers was King of the … [Read more...]

There was a time when America’s young people took advantage of a thing called Spring Break and headed, en masse, to Florida, namely Ft. Lauderdale. The movie and song, Where the Boys Are, captured that experience. As a sophomore at the University of North Carolina, I also headed to Florida on spring break, but not to Ft. Lauderdale. Rather, my roommate, Bob Payet, and I headed for Indian Lake … [Read more...]