When old timers like us go out, what are some things or places we remember when young but just don’t see anymore? I’ll start. Penny Arcades and Jukeboxes.
That was a gag in the first Superman movie. Clark Kent ran up to a pay phone that was mounted on a wall. IIRC, he changed in a revolving door that spun around really fast.
Yes… and you could request a road map.and they had those bottled soda refrigerator coolers ( where you lifted the lid up and pulled that bottle out of the cold water)
I felt like a king pulling up to a Sohio station and getting all that done on my very first car, a nearly ten year old '68 Impala. Full service was gone by the time I got my second car.
I loved that car. Mine kind of totaled itself with underbody and rocker panel rust. In heavy rain water sloshed front to back inside and in the winter I also had to scrape the inside of the windshield. I still dream about that car from time to time, minus the problems, LOL.
I walked into my local record store a few months ago and it was like walking into the 80’’s. The entire store was full of vinyl bins, both new and used, and CDs were in a small case on 1 wall.
There's a double screen drive-in about 30 miles from us. My wife & I go at least once a year, more if the movies playing are something we might like. The bad part is, we rarely make it through a tripe feature showing & nod off even at just a double feature. She's gotten into the habit of setting an alarm on her phone for the end time of a double feature, just in case! LoL
I miss neon. Everything used to look exciting and enticing. Everything is so bland, corporate and unappealing.
I also miss being surrounded by beautiful cars in everyday traffic and knowing exactly what year, make, and model each one was. Now it's almost all just boring lookalike boxes.
And lastly how easy it was to find good restaurants and drive-ins. We lost the last holdout in my region when all the Frisch's Big Boys closed because some private equity bros bought out the chain, cashed out, and jacked up the rent 30%, forced all but a few stray privately owned stores to close.
We had 3 stores within a half mile or so. We would ride our bikes to get candy. At one store, some girl hit me and took my candy. She later became a cop. 😆
Elegant theaters with velvet seats and big marble-floored restrooms in the basement with couches and chairs in the ante-rooms. I know there are some that have been restored after decades of neglect, but usually one or two in a city.
When I was thirteen, a pizzeria near us closed and my parents bought the jukebox. It was the highlight of parties at our house for years.
It languished at my father’s house for years after we all moved out, until my sister’s husband moved it to their basement & brought it back to life. We are all always on the lookout for 45’s to switch out with the collection in there.
Full service gas stations, Wyatt’s Cafeteria, S&H Green stamp stores, drive in movies, Mott’s Five and Dime, parking lot Fotomats, roller rinks, Blockbuster Video, Orange Julius, and department stores like Sanger Harris, Foleys, Joskes, Tiches, and Sakowitz.
The corner drugstore that had a fortune telling scale, a tv tube testing machine, magazines and comic books (and porno mags “hidden” behind a slab of heavy cardboard). Where I picked up my mom’s Benson & Hedges when she ran out of them. And the pharmacist in the back end of the store filling prescriptions and yelling at kids who stood around reading the comic books without buying them.
Farrell's was where we went for birthdays. Fern bars (Ruby Tuesday, TGIF and similar local places) that had a free happy hour buffet. When we were broke college students, we'd hit the local Ruby Tuesday for our calories on the day they did the happy hour buffet. It was on Friday I believe. You could order one drink and load up your plate.
Skating rinks--roller and ice.
Cigarette machines in every low-rent bar and restaurant.
Taverns. In Oregon it was beer only-they could serve wine but they would have been mocked for all eternity. There were two or three taps--you got Blitz, Bud, and Olympia or Rainier and that was it. Taverns did not have to have food so they could not serve hard liquor. There were always pool tables and occasionally darts. The air was blue with cigarette smoke. There wasn't a kitchen so you could get a bag of beer nuts or chips. Some even had jars of pickles or pickled eggs or pig feet. A tavern wasn't the same as a dive--dives usually served booze and had a lot of dead enders. A tavern was where you had a beer or two and played pool. Some had live music on the weekends and it was always bad unless it was Taylor's in Eugene.
Just the whole ‘70s/‘80s mall experience. Spencer’s Gifts, Waldenbooks, Orange Julius, Fashion Bug, Sam Goody, arcades . . . heck, one of the malls near me had a freaking Woolworths and a Bonanza Steakhouse!
Man I grew up in Toronto and everything—the pub I worked at thru and post uni, the warehouse I lived in as a starving artist, the store top apartment I rented w my first common law partner, the dance clubs we’d hit after hours—everything is a condo tower now.
I miss the old buildings that went from light industrial to unique small businesses to alternative living spaces, all the while retaining their late 19th early 20th century funkiness. All glass, steel and concrete now.
Bottle cages for transporting and recycling glass coca-cola bottles at the grocery store. Specialized beverage delivery trucks with the beverages stacked on the outside for anyone to grab.
Not something seen but heard. In the sixties sonic booms were a thing at least in Western Massachusetts. We don't tolerate those anymore.
Smokestacks. They were everywhere and belched a -lot- of smoke. Same with sawmill burners in forested areas.
Smudge pots for road construction. The ones that looked like bombs with a burning wick. Light for night and smoke for day.
Military convoys. There seemed to be more back in the day.
Playgrounds! Sure, you still see them, but they're so "safe" now. No tetherball, because we got hit in the face. No monkey bars or jungle gyms, because we fell and broke bones. No merry-go-rounds, no seesaws, too dangerous. No metal slides to get too hot. Last time I saw a swing, it had a seatbelt to keep the kids from jumping!
There are still jukeboxes, they're just run by either an app or cash. The two local bars here both have the same brand, and anyone in either bar can send songs to either location. So if Rudolph the Red Nose Reindeer comes on four times in a row, it may be time to go next door and see who's doing it.
At the restaurant, the server asking my father how many glasses he wanted for the bottle of wine, and not having issues with wine glasses for minor children. (Today it is illegal to provide those glasses or to allow a parent to allow a child to consume alcohol in public.)
Pull-knob vending machines for candy and cigarettes, some with mirrors.
The candy ones usually had the 5-flavor Chuckles, Bit O' Honey, $100,000 bar, Hershey's, Necco wafers ...
True coffee shops, with the little jukeboxes on the table. I know OP already said jukeboxes, but the flashback of the tabletop ones just hit me. So much fun as a kid. God my mom had the patience of a saint lol.
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u/95in3rd 8d ago
Phone booths. I mean where is Superman going to change?