Do you remember when.....

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studioseven

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May 6, 2014
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Wisconsin
I was watching an episode of Pawn Stars today and they were dating a poster. Because it had a zip-code they were able to tell that it was printed in the mid 1960's or later. I hadn't thought about that in a long time, but I do remember when the zip codes first came out. Love to hear from other members what they recall.

Seven
 
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leehljp

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Feb 6, 2005
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Tunica, Mississippi,
when Zip Code started, I was a freshman in college about 200 miles from home and wondered if the Zip Code would do what we were told it would do. So I sent a letter to a close friend who was a senior in high school back home. I did not put the town, just his name, the box number and zip code. He got it quickly.

It doesn't always work like that now! :rolleyes:
 

egnald

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Jun 9, 2017
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3,061
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Columbus, Nebraska, USA
Here are a few things that I recall. Definitely things my kids will never experience, especially the prices. - Dave

Credit Card Reader.JPG Cap Gun.JPG Drive In Speaker.JPG McDonalds.JPG

Mercurochrome.JPG Oil Can.JPG Soda Machine.JPG Gas Prices.JPG
 
Joined
Dec 22, 2017
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Location
Wolf Creek Montana

I'm actually a Chevron man. Retired with them but my Dad spent 42 years with them(mostly Standard). I started collecting Chevron/Standard memorabilia some years back. I actually have a very old Standard Sign from a service station, soon to be mounted on my garage wall. All the other stuff I remember very well...especially Mercurochrome...man did it sting. I still wish there were drive-in movies and the days where you could go to McDonald's and fill your belly for less than a dollar. Those were for sure some good days. I think minimum wage was like $0.85 per hour, maybe less in some areas. I saw a sign the other day for day help at a Taco Bell in Bozeman that paid $22.00 an hour. Boy have things changed.
 

Brandy

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Sep 3, 2019
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339
Location
Aurora, CO
I remember when gas was 0.90 a gallon and I made $3.00 an hour at my first job (I was 13 and don't count working for my dad. I distinctly remember picking up nails on a job site for a penny a nail when I was 7 or 8). I also remember drive-in movies, our first microwave, and when we got a TV with a remote control (which was a huge black box with five buttons: on/off, channel up, channel down, sound up, and sound down) and only dialing five numbers to make a phone call. And if you misdialed you had to start all over. There were no answering machines and it didn't really matter. You just called back later.

I'm not as old as some of you so I suppose these aren't as memorable for you! 😂😂😂
 

jttheclockman

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Feb 22, 2005
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19,082
Location
NJ, USA.
Remember everyone of those things David. I remember when gas was 19.9 and there was a gas war from station to station. The off brands were the lowest. But was always told Amacco was the best. It was white lead gas whatever that meant. They gave out green stamps, they gave out tiger tails, glasses and much more. Cap guns. Man I had a few of them along with the Lone Ranger holster. Wish I still had some of that old stuff. This is when life was so much more simple and things were not anything like today.
 

leehljp

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Tunica, Mississippi,
David, I remember all of those, and especially the mercurochrome. Except for regular sore throats, I was a healthy kid. Those sore throats were treated with a swab of mercurochrome or sometimes iodine by the local doctor practitioner (mom). Then I was good to go!

I do remember one sale of 20¢ gas that lasted a week; otherwise most gas that I remember was 24¢ to 30¢.

OH those Hamburger/cheese burger prices. Sure do remember them. Cheeseburger, fries and a coke for less than 50¢
 

rixstix

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Jan 10, 2007
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615
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Canistota, SD USA
Boy, most of that puts us pretty deep into 'old fart' status.

Mercurochrome was a luxury item. We got Merthiolate because it was cheaper and because you had to think twice about the pain of the scrape vs pain of the merthiolate.

Yep, sub 20 cent gas lasted a week or so.

Phone memories are 2 letters plus 5 digits & still remember our childhood phone number but can't remember our landline number from 2 years ago.

Zipcode + 4 is fairly recent. I tried zip+4 only on a letter to a PO Box and it was delivered without name, address or anything other than zip+4.
 
Joined
Sep 24, 2006
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8,206
Location
Tellico Plains, Tennessee, USA.
I remember those things except the motor oil, don't remember ever seeing that, must probably did when Dad changed the oil... remember in Waco, TX they had a gas war and gas got down to $0.14 per gallon... a guy from Kansas pulled into a station with a tanker truck and said fill'er up... the attendant filled the gas tanks, but the driver said no the tanker... he pumped the station dry, took it back to Kansas and sold it for twice what he paid. Also remember driving from San Francisco when I was in the Navy and had to stop for gas in Mountain Air, NM and paid $0.48 per gallon for gas... I was livid over them "Price gouging".... gas was about $032 in Bay Area at the time.

My last year in high school I rented a room with a local lady whose phone number was 98... no dial on the phone, the operator asked number please and you gave her a number, or you could just ask for the person... they put in dial phones by the time I graduated in 1960. I also remember when the power company strung wire and put in electricity in Freestone County, TX.

We had a gas station in town that sold SINCLAIR... I haven't been back to my home town in years, but last time there about 20 years back, they still had the dinosaur painted on the side of a building. We had 2 five and dime stores in town.

We still have a drive in movie theatre in Athens, TN.... it's only open on weekends during the summer.... sometimes doubles as a flea market during off season.

My roommate in 1965 could go down to McDonald's and get hamburgers 5 for $1.00... we ate there more often than we cooked.

In 1955 my mother and dad separated and Mom opened a laundry mat with wringer type machines where women brought their laundry and did the wash... we had a soda machine that was a box you opened/lifted the lid, slid the bottle to the end of the rack and pulled it out after you inserted your nickel... we had Coco Cola, Royal Crown (RC), Nehi orange and strawberry, and Dr. Pepper.... We kids weren't allowed to have Coco Cola we usually got one of the Nehi drinks.

I still have one of the "knuckle buster" credit card machines... used one at my booth at the Farmer's Market until I got Square on my cell phone... still had my cap gun from my younger years until a few years ago... think the spring that made it pop the caps was broken.

For skinned knees and nails in bare feet, my attending physician (Mom) always set me down and soaked my foot in keroscene... probably got some form of iodine.

I saw my first doctor when I was 6 and needed all my vaccinations for school... my first tetanus shot was at 19 when I took the battery of shots the navy put into my arm in boot camp.
 

Woodchipper

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Mar 15, 2017
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Cleveland, TN
I remember gas at 19.9 cents a gallon in the mid 50s. I have two bottles of Mercurochrome...best thing since penicillin. Mail used to have only one number in the address; Columbus 7, Ohio. Phone numbers started wit two letters for a certain area. East side of Columbus, Ohio was Capital (CA). When I moved to Tennessee in 1966, there were three exchanges and one only had to dial five numbers for a local call.
egnald, had a nice collection of things from the past. Thanks for sharing.
Chuck, I remember many good times at the Midway Drive-In on the Etowah Road.😁
 
Joined
Sep 24, 2006
Messages
8,206
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Tellico Plains, Tennessee, USA.
Party lines with a rotary dial phone and then along came pushbutton.
John, the Museum where I clerk a couple times a month is actually a telephone museum... it's fun to watch teenage kids come in and actually try to figure out how the rotary dial phones work. We have telephone equipment from the very beginning of the industry to today's modern phones... the wooden boxes with the cranks, the old candle stick phones, all the Disney character phones for kids, the princess phones, telephone booths, etc.
 

jttheclockman

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Feb 22, 2005
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NJ, USA.
John, the Museum where I clerk a couple times a month is actually a telephone museum... it's fun to watch teenage kids come in and actually try to figure out how the rotary dial phones work. We have telephone equipment from the very beginning of the industry to today's modern phones... the wooden boxes with the cranks, the old candle stick phones, all the Disney character phones for kids, the princess phones, telephone booths, etc.
One ringy dingy, two ringy dingy. :D :D :D I am sure people will make the connection
 

Woodchipper

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Mar 15, 2017
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Cleveland, TN
Making this as a separate post. My wife and I like to browse through antique shops in our travels. We were in Blue Ridge, GA, several years ago. We were reminiscing: "My grandmother had that. My mother had one of those." My wife stopped, looked at me and said, "You know you are getting old to see things that were new when you were a kid are now in an antique shop."
 

boatemp

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NoCal
I got out of the service in '64. Worked in a diner. Litton put out a "radar range." First microwave I ever saw
 

jttheclockman

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Feb 22, 2005
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NJ, USA.
I was the first in our family to get a colored TV. It was a 17" portable Zenith that our neighbor was getting rid of. They were both lawyers and very rich. It had the old clicker that you could hear in the next town over it was so loud. But used rabbit ears. Those were the days.
 

tomtedesco

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Jan 7, 2015
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Centennial, CO
I worked at a Sunoco gas station at 15 years old, dollar an hour pay. During a "gas war" I saw it at 16.9 a gallon, washed all windows, checked oil (40 cents a quart), checked tires, and gave S&H green stamps. God I'm old.:(
 

pssherman

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Jan 19, 2006
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Paragould, Arkansas, USA.
I remember when my grandparents had a phone that you turned a crank and spoke to an operator to place a call. There was no dial on the phone. And you had to listen to the patern of rings to see if a call was for you.
 

Sataro

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Mar 15, 2009
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Mexia, TX
My memories of buying a candy bar & coke was when I was young enough that I still rode my Shetland pony everywhere. I lived about 3/4 of a mile from the country store. The coke cost me a dime & the candy bar cost me a nickel. I would ride my pony to the store. While riding in the ditch I would stop & pickup empty soda bottles. I would usually have collected 5 or more by the time I made it to the store. Returnable bottles were going for 3 cents each. So I never had to pay for my coke or candy bar. Just swap empty bottles for them. On my return trip home, I would ride in the opposite ditch & collect bottles on the way back…
 

jcm71

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May 5, 2011
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Chattanooga, TN
When I was in 5th grade we lived outside on Summerville SC. I remember riding my bike down to the country store about a mile down the road and buying all the Ash Cans and Cherry Bombs my i could. I think they were about 10 cents each.
 

jcm71

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Chattanooga, TN
We used to flip baseball cards to the base of a wall from about 10 feet. The first kid to overlap a card won the pot. I remember accidently tossing a Yogi Berra. Of course I lost.
 

Mike

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Oct 23, 2022
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302
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Albuquerque
Lots of good stuff here. I grew up in Fort Worth TX. We had a party line and rotary dial phone, dad hated the party line but private lines were not available. I remember gas under 20 cents, and around a quarter when I got my first car. A 1955 Buick I bought in 1966. Got it a few weeks before my 15th birthday. Had a paper route, threw a little over 100 papers morning and evening 6 days a week and about 140 Sunday morning. IIRC, I made a little over $100 a month. Seemed like big money for a 12 year old in 1963. Burger, fries and a milkshake at DQ didn't make too big a dent and really good.
 

KMCloonan

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Jun 13, 2017
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Round Lake, Illinois
I worked at a local grocery store when I was in high school. I started as a bagger, then I did stocking, This was before UPC barcodes. In the back room we used to open cases of canned goods, bottles, cartons, etc, and apply a price sticker or an ink stamp to each item before sending them out of the back room to be loaded onto the shelves. Then I became a cashier. I got pretty good at hand keying in items based on the price sticker. I think I was one of the fastest cashiers we had. In about 1977 we got UPC scanners. Then all you needed to be a cashier was to be able to drag a can over a scanner.
 
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