Information wars, getting messy
(media.greatawakening.win)
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Mom brought each of us a comic book (no superheroes, more like Archie or Little Dottie) when she went to the grocery store each week. Toys at birthdays or Christmas unless you snagged enough pennies to get a Wooly Willy, paper dolls or one of those balls attached to a paddle at the 5 and Dime. What a treasure trove that was, and they had real penny candy for 1 cent each piece. And they had real metal with rubber tips batons.
You had a really sweet daddy, Mary!
Pick Temple had a kids' show on one of the DC tv stations. He was a cowboy. I remember how excited my two older cousins were to meet him at something local in Fairfax Va., where they lived.
Oh what wonderful memories you are bringing back to me. The five and dime stores like Ben Franklin's. I always loved to go there because you could buy yourself a cheap birthstone ring which I had one of. I remember the penny candy. The Kits that came in vanilla, strawberry, chocolate and banana flavor. My Mother always wanted the banana ones whenever we went to the little (old fashioned and I mean old fashioned store) around the curve from our house. You could buy the small Tootsie Rolls, some gum balls and suckers. The square Bazooka Joe gum we could get 2 for a penny. So you could go inside with a dime and come out with a small bag full of candy. Old Lady Carter/ who owned the store always kept her candy in large jars on the counter. Kids today wouldn't know what that was like.
I remember going to Woolworths where they had the Brach's chocolates in an open area inside the store and you could get a bag and a scoop and help yourself. My oldest sister would always stop and buy some as she loved the Chocolate Stars and the Peanut Clusters.
Oh my Lord, I am having a great day of remembrance. Sorry this is long; but I'd love to have those "Good Old Days" back again. It was a much simpler time then. Don't get me to talking about Christmas morning; that's a whole other story.
Thank you and God bless.
Oh, gosh, we had Ben Franklin - primo paper doll booklets - and Woolworths after they built the first shopping center about a half block from our house. But the best 5 and dime was owned by a local man. He had stuff you couldn't find anywhere else because he'd bought oodles of apparently everything on earth 20 years before and never sold out. The penny candy was in a big, round circular thing of glass cases, so we'd walk around and around stretching our nickels, dimes and pennies. One huge room was half clothes and half toys. Another room was housewares. You name it. He sold tiny bottles of Evening in Paris for something like 25 cents, very handy for Mothers Day when on an 8-year-old's budget.
When she died, my mother had on her dresser a pair of glass bottles about 7-8 inches tall that looked like oil lamps with some kind of really cheap perfume in them that I bought her at Woolworths when I was a little bit older and more flush with cash.
Evening in Paris, I loved it. I even had some as a child. The small blue bottle with the au de cologne and the powder. Mine came in a perfume set. I was about 13 I think and it made me feel grown up as my 2 older sisters had things that I didn't. It was my first perfume.
And the Paper Dolls. I had those too. It was much easier changing their clothes than on a real doll. That is until you tore the tabs off and they couldn't hang on. Haha And one Christmas my Grandma, (I only had one since my Dad's mother died before he and my mother married) got me and my baby sister a Raggedy Ann (mine) and Andy (hers). I had mine for many years. I think I gave it to my baby sister with all my other dolls when I outgrew them. I wish I had my Raggedy Ann now. Sentimental value only.
I miss Woolworth's too and wish they would bring it back. Amazon has cost us a lot of the shopping stores that we've known through the years. I don't know if they cost us Woolworth's or not, but I wish we could get them all back. I do not shop on Amazon and I plan on never shopping there. If I can't see it with my own eyes and touch it, I'm not buying it. Going to town to shop was never an inconvenience to me, it was part of the excitement. Just like the movie A Christmas Story when the parents went shopping after the Parade. That movie reminds me of what Christmas was like when I was a kid.
Do you remember the paper dolls that had plastic clothes that would stick to the coated cardboard dolls? I can't remember what they were called. We had those too. I never had a Raggedy Ann but I had a Betsy Wetsy, remember those? She had "real" hair and came with a bottle and diaper because she would wet her diaper when you gave her water. I still have that little doll, bald because I wore all her hair off combing it.
I shop at Amazon all the time because I live 25 miles from the nearest town and about 9 times out of 10 when I drive 25-45 miles one way to get something I need, they don't have it. I drove 45 miles yesterday because Walmart website said something I had to have was in stock there, drove past two other Walmarts because it said it was only at this other store. Guess what wasn't in stock? Can't call ahead because they don't answer the phone any more. I've tried ordering for pickup but twice I got there and it was an opened box with a broken item that had been returned. So I had to wait in line to pick it up and then wait in another line to return it.
I think most people would rather shop in person and see what they're buying, but the stores make it hard to do that. I don't think Amazon destroyed them as much as they destroyed themselves.
Growing up in my then little home town we drove into the city to do things like Christmas and back to school. No McDonalds, we got a bag of little burgers from White Tower, what a treat! The city we went to is now a hellhole. What I miss is driving to DC and that other city to see the Christmas windows at the department stores. Seeing mechanical elves and sparkly angels was magical.