Progressive Nostalgia and the Class Clowns

I like to look for old high school and college yearbooks at yard sales and estate sales.  Some of them are rather collectible, and there are lots of folks who didn't buy a yearbook when they were in school who are kicking themselves now and looking online for the book they didn't buy.

I found a stack of 'em at an estate sale this past weekend.  In addition to several yearbooks from a local high school dating back to the 1980s -- pictures of girls with big hair, guys on the basketball team wearing very short shorts -- I found a copy of the 1957 L'Acadien from Southwest Louisiana Institute in Lafayette, Louisiana.

The 1957 L'Acadien is a snapshot in time of the American South.  The student body was mostly white, but there were a number of African-American students, as well as some international students from Central and South America and Asia.  The school's website confirms my observations:

"In 1954, SLI became the first college in Louisiana to integrate its student body. The first African American students were admitted without incident, and today UL Lafayette has honored its first African American graduate, Christiana Smith, by naming an alumni chapter after her."

The students celebrated Sadie Hawkins Day; they joined sororities and fraternities, the Home Economics Club; they played basketball and football.   Entire pages were dedicated to debutantes, to showcase their "glamour" photos.  (This was the South, after all.)  Some of the student names are very "Southern" as well, and hearken back to this era past -- young ladies named Heartsease, Jose Ann, Inza Rae and Billy Ann; young men named Abelardo, Junice, Expadie, Ludrice, and Curvin.  A young woman named Reggie Lou Gates was in the ROTC.

But as I leafed through the pages of  the book, my nostalgic-progressive reverie was interrupted by the presence of the fruits and vegetables lurking among the photos of the underclassmen.

The pear's name is listed as Conspiance Poire.  A few pages later, Belle Pepper appears among the sophomores. 

An apple, a bunch of bananas, and a female student smoking a cigar labeled "Pogo Possum, Okafonokee, Georgia" also appear among the underclassmen.  Many of the sophomores and freshmen had their class pictures made wearing silly hats.

The yearbook staff had struck again.

The school is now the University of Louisiana at Lafayette, and apparently L'Acadien is still being published.  I hope the current yearbook staff members have as much innocent fun, and put out as nice a publication, as their predecessors did.  

And if anyone is looking for inspiration and a reference source for a Gently Humorous Novel of the Mid-Century American South -- y'all need look no further.

The Clipper Salesmen

I think I'll pass along these estate sale items to someone who might be able to appreciate them -- like this:

 

February 4, 2013

Company Historian

Wahl Electric Clipper Corporation
Sterling, IL


Dear Company Historian:

I am enclosing with this note, two items I found at a recent estate sale in my area.

At first, I had no idea what they were. 

 

 

When I unrolled them, I realized they are panoramic photographs from the 1930s.  Upon closer inspection, I saw that they are group shots of conventions of Wahl clipper salesmen from that era.  I believe they’re standing in front of your company’s old offices on Third Street.

 

The Library of Congress has more than 4,000 panoramic photographs in its collection, but apparently it doesn’t have these.  The LOC website explains the history of panoramic pictures and how they were made:

http://memory.loc.gov/ammem/collections/panoramic_photo/pnabout.html

Your company website says the first patent for a vibrating “electromagnetic hair clipper” was granted to your company founder in 1921.  Ten years later, one of these photographs was made.  Is Mr. Wahl one of the people in the front row of this picture?

 

The photographs are not in the best of shape.  The woman who was holding the estate sale told me, “Take them, just take them – who’s going to want something like this?"  (She had no idea how they got to my part of the country, what their connection was with the estate sale, nor why someone hung onto the pictures for more than three-quarters of a century.)

 

I thought you might like to have them -- if for no other reason than to look at the faces of the people who worked for the company more than 80 years ago.  You can imagine the personalities of the salesmen if you study the pictures closely.

 

And you can admire how nicely they dressed: hats and spats and overcoats, the fashion of the day.

 

But I think the panoramic photographs are more than just a unique find at an estate sale.  During the Great Depression, it must have been important for businessmen, especially men looking for new jobs, to be well-groomed.  I’ve enjoyed looking at these pictures of the salesmen who, through their own work, gave local barbers across America the tools to help men feel confident about their appearance.  I hope you'll consider having the pictures conserved and framed, so other people can appreciate these little time capsules of American business history. 

 

Sincerely yours,

 

Editor, The Estate Sale Chronicles

Ruth's Handkerchiefs

Her name was Ruth, and she liked handkerchiefs.

No, scratch that.  She loved handkerchiefs.

Seriously, the picture shows about one-third of the hankies that came home with me, just from the one estate sale.  Ruth, whoever she was, had very good taste and loved her hankies, especially the ones with flowers.



Daffodils and Daisies

Roses

Lilacs

Tulips

I had to find out more about what fueled this sort of passion, so I started doing some online research on the humble handkerchief and discovered how it evolved from something with which to wipe your nose or your eyes, to a tiny work of art.   The hankies Ruth collected were in their heyday during the 1940s and 1950s, some of the vintage hanky websites told me, when women could freshen up a drab wartime wardrobe with these small splashes of color.  They carried hankies with red, white and blue designs in honor of servicemen far away.  

Ruth had hankies for every occasion, every holiday.  At Christmas she could carry any of more than a dozen Christmas designs, including these.



Poinsettias

Reindeer Conga Line with More Poinsettias

Ruth, like many women in the 1930s through 1950s, crocheted borders on her plain handkerchiefs.   Among her collection was a pamphlet dated 1931, explaining how to add these colorful edges to liven up a plain square of cloth.

Apparently Ruth spent a lot of time doing this over the years.

The Internet is blanketed with vintage handkerchiefs.  I found them on Pinterest, and on sale sites like etsy and eBay.  I found well over a dozen websites that chronicle the history of hankies, and even more that show modern uses for them.  Vintage hankies are very popular with collectors.  Modern-day brides have their wedding invitations printed on vintage hankies, so the guests will have something to wipe away the tears of joy.   Seamstresses and crafters use hankies to make clothing, curtains, wall hangings and more.  Vintage hankies can be made into baby caps, with the idea that when the child grows up and is married, the hanky can be "something old" for the bride to carry up the aisle. 

So a hanky, small as it is, can be an important part of a larger whole.

Looking up the uses of vintage hankies reminded me of a classic scene from Louisa May Alcott's Little Women, as Meg and Jo leave the house for a party:

"Have a good time, dearies!" said Mrs. March, as the sisters went daintily down the walk. "Don't eat much supper, and come away at eleven when I send Hannah for you." As the gate clashed behind them, a voice cried from a window...

"Girls, girls! Have you you both got nice pocket handkerchiefs?"

"Yes, yes, spandy nice, and Meg has cologne on hers," cried Jo, adding with a laugh as they went on, "I do believe Marmee would ask that if we were all running away from an earthquake."

"It is one of her aristocratic tastes, and quite proper, for a real lady is always known by neat boots, gloves, and handkerchief," replied Meg, who had a good many little 'aristocratic tastes' of her own.

I wonder what Meg and Jo's pocket handkerchiefs looked like?  Whatever style they were, we know Ruth, like Marmee, would have approved. 

A Record of Happiness

I don't know what her name was.  I do know she was in love in 1935.

Not everything from her estate sold during the two "official" days of the sale.  So the estate sale company posted a notice online:  Everything left in the house would be given away at no charge on a first-come, first-served basis.

Naturally I took advantage of this offer.  

I found, among a pile of used books and office supplies, three pages torn from her old diary.  Just three pages.  They must have been the most important ones, the ones she made sure she saved.   Her survivors didn't treasure them like she did.  So I did.

I didn't take the time to read the three pages until I got home.  They are the (partial) story of her romance, set in the midst of  the Great Depression.

Tuesday, June, 11, 1935

11:00 p.m. The chimes are just striking.  Only 45 minutes ago I said good-bye to Burke.  I have no idea when I'll see him again.  It may be the end of another chapter in my life -- I hope not, but it may be.  Things look very dark -- I wish I could see ahead, but perhaps it is better that I cannot.  It is strange how "alone" a parting can make one feel.  Close friends are so few in this world & so dear.... I think I'd better get into bed & to sleep before I begin "slopping over."

Monday, July 22, 1935

Had 3 letters from Burke today.  He has a job!  Not so much of a one to begin with but it has a future -- with Standard Oil.  He is very happy about it & is actually making plans for the future -- that's something for him.  I'm so happy about this!  He wants me to come in fall if the job works out all right & he likes it.  He writes:

"I'm sure you'll like it out here and at least we can start by ourselves and build our own little world."

Does that sound like a proposal of marriage?  Is it just that distance lends enchantment -- or has he discovered that he really needs me? 

Perhaps this year will be quite interesting before it is over.  But I am very happy tonight.

Tuesday, September 3, 1935

Tonight is a very special night.  I wrote to mother & dad and told them I'm going to be married the first week in October.  Mother has thought of it already, but I wonder what Dad will say.  Told Mrs. Rudolph tonight that I'm leaving the 15th.  It all seems rather hazy yet -- it doesn't seem like it's really true.  It is hard to realize that I will be married in a little over a month.  Only 10 more days to go of work.  Wonder what Townsend will say? 

It's all like a dream, but it's a dream coming true!


I don't know what her name was.  I do know I'm glad she wrote down her love story as it unfolded.   Because now I can apply the Sonnet 18 theory to her words, and the words of her loved one, once destined for a green recycling bin if someone didn't rescue them.

William Shakespeare -- even though he never dreamed of cyberspace as a library for the memories of love -- was right!

Shall I compare thee to a summer's day?
Thou art more lovely and more temperate:
Rough winds do shake the darling buds of May,
And summer's lease hath all too short a date:
Sometime too hot the eye of heaven shines,
And often is his gold complexion dimmed,
And every fair from fair sometime declines,
By chance, or nature's changing course untrimmed:
But thy eternal summer shall not fade,
Nor lose possession of that fair thou ow'st,
Nor shall death brag thou wander'st in his shade,
When in eternal lines to time thou grow'st,
So long as men can breathe, or eyes can see,
So long lives this, and this gives life to thee.

Write down the story of your love.  Even if you don't share it with anyone else.  Write it down.

The Ghosts of Christmases Past

I didn't know Irene personally.   But I know she absolutely loved Christmas.  She saved the December issues and "Christmas Specials" of dozens of magazines between about 1957 and 1970 in a bookcase in her home office.  When her family had an estate sale a few months ago, I bought all the magazines I could load into a paper grocery bag for $5.

Every holiday season, people say they wish that Christmas was "the way it used to be."  With the help of the feline blog assistants, I decided to explore some of these old magazines on Christmas Eve day.   Maybe I could see how Christmas used to be, 40 or 50 or more years ago, at least as it was presented to the public in print.  I came to the conclusion that things haven't changed all that much.

Most of the old magazines in Irene's collection featured inspiring Christmas stories from contemporary writers -- Rumer Godden, Norah Lofts, Richard Armour, Ogden Nash and others were well-represented.  Dr. Spock wrote an advice column for parents.  (Look him up, kids.  No relation to the other Spock, except that they were both good at calmly giving advice.)

Kurt Vonnegut, Jr., penned a Christmas play for children in one issue.  Another Christmas play for kids featured illustrations by Joan Walsh Anglund.

Not to be outdone, the artists at the Disney studios created "A Christmas Carol" featuring a family of mice, in December 1957.

Christmas fashions, particularly for women and children, were prominently displayed.  In the make-it-yourself magazines, the focus was on homemade dresses.

By contrast, the December 1957 Ladies' Home Journal featured a multi-page spread of fashions modeled by two young socialites who were sisters.   This picture is of one of them -- the young Mrs. John F. Kennedy. 

(McCall's magazine from the same month featured a story on "President Eisenhower's Diet."   Needless to say, it did not have the same appeal.  However, McCall's promoted an upcoming article in its January 1958 edition, by this young lady's husband, on "Three Women of Courage.")

All the magazines featured articles on how to decorate your home for the holidays, usually by making some of the decor yourself.   This picture of a Christmas-themed living room in 1957 is a "retro" fan's dream.

Many articles explained to readers how to create their own Christmas ornaments and toys.

Of course it wouldn't be Christmas without food.  All the magazines devoted a lot of space to holiday recipes.  "Over 100 Tempting HOLIDAY RECIPES" read one headline. Feature stories told readers how to create the perfect holiday feast.

Millions of calories' worth of meals and treats, cheek-by-jowl with ads for tomato juice and Sucaryl and Sweeta tablets to help the reader stay slim.  (That paradox hasn't changed!)  One magazine advertisement suggested a set of scales (available in a variety of designer colors) as the perfect Christmas gift for the person on a diet.  (I hope whoever received a device to weigh themselves for Christmas, threw it straight in the direction of the sadistic giver.)   A small article, lavishly illustrated, recommended giving socks for Christmas to the man who already "has everything."  So that's where the tradition started....

Even the recipes in the old advertisements are familiar.

To provide a sense of balance, magazine articles explained to parents how to make the holidays more meaningful for their kids.

 

 

Stories for children and parents to read together were significant parts of most of the Christmas magazines in the 1950s and '60s.  Only they were relatively new stories back then.



The cartoon Christmas story that actually tells the real "good tidings of great joy" to all people, was the same then as it is now.  Woman's Day, December 1968, featured illustrations by Charles Schulz.

Christmas commercialism was alive and well in the 1950s and '60s.  Does it seem more innocent?  Or is that just the voice of nostalgia speaking?  Like them or not, the ads are great snapshots-in-time.

Christmas characters from TV programs were featured in 1960s print ads as well.

Ads showed appliances (washing machines, refrigerators, hand mixers) in pastel pink and turquoise blue in the late 1950s-early 1960s; they changed to gold and avocado green a few years later.  Getting your family new phones for Christmas had a different (and much more iconic) look back then.

Of course, some of the things in the collection of Christmas magazines don't stand the test of time.  This article, for example, explained how to make jewelry out of pop-tops from soda cans.  It's just as well that we let that sleeping ghost of Christmas past, lie.

I'm grateful Irene saved her Christmas magazines, so we can read over her shoulder today.  Merry Christmas, everyone.

The Orphan Flatware

The holidays are a time for tradition.  Often, traditions are passed down from one generation to another:  a menu, a recipe, a certain old movie or football game to watch on television.  A holiday is a time to get out "special" or "best" things to set the table for a family meal.

My mother only used her "best" silverplated (sometimes just called silverplate) flatware for Thanksgiving, Christmas and Easter.  The rest of the year, the 1847 Rogers Bros.* knives, forks, spoons and serving pieces lived in their special wooden felt-lined case in a cupbord.   About once a year the silverplate pieces were taken out and polished, gently washed and carefully dried, then returned to their case.  Cheap stainless steel flatware, which could be hand-washed (or later, put in the dishwasher), air-dried, and generally mildly abused was the choice for everyday use. 

(*1847 wasn't the year they were made, by the way.  That's the name of the brand.)

Silverplated flatware like this was an integral part of the lives of many families after World War II and throughout the mid-20th century.    

A piece, or a set, of flatware was an excellent wedding, anniversary or Christmas gift. If you needed to replace a piece, or buy another place setting as your extended family grew larger, you could do that as well.   If you were very fortunate, you would receive a set (or often just one-piece-at-a-time) of sterling silver flatware, for those special occasions.  The flatware came in a variety of pretty patterns.  Flatware sets were widely advertised in women's magazines in the 1940s and '50s. 

"Adoration" was my parents' silverplate flatware pattern.  Dad's older sisters pooled their resources and bought a set for the newlyweds, carefully packaged in a small wooden chest with cutout slots for each size and style of knife, fork, spoon and serving piece.  The set included exotic items such as long-handled teaspoons, soup spoons, a ladle and butter knives, which were used even more sparingly than the rest of the flatware.  My mother passed this set on to me.  "Use it for special occasions," she told me.  Years later, I acquired another set of silverplated flatware, still in its original case, by the same company in a different pattern when some friends were liquidating their parents' estate.

And then a few weeks ago, I spotted a handful of pieces of silverplate in a plastic bag at an estate sale. They were bright and shiny, almost like they'd never been used.  The pattern was different than the other two sets I already owned.

Only a few pieces.  Where was the special wooden case with the felt lining?  Where were the knives, the dinner forks, the serving pieces?  No one at the sale knew.  There were just a few regular spoons and salad forks, a handful of soup spoons, six butter knifes, and an olive fork.  Someone had cherished them once, but now they were orphans -- silverplate flatware without a special occasion.  Their pattern is called "Daffodil."

I couldn't leave them there. 

I will use them, as well as some pieces from my other two complete sets, for Thanksgiving and Christmas dinner this year.   But it won't be the first time I've used them.  I've already used them for a meal of soup, whole wheat bread and olives last month; with a chocolate peppermint loaf cake I made two weeks ago; with my tea this morning.  Each time I use them, I wash and dry them carefully and put them back in the drawer with the "everyday" stainless steel flatware, where they belong.

Because every day we're alive is a special occasion.  Because we live throughout the year, as the Apostle John once wrote, receiving "grace upon grace" to help us.  We should celebrate.

The Old Magazine

I love looking through old magazines.   At a recent estate sale, I found a copy of the November 1933 Better Homes and Gardens.  I can imagine my grandmother sitting at her kitchen table reading this same magazine, planning what she will cook for Thanksgiving dinner.  It’s interesting to leaf through the fragile old magazine pages and see the similarities between life in America 79 years ago, and today.

Electrical gadgets -- okay, appliances -- were a big deal in 1933.  This magazine features more than one article extolling the virtues of the latest models of electric mixers.  (They weren’t widely used in homes until the 1920s.)

In 1933, as now, they used images of beautiful women to sell stuff.  Granted, this young lady in from the Depression era is wearing far more clothing than her counterpart today.  (This is a good thing.)

The country was in the grips of an economic disaster in 1933.  Many of the magazine ads feature the National Recovery Administration emblem, signifying that company’s participation in FDR’s New Deal strategy.   Advertisements communicated messages about how rich people also used inexpensive products that the “average person” could afford.

This ad for Listerine toothpaste features an illustration by Paul Desmond Brown (1893-1958), who has been described as the “pre-eminent American illustrator of equestrian subjects.”  Brown was probably best-known in the 1930s for his images of polo matches – that was the heyday of the sport.  He’s also known as an illustrator of children’s horse books.

In an article entitled “Good Stories for Your Christmas Gift Lists,” the writer reviews a book called Little Man, What Now? and makes this ominous sidebar comment:  “How in the world has Germany gotten this way?  Ever since the bewildering Hitler regime, I’ve been wondering, haven’t you?”

So many ads, large and small.  Floor wax.  Bran flakes.  Dog food.  A coupon to send away for information on raising chickens for fun and profit.  Cyclone fences.  Eatmor Cranberries (it was November, after all).  Electric space heaters.  Food, food, and more food.

One of my favorite ads features a recipe for gingerbread.   I thought it was only appropriate at the end of this nostalgia trip to see if the gingerbread they were eating in 1933 stands the test of time.  I’m happy to report that it does.

½ cup sugar

½ cup butter and lard mixed (I used all butter)

1 cup molasses

1 egg

2 ½ cups flour

1 ½ teaspoons baking soda

1 teaspoon cinnamon

1 teaspoon ginger

½ teaspoon cloves

½ teaspoon salt

1 cup hot water

(since my grandmother in 1933 would have added a pinch of black pepper to bring out the flavors of the spices, I added that too)

Cream shortening and sugar.  Add beaten egg, molasses, then dry ingredients which have been sifted together.  Add hot water last and beat until smooth.  The batter is soft but it makes a fine cake.  Bake in greased shallow pan 35 minutes in moderate oven (325 to 350 degrees).  Makes 15 generous portions.  Serve it every week.

Another ad, for Washburn Crosby Gold Medal Flour, shows a thick slice of gingerbread from their recipe ("FREE inside every sack of GOLD MEDAL 'Kitchen-Tested' Flour) cut in half, stuffed with fluffy cream cheese and drizzled with lemon sauce.  Perhaps I'll try that method as well.