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Forum
-> Miscellaneous
How many of you have ever used these:
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| Slide rule |
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5% |
[ 1 ] |
| Carbon paper |
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26% |
[ 5 ] |
| Reel to reel audiotape |
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0% |
[ 0 ] |
| Record player with vinyl LP or 45 rpm singles |
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5% |
[ 1 ] |
| Windup alarm clock or watch |
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5% |
[ 1 ] |
| Wringer wash machine |
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0% |
[ 0 ] |
| Typewriter-electric or manual |
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5% |
[ 1 ] |
| Bonnet-type hair dryer |
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5% |
[ 1 ] |
| manual crank-type sharpener |
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47% |
[ 9 ] |
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| Total Votes : 19 |
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seniormom
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 Sun, May 21 2006, 7:15 am
Chen, keep 'em coming! 
I guess I'm enjoying this so much because it hits home. BTW, if it's not too personal, approx. when were you born? You've kindled my curiosity!. You can pm me if you like.
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chen
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Sun, May 21 2006, 7:15 pm
Brush-and-comb cleaners? these were shaped like a short, fat toothbrush with comblike teeth at one end, for raking hair out of a brush, and had a small round short-bristled brush mounted on a spindle so it could rotate, for snagging hairs out of combs. I wish I had one--a toothbrush does not work nearly as well as that little rotating brush.
Anyone remember legless ironing boards? you'd place each end between the rungs of a ladderback chair, or just across the backs of the chairs if they weren't ladderback. very unstable that way, though.
How about box cameras?
the first polaroid cameras? you'd count x number of seconds after the photo was ejected from the camera, peel off the backing and there was your picture.
remember when kids carried briefcases to school? Not backpacks, not attache cases, not tote bags, but actual accordion-style leather briefcases of the type now used only by lawyers and accountants over age 65. they weighed a ton when they were empty, never mind when they were full of books. I still occasionally slip and ask one of the kids where his "briefcase" is. They think it's a riot.
Oh, how could I forget hatboxes? These were a piece of luggage that was nothing more than a round, hard-sided suitcase, somewhere between 18 and 24 inches in diameter. I don't know anyone who actually used one for hats, but they were a convenient size for a sleepover at a friend's house. there were also "train cases", little pieces of luggage about the size of two large shoeboxes, with a mirror inside the lid and usually fitted with a shallow tray and a variety of little elastic loops and pockets for your cosmetics and other grooming gear.
how about those little wax bottles full of sweet syrup in different colors? they came in packs of 5 or so. you'd bite off the top of the bottle, drink the syrup, and chew on the wax till it fell apart in your mouth.
ko-rec-type, the precursor to wite-out? these were little slips of paper coated on one side with a chalky substance. to correct a typing mistake, you'd backspace, slip the ko-rec-type under the ribbon, and retype the error. the force of the keys would press the white powder onto the paper over the error and 'erase' it. then backspace again and type correctly. Sounds tedious, but it was a whole lot better than erasing with those special typewriter erasers that looked either like pencils with brushes on the end, or like rubber disks attached to a brush.
when I was in first grade, you could tell who were the future JAPs, though the term JAP hadn't been coined yet. these were the girls who had the box of 64 crayola crayons with the sharpener in the back. Today, who uses crayons? markers are the artistic medium of choice!
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imaamy
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Sun, May 21 2006, 7:23 pm
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Wow, I am old at 38! I remember before personal computers, my dad did his work on huge computer machines at work. I went with him and he had boxes of rectangular cards with punch holes in them to lug back and forth. Imagine that in our age of instant messaging, digital music, and more electronic options than I can understand!
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chen
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Sun, May 21 2006, 7:27 pm
roller skates that went over your shoes, and used a key to make them longer or shorter.
stickball--baseball played, usually on the street, with a pink rubber ball (Spalding) and a sawed-off broomstick.
how about this little gizmo for sprinkling laundry: a hollow cork attached to a pierced aluminum ball like the head of a sprinkler can. you'd fill a soda bottle with water, insert the sprinkler gizmo into the neck, and sprinkle away. Does anyone remember sprinkling laundry at all?
remember "car beds" for babies? they just sat on the rear seat and were not attached to the car in any way. they let you travel by car and not have to hold the baby in your lap the whole time. of course, they provided zero protection in a crash, but in those days seat belts were optional when they were available at all.
smelling salts? little bottles filled with colored ammonia and some sort of crystalline salts. old ladies used to bring these to shul on yom kippur and sniff them when they felt faint. little kids like me would sniff them and make faces.
Last edited by chen on Sun, May 21 2006, 7:47 pm; edited 2 times in total
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chen
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Sun, May 21 2006, 7:45 pm
How about GLASS baby bottles?
I don't remember this myself, but my mother remembers when you would buy rubber nipples to fit over the neck of a beer bottle (!) to feed a baby.
How about sharpening your pencil with a pocket knife?
cartridge pens were a craze when I was in jr. high. they were neater than fountain pens b/c you didn't refill a reservoir from a bottle of ink, you'd pop in a new cartridge. the craze didn't last long b/c the ink ran like jesse owens if it got the least bit wet.
inkwells on school desks? we didn't use them by the time I was in school, but they were there embedded into the desks. we used to stick chewing gum--or worse--in there.
wooden desks in school? when you carved your initials in there, they were there forever. then they renovated the school, replaced the wooden desks with formica, and goodbye carving. all you could do was write on them.
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chen
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Sun, May 21 2006, 7:51 pm
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thigh-high stockings with elastic tops that supposedly stayed up without garters? (they didn't.)
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seniormom
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Sun, May 21 2006, 8:11 pm
Yup...remember it well.
I think we left the rest of amos in the dust! 
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sarahd
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Mon, May 22 2006, 1:42 am
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No, no, I'm huffing and puffing as I try to keep up, but I remember most of this stuff, from my mother's stories if not my own experience.
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RivkaS
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Mon, May 22 2006, 4:09 am
| seniormom wrote: |
Carbon paper -- yes, recently found carbon copies of some of my college term papers! 
Reel to reel audiotape -- yes!
Record player with vinyl LP or 45 rpm singles -- how about 78 rpm ceramic records, some of which I still have!
Windup alarm clock or watch -- of course!
Wringer wash machine -- never used one, but remember it -- also remember having a washboard at home (anyone here know what that is?!)
Typewriter-electric or manual -- typed all my school papers and early job applications on a manual Smith-Corona portable! (You really had to hit those keys hard, escpecially if you were doing carbon copies.) Bonnet-type hair dryer -- oh, yes -- with extra large bonnet to accomodate the beer can size rollers!
Manual pencil sharpener -- yes, and it's probably the only thing on this list that's still actually used.
| Rofl... yes, childhood/youth memories... I learned to type on such a monster!!!!! (OMG, I also learned shorthand... does anybody still learn shorthand today?)
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chen
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Mon, May 22 2006, 4:45 am
eek! shorthand! yes! I took one class in summer school to make note-taking easier in college, but was so afraid I'd not be able to read the notes back that I never used it! good thing, too--I'd written a letter to a friend in which I signed off "yours truly" or something in shorthand, and by the time my friend showed it to me to ask me what that was, I couldn't read it any more!
Ok--how about claw-foot bathtubs? A real pain to mop under, plus your slippers would always wind up under there and you'd have to get down on your belly and fish them out--after you'd just taken a bath.
Flit pumps? Flit was a brand of insecticide that came in an applicator consisting of a refillable screw-cap metal can with a piston-type pump attached to the lid. you'd pump the handle and and the stuff would squirt out. this was such a common sight that there was a whole series of cartoons, political and otherwise, featuring someone using this device, with the caption "Quick, Henry, the Flit!"
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chen
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Mon, May 22 2006, 5:28 am
| sarahd wrote: | a chopping blade* with a wooden bowl to make chopped liver.
*I forget what they're called - a rounded blade about 6" wide and 5" high with a handle on top. |
I just remembered my grandmother called it a "hockmesser", which just means chopping knife. That may or may not have been the real name for it.
Who remembers vitreous enamel-coated cookware? It usually came in either dark blue or black speckled with white, or plain white with red or blue bands around the edges and on the handles. That's how people knew which was milchik and which was fleishik. The enamel would chip and expose the iron underneath, which would then rust.
Oh, and Rokeach kosher dish soap with the word "Kosher" in hebrew letters right in the soap in blue or red. This was before the days of kosher liquid dish detergent. Rokeach soap is till around, usually on the bottom shelf in the kosher aisle of the supermarket, where it hangs around for a very long time. Being coconut-oil based, it's very mild and makes a good face soap, believe it or not. Leaves your skin feeling supple, even if it does smell like your grandmother's kitchen. Or, rather, MY grandmother's kitchen.
OK--for the big bucks: Who was the Jewish Tom Thumb, and how did he almost come to grief when his mother was making gefilte fish?
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chen
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Mon, May 22 2006, 6:28 am
wowie, the suntanning thread reminded me of this from the 1960's--reflectors! These were cardboard panels, usually folded in thirds, laminated to aluminum foil. you'd open up the trifold panel and hold it under your chin to reflect sun under there, to ensure an even tan and avoid being left with a pale underchin.
how about those "passive exercise" machines they had in gyms? they consisted of a wide belt attached to a motorized stand. you'd place the belt against your main "trouble spot," turn on the machine and let it jiggle your fat away, tone up your muscles and make a milkshake at the same time. (I'm just kidding about the milkshake. ) The theory was that these machines would exercise your body for you. Well, they DID jiggle you around, but they certainly did not jiggle anything away, except maybe your pocket change.
seniormom, you will remember this, I'll bet: gymsuits! these were dreadful one-piece garments that were like short jumpsuits, except the shorts were these absurd, billowy, gathered "bloomer"-type things that didn't look good on anyone, and of course they always came in awful colors that didn't look good on anyone, either. I didn't have one of those, but then we didn't have a real gym, either. My sister, whose school had a "real" gym, had to endure 4 years of this torture in HS. I think the gymsuits hadn't changed since the school was founded in the 1920's.
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Mommy912
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Mon, May 22 2006, 7:08 am
| chen wrote: | | OK--for the big bucks: Who was the Jewish Tom Thumb, and how did he almost come to grief when his mother was making gefilte fish? |
OK, now I am rich.
That would be Ke'Tan-Tan (sp?) who was so little that he ended up on the chopping knife (or some such thing) and went up and down for a ride - and then fell in the fish.
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chen
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Mon, May 22 2006, 7:51 am
very good! I think it was spelled K'tonton. And, yes, he went for a ride on his mother's hockmesser, fell in, and came this close to suffering the same fate as Marie Antoinette.
are the K'tonton books still in print?
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Mommy912
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Mon, May 22 2006, 7:58 am
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They have them on Amazon.com: the author is Sadie Rose Weilerstein.
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chen
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Mon, May 22 2006, 8:57 am
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wow, 912, you're goooood!
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imaamy
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Mon, May 22 2006, 12:08 pm
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Chen, I have those stockings in my drawer! They still make em, and they have such scratchy rubberized elastic that they do stay up, and leave a nice indent on your thigh. I can't believe I'm the only one who used a typewriter? We still have one in the closet. My husband used it some in grad school.
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Ruchel
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Mon, May 22 2006, 12:11 pm
21 here, have used:
Slide rule
Carbon paper
Reel to reel audiotape
Record player with vinyl LP or 45 rpm singles
Windup alarm clock or watch
Typewriter-electric or manual
manual crank-type sharpener
Cool thread!
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amother
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Mon, May 22 2006, 3:12 pm
LOL, I was once at a judaica crafts fair and the very young vendor didn't know how to use the sales receipt book. she was writing down the info on the original and the copy slips, thinking the "multipart carbonless forms' were defective. I had to show her that there were two sheets of carbon paper provided between the last receipt and the cardboard backing of the pad. She'd never seen such a thing.
anonymous b/c the vendor could well be one of you.
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