Tag Archives: relics

Relics: Wind-up car and jalousie windows, car cigarette lighters

words and images Posted on by

I can’t say we took any great American road trips when I was a child — mostly 200-mile jaunts to visit family in the Altoona area of Pennsylvania or rare shorter ones to local attractions like Niagara Falls or Letchworth State Park. The first car I remember was a powder blue Ford Falcon. With Virgil and me in the back seat picking on each other and wondering “Are we there yet?” after 25 or 50 miles, time and money may not have been the only reason we didn’t travel far or often.

Later, my dad bought a used van with two back seats. This was such a novelty that kids stopped by to pile in. All that room! Of course it was bare bones, a working man’s van, with none of the comforts of today’s SUVs and minivans, like DVD players or even — gasp! — cup holders. We “roughed it” back in those days with tap water or water from a roadside spring in Pennsylvania kept in a jug. We’d have to pull over to drink it. And we didn’t know about “hydration,” only thirst.

We had only an over-the-air radio — no Sirius, no subscription services tailored to our tastes. You might find yourself in a part of the country with only bland pop and country & western. Our series of bare-bones vehicles didn’t have 8-track tape decks or CB radios for chatting with passing truckers. I don’t think the radio played much of a role in our trips, except to get traffic and weather.

We had games like “punch bug,” in which being the first to see a Volkswagen Beetle on the highway entitled you to punch your annoying brother, sister, or friend. We also kept an eye peeled for “beavers,” station wagons with wood-paneled sides. We’d make a pulling motion to truck drivers to try to get them to pull their air horns. We liked the ones who accommodated us. I understand the tradition continues today, although with safety first (no startling of unaware drivers) and the hope it doesn’t provoke a modern road rage incident.

Of course there were no USB ports, but there were cigarette lighters — in 1965, a whopping 45 percent of Americans smoked. I’ve never bought a car, but it sounds like what Wikipedia describes as a “de facto DC connector,” or cigarette lighter receptacle, is more likely to be used to power portable accessories (“lights, fans, beverage heating devices, and air compressors for inflating tires”). I wonder if it can be used for e-cigarettes? J’s is used for an iPhone charger. With only about 15 percent of Americans smoking today, I suspect the car cigarette lighter as such has achieved “relic” status for many of us.

Neither the Ford Falcon nor the vans that followed had air conditioning save that offered by an open window and a speed-generated breeze. I don’t know how we held conversations on the open highway. Maybe we didn’t, other than, “He’s picking on me!” and “Are we there yet?” punctuated by “Ralph, STOP!” (My mother had imaginary brakes on her side and possibly a worn-out floorboard.)

Most cars sold in the U.S. now come with air conditioning as a standard; it’s a given, not a luxury — not so north of the border. Today we “wind” the windows down mostly to take photos, ask passers-by questions, pay entrance fees or talk to booth operators, and on occasion encourage a fly or mosquito to vamoose. I say “wind” even though the push of a button opens the windows (as long as they’re powered, that is).

In the old Ford Falcon and vans, you did wind the windows up and down, just like we used window winders to open and close the trailer’s jalousie windows. I had to look that term up — jalousie windows in campers/trailers/mobile homes were common in the 1950s and ‘60s, but aren’t anymore.

Jalousie window in Riverside, Illinois
Jalousie window opened with a window winder in Riverside, Illinois

Although cars.com talks about “old-school manual crank windows that seem, especially now, from a bygone automotive era,” they’re also not quite a relic. People don’t want them for themselves, but they do want the lower car price. They’re also found in many trucks. The 2015 cars.com article concludes, “For now, at least, it’s clear there are enough price-conscious new-car shoppers to keep manual windows around.”

I’ve never been a smoker, and I don’t feel nostalgic about car cigarette lighters. As with push lawn mowers and clotheslines, however, I do miss manual windows and window winders. Power windows have their advantages when you spot something and want to take a photo or video quickly (although they make enough noise to scare off animals). On the other hand, when I wait in the car I don’t always remember to open the window when the power is on, so I resort to the alternative, awkward in a parking lot, of opening the door. It doesn’t sound like much, but sometimes I want to crank open the window.

At least it’s not because someone used the cigarette lighter.

Interstate Inn, Gary, Indiana

Interstate Inn, Gary, Indiana
Interstate Inn, Gary, Indiana, 10 March 2019

This isn’t the first time the sign for the Interstate Inn has captured my attention. The decrepit sign, with “Restaurant,” beckons you to a building that persists in a half state — still standing but open.

According to Lost Indiana, it was once a Holiday Inn strategically placed to lure travelers on Dunes Highway. To me it’s a metaphor for most of the works of man — a short productive existence followed by a long deterioration haunted by aging, fading memories. It’s like an example of Life After People, only the people haven’t died, just given up.

And now that I’ve seen the Doctor Who episode “Blink,” when I see the Interstate Inn, which is not unlike the fictional “Wester Drumlins,” I’ll think of this bit of dialogue:

Sally Sparrow:

I love old things. They make me feel sad.

Kathy Nightingale:

What’s good about sad?

Sally Sparrow:

It’s happy for deep people.

Relics: Fotomat

words and images Posted on by

Do you remember Fotomat? You drove up, dropped off your film, and got your photos back the next day. (I can’t swear they were always on time.) If you don’t recall the distinctive Fotomat kiosk, you may be familiar with the idea from That 70s Show. The name was disguised as Photo Hut, which loses the charm of the alternative spelling common in the era’s advertising and the nod to the old-school automat.

This is a typical drive-up Fotomat booth.
Not on display [CC BY-SA 3.0], from Wikimedia Commons

Fotomat seems like a natural extension of mid 20th-century culture. Interstates, drive-in restaurants and movie theaters, motels (motor hotels) — why not drive-up film processing and prints?

In Hamburg, New York, the nearest Fotomat couldn’t have been any closer to us. It was plopped near the outer edge of the South Shore Plaza parking lot, where my dad could stop on the way home from work or to the store. If he’d been so inclined (and willing to dodge Route 20 and parking lot traffic), he could have walked over from the trailer park.

My dad liked Fotomat because they used Kodak processing and film for his primarily 126 film prints. He could be snobbish about certain brands, and Kodak was one of them. If I remember right, our South Shore Plaza Fotomat and others switched to another brand, possibly Fujifilm. That’s when and why he began to use Fotomat less frequently.

According to Wikipedia, the photo minilab made Fotomat obsolete in the late 1980s. The brand continued online with photo storage and editing until 2009. It’s funny to think of a brand built upon its unique physical locations and look surviving (barely) as a virtual service.

South Shore Plaza, opened in 1960, died a long, painful death, finally torn down and replaced by a Wal-Mart in 2009. I’d guess the Fotomat succumbed long before the plaza emitted its final gasp.

As we know from many creepy images of Poconos resorts or old amusement parks, when an idea or place is abandoned, it’s sometimes left in place until it falls apart or something comes along to take its place. Some of the 4,000 Fotomat booths remain, repurposed. Drive-through coffee or cigarettes, anyone?

Former Fotomat booth
Britta Gustafson [CC BY-SA 2.0], via Wikimedia Commons
A former Fotomat drive-through kiosk in Glendale, California, now a cigarette kiosk

Further reading: Democrat & Chronicle, “Whatever Happened To … Fotomat?”

Relics: Parking meters

Do you remember “lovely Rita, meter maid”? If your name is Rita, you may never forgive the Beatles. If you remember the Beatles’ heyday, you may recall parking meters.

Once upon a time in Chicago (and today in many suburbs), you put coins into a metal contraption embedded in the sidewalk to pay for parking. The challenge was to have enough quarters and not to over- or underpay. You might have to dash outside in the middle of a restaurant meal or movie to check on the meter or add coins.

Sign outside Mellow Yellow, Hyde Park, Chicago
Sign outside Mellow Yellow, Hyde Park, Chicago
Untitled
Modernized twin parking meters in Evanston, Illinois — with red flashing “expired” lights and credit cards accepted

To keep you honest, uniformed “meter maids” patrolled the meters, writing a ticket to place on each car next to a meter with a red “expired” flag. Alternatively, she might listen to your sob story about how you were just leaving, etc.

If you were running a quick errand and were lucky, you might find a meter with time left on it. No matter your financial lot in life, whether rich or poor, finding an unexpired meter made you feel great. You saved a quarter or 50 cents!

Repurposed parking meter
Repurposed old-school parking meter

In Chicago, the traditional parking meters by each parking spot are long gone. Instead, you pay at a “pay box” on the block, usually with a credit or debit card.

If you have a smartphone, there’s an app for that. This lets you avoid the walk to the pay box, alerts you when time is almost up, and allows you to add time if needed.

Parking meters are relics, along with the term “meter maid.” “Parking enforcement officer” sounds better, that is, if you’re not parked illegally.

This is the only parking meter left near me, the only one of several that lined the block.

Repurposed parking meter
From parking meter to bicycle lockup

I haven’t seen a cyclist use this parking-meter-turned-bicycle-post. Yet.

Relics: Portable typewriter, Royal Sabre style

words and images Posted on by

Let’s talk about the relic that’s helped to bring us countless words of wisdom — in more than 144 characters at a time. Yes, today’s relic is the typewriter.

Royal Sabre portable typewriter in case

I still have the typewriter that got me through the final years of high school, then college — a Royal Sabre portable, complete with manual (it’s around somewhere, although the key to the typewriter case likely has gone missing). When I moved in 2003, I started to put it outdoors for the neighborhood scavengers, but couldn’t bring myself to go through with it. It was one of the most expensive gifts from my reluctant parents.

Why the Royal Sabre? I don’t remember where we bought it. We would have looked at discount stores like K-mart or perhaps Ames, where I’d picked out my Huffy Superstar 10-speed bicycle. We’d have looked at quality and price. My thrifty dad, who’d turned 16 in 1929, didn’t believe in throwing away good money on poor quality (or generic store brands, unless they’d proven themselves). Because of the store’s nature, there wouldn’t have been much of a selection. I don’t recall the price, but I’d guess about $80 to $90. (Incidentally, this is the price I remember for the Huffy Superstar.)

As a portable typewriter, the Royal Sabre was noisy. The keys striking the platen solidly made quite a racket, especially when a poor, erratic like me was in front of the keyboard. My bad habit of typing during the wee hours began in high school, when Mr. Verrault’s papers were due Monday morning. I’m embarrassed now to admit that, in a single-wide, 55-foot-long trailer, on Sunday nights/Monday mornings I was at it until after midnight. Forty years later I can’t tell you how late, but later than suited my early-to-bed, early-to-rise parents. Oddly, I don’t recall much criticism from them for keeping them up. (Of course, my dad could have slept through the Apocalypse.) If he were convinced something was necessary for my education and future independence, my dad would go along as best he could. Of course the procrastination wasn’t necessary — hence my guilty conscience 40 years later!

At college, I found many of my fellow students were more affluent and had electric models, which I considered decadent (I’d told my mother the same thing about electric can openers). I learned I had a fixed number of computer hours per quarter, but playing the text-based Adventure seemed easier than learning to write/type without a program. Although I had a vague idea about computers from Star Trek (for example, oddly computers sound like Nurse Chapel), in practice they were a new and mysterious beast to me.

Then, as now, typing was the last step in the writing process. At 3 a.m., I was writing the paper longhand in pencil on notebook paper in the dorm lounge. At 6 a.m., I was typing the pages slowly on the faithful Royal Sabre. At 9 a.m., I was finishing proofing and marking errors or retyping if needed. At 9:55 a.m. I was running madly up several flights of faux-Gothic stairs (or waiting impatiently for an elevator) to meet a 10 a.m. deadline. By then I would have had some wild hallucinations from fatigue and panic. The Royal Sabre would go back into its hard plastic case, and I would go to bed, too tired and wound up to sleep.

One of my college professors — I don’t recall which — sternly forbade the use of erasable typewriter paper. The finish made it easy to erase mistakes, but it was friendly to neither pen nor pencil. He was so adamant that he would threaten to knock your grade down or refuse the paper if you dared to defy his prohibition. For someone like me — with portable typewriter, subpar typing skills, no correction key, and no budget for different kinds of paper, this seemed excessive.

At some point my dad’s sister Marietta acquired a word processor, and several years after college so did I — a Smith-Corona. It had some built-in storage and some kind of external storage. When I first got it, I spent a happy afternoon playing with the different setups and type wheels, and practicing my typing speed. Suddenly it was dark, and I realized hours had passed while I was blissfully unaware. I used the Smith-Corona for resumés (for all the good that did me) and some correspondence. I’m not sure how I used it, just that it mostly supplanted the Royal Sabre. I don’t think I used it much because it was large and heavy, and I was lazy about getting it out and setting it up. It was also hard to write and edit on the three-line(?) screen.

When it was in semi-regular use, the Royal Sabre never needed repair that I recall. Help was hand nearby, however, if required. A-Active (named to appear at or near the top of telephone directory listings — another relic) Business Machines operated in Hyde Park, first on 57th Street, then at 1633 East 55th, where I remember passing it. I never went in, but the ancient Underwood(?) in the window would catch my eye. The last ad I could find in the Hyde Park Herald for A-Active is dated July 6, 1994 — which was probably about the time I brought home my first computer, a Macintosh Classic II borrowed from work.

The Classic was followed by a series of Apple laptops, and the Smith-Corona word processor faded from favor as I was sucked into eWorld and America Online. When I moved in 2003, I debated with myself over keeping the Smith Corona. Unlike the Royal Sabre, it ended up in the alley, its fate to be forever unknown to me.

In a previous, early work life, sometimes I used a typewriter, likely an IBM Selectric model. When the proofing business was slow, I might help with filling out forms. If I remember right, one or two typewriters had been dedicated to and set up for this task. I don’t recall details (probably to preserve my emotional health), but I’m sure it was a lot of fun to line up everything and hit the magic correction key when the mind or finger slipped as they often did, or start over if things went way south — as they often did. I’m sure I saw the correction key as a technological marvel. I’m pretty sure computerization and automation of forms became big business as soon as introduced.

Every now and then (more then than now), I play with Hanxwriter, a typewrite simulator for Apple devices inspired by actor Tom Hanks. If you want to spend more money, you can “buy” typewriters from the “Signature Collection,” like Hanx Prime Select, Hanx 707 (the closest to the Royal Sabre’s shower stall green), Hanx Golden Touch, Hanx Del Sol, Hanx Electrix, or Hanx Matterhorn. Despite the “now and then” above, I finally bought all. Hanxwriter can save documents as PDFs only, not text — so, like typewritten pages, Hanxwriter pages are not easily edited. There’s something amusing about that.

Royal Sabre portable typewriter with Magic Margin key

The Royal Sabre weighs more than even heavy laptops, and from the start I thought the handle on the case was too flimsy for the weight. It’s stood the test of time, however, and as far as I know the typewriter would still work with a fresh ribbon. Surprisingly, ribbons are available for many typewriters, including the Royal Sabre. I tell myself that someday I’m going to get one and try out my computer-improved typing skills, although I doubt they’re better on a machine where you have to depress each key with an impressive force — hence the beauty of those “decadent” IBM Selectrics. Someday.

Relics: Landline telephones, or how I learned to love Ma Bell

words and images Posted on by

The Illinois legislature is trying to help phase out landlines, so this is a good time to talk about the relic whose descendant you may be holding in your hand at this moment: the old-school landline telephone as I knew it.

I was about five years old when my parents had a black wall phone installed over the desk that separated the kitchen from the living room. My mother was proud that I memorized the phone number instantly. The day I forget that 716 number is the day you can write “dementia” in my medical records.

As a rotary phone, even then it was becoming old-fashioned compared to the newfangled tone dialing phone introduced November 18, 1963. I felt like my folks were behind the times, but according to Wikipedia the rotary phone persisted into the 1970s with the majority of telephone subscribers.

We had a private line, but one of my new friends did not—shared “party lines” were cheaper. When I needed my dad to pick me up after a visit, the chances were good that when I picked up the phone I’d be greeted not with a dial tone but with the voice or giggles of one of the neighbors or their teenagers. If they’d heard the click and you didn’t hang up right away, you might get a wonderfully crusty suggestion that you hang up. If it seemed that they hadn’t heard the click, it was tempting to listen in—except there was going to be nothing interesting said. No Sorry, Wrong Number type opportunities on Pleasant Avenue.

When I got to college, I found the dorm house had two phone booths off the television lounge. AT&T offered phones at student rates, so somehow (I’ll never know how) I talked my parents into letting me get one. I must have been more of a talker in those days, or 34 years of business calls have soured me on phone chatting. I chose a pastel blue tone dial desk phone, which thanks to what I think was then recently introduced color-coded modular jack technology I installed myself by matching wires—one of my proudest moments. That phone went with me to my first apartment, although the phone number (which I have forgotten) didn’t.

At some point AT&T (or whichever Bell it was if after the breakup) sent a letter saying I could (or had to?) buy my phone. In the rotary days, you were a subscriber and rented your phone, but the phone company(ies) began to sell phones. I can’t remember what happened—whether I got tired of that phone or if I dropped and broke it (either is likely), and I bought a boring tan Trimline. My heart, if not my budget or my living space, really wanted an old-school cradle phone, perhaps not as fancy as this Design Line Early American model. I was stuck with the Trimline, however, and missed the solid bell ring of my first phone.

My next phone was a beige combination cordless with answering machine, so lacking in distinction that I remember mostly turning the little tape over. When I went shopping for it, I was disappointed to find the phone store was a thing of the past. Not only was the cradle phone no longer an option, but the office supply store phones were ugly and utilitarian, something more suited to a cubicle farm than a cozy home.

By the time I looked for my next and current phone, the office supply store options hadn’t changed much in style, although the color choices were more in the black, gray, and silver line. The answering “machine” is now digital. The phone docks in an upright position, so its footprint is more like that of the old candlestick telephone. It looks out of place on my Arts and Crafts-style desk. It would be more at home on the 1980s version of the USS Enterprise if the USS Enterprise had landline telephones. No one will feel nostalgic for this telephone in 50 years, and unlike cradle phones it won’t be sold on the 21st or 22nd century version of eBay or Craigslist.

At this point I have a landline telephone because I’m too lazy to switch from the DSL Internet access I’ve had for many years. I don’t use that phone often, although I still get doctor’s office reminders on that number, which I carried over from my first (shared) apartment. When I work from home, I realize how many spam/scam calls come in on that line. I can’t hear very well using it at normal volume, plus it costs an embarrassing amount of money every month. Although the Illinois rush to get rid of landlines is a problem for many, for me maybe it’s time. I’m never going to get that cradle phone after all.

(Also a relic: The sound of the landline telephone bell clanging loudly and all the household teenage zombies coming to life with a shout of “I’ll get it!” Now weird music emanates from their hand, purse, or pants pocket—that is, if they even get calls instead of texts. Remember the scene from Meet Me in St. Louis in which Warren Sheffield calls Rose long distance from New York City while the Smith family looks on and listens awkwardly? Those days are gone for good. Now it’s people on the bus or at the coffee shop or on the street corner who get to eavesdrop on your teens.)

Relics: Sands Motel in Ottawa, Illinois

words and images Posted on by

My family didn’t travel for recreation. When we visited relatives, we stayed with one of my dad’s sisters, Mildred or Thelma. Even when I figured out that other families went on real vacations to Disney (ugh) or other attractions, I never thought about where they hung their hats at night.

Psycho, of all things, exposed me to that all-American icon, the motel or motor inn, with its outside doors and convenient parking. By 1960, though, even the Bates Motel had become a victim of the burgeoning interstate system, accessible only to those few who happened to stray onto the exit, say, during a blinding downpour.

Judging from the mid-century motels that remain open, someone still stays at them. I’ve spotted a few on the north side of Chicago as well as in a number of small midwestern towns. I can tell they’re old school because they tout amenities like air conditioning and color TV. Not just TV, but color TV. If today’s signs weren’t programmable, future generations might wonder at the “free WiFi” advertised at interstate exit hotels.

Years ago I spotted this old-school sign in Ottawa, Illinois, where “Lincoln’s voice was FIRST heard!” and a number of women worked themselves to death painting radium onto watch dials. Ever since I’ve wanted to stay there so I could take photos of the sign and enjoy some of that good old-fashioned air conditioning and TV (color not mentioned, but assumed). When I looked the Sands Motel up, I found the rate — under $50 — also looks like a relic from yesteryear, perhaps the 1980s. (Ice, however, is extra.)

Sands Motel pc front
Sands Motel in Ottawa, Illinois, at a more colorful (or garish) time — and look at that sign!
Sands Motel pc back
All the expected luxuries of a motel, except is the TV in color?

Arriving at The Sands from long drive from Flossmoor, I didn’t think to look at the sign. After hiking at Matthiessen State Park and dining at the Lone Buffalo, I was too tired to look at the sign, although I had passed it at least three times by then. The fact that I didn’t notice the sign should have been a clue that something was up. Yes, imagine my surprise when the next morning I went out to take a photo of the beloved sign and discovered this:

The Sands Motel, Ottawa, Illinois
Sands Motel in Ottawa, Illinois. Note the hourglass on the new sign.

The sign had been replaced! I sent my friend to the Sands Motel office to get the story, which varied a bit from a local newspaper account that’s no longer online. The sign was not the victim of changing fashions or tastes but of its own age and years of exposure to Illinois weather. It had become a hazard, perhaps ready to topple in the wind. If you look beyond the rust, you can see a crack between the bottom and middle pieces. The new, less elaborate sign perhaps plays a sly tribute to its predecessor’s fate, depicting a tilted hourglass with the sands of time starting to run out.

What’s that you say? “What’s an hourglass?”