Round Robin: Memories of Childhood, Not All of Them Mine

Hi ho! This week's Round Robin Challenge: Childhood Memories, comes to us from Monica of the blog Shutterly Happy. Many of the exhibits here at Casa Blocher, the Museum of the Weird, are kid-related, and over the years I've shown you lots of them: my battered plush dog Trophy, John's Handy Andy bulldozer, my Barbies along with all their friends and relatives, Chatty Baby in two different hair colors and many more. This time out, let's skip over all of those and focus on other vintage items in our collection.

From the Picasa album Museum of the Weird

John has spent much more time on eBay than I have over the years, so let's take a look at a few items from his collection. The toy soldier in box is from the Marx "Warriors of the World" collection. The colorful plastic frogmen are powered by baking soda, and originally came in Kellogg's cereal boxes. The yellow dinosaur, as far as I know, is just a yellow dinosaur. The autographed baseball he got as an adult. Can you tell what famous Japanese player signed it?

This one is probably more universal for children of the 1950s and 1960s. Display space is at a premium here at the Museum of the Weird, so these Lincoln Logs are "on display" in John's office closet! My exposure to Lincoln Logs was mostly at Pebble Hill School in DeWitt, NY, where I spent the second half of kindergarten. We also had Mr. Machine! I always wanted one of those.

From the Picasa album Museum of the Weird

Let's move on to some of my childhood mementos. Like John, I've repurchased some stuff I had as a kid, having managed to hang onto very few of my original childhood things. But the china dog on the left has been with me since 1964 or 1965, when he arrived on a planter someone gave my mom. A few years later I appropriated him for my china animal collection. He's named Heather, after a dog my friend Cindy R. had before I knew her. He's been broken and glued back together, but what of it? The memories evoked by this battered relic are intact.

The mother raccoon with her cub are a repurchase. I used to buy bone china animals in sets of three, little family groupings glued onto a white card for display in the few stores that sold them. Originally they cost $3.00 per set, but got as high as $3.75 or even $4.00 by the time I stopped buying them. It took me a while to save up for them at 50 cents a week in allowance! The day I bought one such set at a store in Shoppingtown (DeWitt, NY), I found a $10 bill. The store owner hung onto it for me, and if nobody claimed it in 30 days I would get to keep it. And I did! I almost certainly spent it on china animals, or possibly plastic ones in the Britain's Limited zoo and farm animal collections.

The raccoon bone china grouping, to which the figure above belongs, I remember especially. I used a file to separate the baby raccoon from the mother's mouth, so that I would have an extra toy animal and more versatility for our games about the animals' adventures. I came to regret this, but it kinda worked!

This Peanuts lunchbox dates back to about 1964, when my friend Joel used to bring his lunch to school in it. I always loved that lunchbox, and when I happened to mention it to him some years back he sent it to me. His late mother had later used it as a paintbox, and it's clearly quite battered. But I don't care. Joel also had a great collection of Hungerford Peanuts figures back in the day, and a great Viewmaster collection.

And here we have two boys with hats! Bunsen Bernie Kiddle is the only doll I'll be showing you today. The kid in the picture is Jacob, my godson. I've only seen him on two occasions since his family moved to Los Alamos when he was a little boy, but his parents send me photos. He's 13 now, I think. So my memories of Jacob as a child are somewhat limited, but still precious.

From Family photos

Here are photographic memories that are barely mine at all. My mom had a copy of this portrait of her younger self (right) on her vanity when I was a kid. When I was a teenager she gave me this double frame with two pictures, one of her sister and one of her mother. I think the shot on the left here is the one of Aunt Flora. Flora M Johnson was an engineer who helped to design the Interstate Highways along the eastern corridor. I don't know the details, but I like to think that Route 81, which we took many times to visit Grandmother and Aunt Flora in Fairfax VA and sometimes in Florida, was partly her accomplishment.

What of the other portrait, the one of my grandmother, Flora D Johnson, nee Dufour, at one time Flora D Ballantine? If I don't have the two portraits mixed up, here she is on the right. I've had that photo buried under the Aunt Flora one for the past eight years or so, because, well, my mom is far more important to me. But let's let little Flora out for a while, in front of Flora-on-the-floral-couch!

Now let's see everyone else's childhood memories!


Linking List
(as of 6:45 PM PST 02/13/10)

Monica - Posted!
Shutterly Happy
http://monica-frameofmind.blogspot.com

Carly - Posted!
Ellipsis
http://ellipsissuddenlycarly.blogspot.com

Suzanne - Posted!
SuzyQ421's Photo Blog
http://suzyq421sphotoblog.blogspot.com

Karen - Posted!
Outpost Mâvarin
http://outmavarin.blogspot.com

Kara
Hip Chick Photo
http://hipchickphotos.blogspot.com

Linda
Mommy's Treasures
http://mommystreasures.blogspot.com

ellen b. - Posted!
The Happy Wonderer
http://happywonderer.wordpress.com

Nancy - Posted!
Nancy Luvs Pics
http://nancyluvspix.blogspot.com

Quiltworks - Posted!
World Through The Eyes Of A Fiber Artist
http://quilt--works.blogspot.com

Sandy - Posted!
From the Heart of Texas
http://sandytrefger.wordpress.com

Gattina - Posted!
Keyhole Pictures
http://gattina-keyholepictures.blogspot.com

Jama - Posted!
Sweet Memories
http://mummyjam.blogspot.com

Ruth - Posted!
Scrabble Queen
http://scrabblequeen.wordpress.com/2010/02/13/childhood-memories/

If you like the Round Robin Challenges, please check our other memes. Click the logos to be redirected to this week's assignments:

The Weekend Assignment, 
hosted by Karen and Carly


This week: Weekend Assignment #306: 
What's the Name of Your Book?


- and -

The Ellipsis Monday Photo Shoot, hosted by Carly

This week: Ellipsis Monday Photo Shoot #77: The Cone Zone

See ya!

Karen

The Photo Not Taken

Back in the days of his AOL blog By the Way, John Scalzi used to periodically warn his readers and fellow bloggers not to post pictures of other people's children without permission, because of the privacy and security issues this might pose. I have not always complied perfectly with this principle, but I try to be sensitive to it, and not to cross a line. So when I drove past the Alamo Wash early yesterday evening and saw a child doing something rather amazing, I did not stop the car, turn around and try to get a picture. But I will tell you about it.

The photo above is from back in May, right after a rain storm. Where you see water flowing in the picture, substitute a dry street and dry dirt, and you'll have some idea of the scene Tuesday evening. As I approached the wash on my way home, with newly-groomed Pepper and rather relieved Cayenne, I noticed there were a couple of kids playing under the blue bridge. It wasn't until I drove past them that I saw what they were doing.

The boy, maybe ten years old, was wearing a Spider-Man costume, a decent one but with a crummy mask. He was hugging the slab of concrete in the left (west) side of the wash, trying to crawl up the wall! His sister(?), a few years older, was dangling a rope from above, presumably trying to help. I tried to give her a high sign, but I doubt that she understood the message. Already past the wash and the kids, I shouted out the open window, "I LOVE that!" and drove away.

I've taken my photos for the Ellipsis Monday Photo Shoot and will edit and post them after I've slept. They do not involve Spider-Man or the wash, but please stop back anyway.

Karen

EMPS: Ah, Youth! Back When They Were Youthier!

For Ellipsis Monday Photo Shoot #21: Youngins', Carly wants to see photos of something young, as in babies, kids, etc. of any species. I'm kind of stuck in the house today with two adult dogs and a fridge full of aged food, so I'm going to the archives, looking for photos I haven't posted before.

There are actually quite a few pictures of kids that I took in 2005 and never posted until now, out of concerns about security and privacy and all that. But now I figure these are fair game. The kids won't look the same by now, and they won't be in the same places, and I'm not giving names or personal details. And frankly, many of these shots are too far away and out of focus to really show kids' faces. Nevertheless, some of this shots are particular favorites of mine. Let's see what we've got!

Kids at the Park Place Mall play area, April 2005

From my Picasa album EMPS

Back in April 2005 I photographed kids in the hospital-sponsored play area at Park Place Mall. (This was years before a security guard told me that photography at the mall wasn't allowed without written permission.) I posted two shots at the time, but these are some of the also-rans. I like the play area: it's full of colorful, oversize representations of desert critters, and there are pretty much always lots of kids running around on the padded carpeting, watched by adults along the sidelines.

The second shot of this other set is one of my favorite photos ever. These adorable little girls were at the English Tea put on by ECW (Episcopal Church Women) at the English Faire at St. Michael's Episcopal Church in September 2005. I assume they're the grandchildren of the two parishioners who brought them. One of the little girls had never been to a church before, and thought St. Michael was a fairy because of the wings.

I'm chafing a little here about the National Day of Service on this Martin Luther King Day - I really want to help out, but I have eight more modules to get through on my FAR homework. I think I'll grab my FAR textbook and head over to the Red Cross. I stopped giving blood months ago due to a nagging cough, but that's pretty much gone now. What are you doing today?

Be sure to check Carly's blog Ellipsis every Monday for the Ellipsis Monday Photo Shoot topic, and for links to the previous week's participants! As for me, I'll make the rounds when I can.

Karen

The Days Are Just Packed

Weekend Assignment #190: Share some of your favorite boredom-alleviating tactics from when you were a kid. "Kid" in this case can stretch from the ages of about six to eighteen; just pick an age where you did something particularly ingenious (or alternately, just plain weird) and go with it. One caveat: avoid the boredom alleviators where the story could end "and then nine months later little Jimmy was born." Because that's in the realm of too much information.

Extra Credit: When was the last time you were really, really bored?

And you expect me to remember this, do you? I mean come on, it was 40 years ago!

Sigh. I'll try, although I'm less than inspired on this one.

What I remember is starting out the window, knowing that no friends were available to me on that particular day, either because someone was busy or I'd had a falling out with someone, or because I was just between friends. From there I might have chosen, in my desperation, to watch tv shows I didn't like, such as Gilligan's Island, or visit the most annoyingly boring friend I had (and no, I won't reveal who that was), or reread a book. When I was a kid, I didn't have a huge book collection, but I had my Whitman versions of Little Women and Black Beauty and Tom Sawyer, two or three books each about Nancy Drew and the Bobbsey Twins, and my grandmother's hand-me-down copy of Winnie-the-Pooh. I don't recall doing anything especially ingenious or weird, unless you count acting out scenarios with china animals, starting a Batman club (membership: three), creating my own secret identity (Bat Friend) and trying to fool my friends, catching salamanders near the old railroad tracks, scrubbing my old ballerina wallpaper, or imagining my own Utopian country (The Place) only to discover how very boring it was.

A slightly more effective boredom-reducing activity was to walk into the village of Manlius, look around at Manlius Pharmacy and Weber's, and maybe even buy something if I had the money, even if it was just wax lips or bubble gum cards, or a comic book from Temple's Dairy Store about some character I didn't even like much. (It took a truly desperate level of boredom to make me to buy an issue of Blackhawk or Sgt. Rock.) Really, though, the walks into the village were better with two people. I imagine nowadays a ten-year-old wouldn't be allowed to walk a mile by herself on a suburban main road, just to buy an ice cream or look at china animals. But in those days it was fine, as long as I told my mom I was going. Sometimes I even walked home facing backwards.

The most boring times of all, it sometimes seemed to me, were on vacation at the Speakman summer house we sometimes rented on Lake Ontario. My parents' idea of a good time was to lie on the beach with a paperback book (John D MacDonald for dad, gothics for Mom) and a transistor radio tuned to Arthur Godfrey on WSYR. For me that was the dullest thing in the world! I would take a rubber raft and ride the waves until I'd thoroughly depleted the entertainment value of that activity, and then there I'd be, wishing I had a good book, or a friend to talk to, or a village nearby where I could purchase wax lips, china animals and comic books. The library books I got on vacation never seemed to be anything worth reading; I particularly remember my mom picking out something for me called The Clothes Horse, and my being annoyed that it wasn't about a horse. Eventually my parents did invite a friend of mine to visit us on vacation, and that helped a lot. So did Dell and Penny Press puzzle magazines with as many logic problems as possible.

Nowadays, as Scalzi says, there's little time to be bored, except possibly at work if I'm doing the same old thing (which assuredly does not describe my present job!). I'm not limited to three or four tv stations, and whatever they happen to show on a weekday afternoon. Nor am I limited to whatever friends might happen to live in my neighborhood. Heck, there's always more to do than I can make myself do. Here I am with Doctor Who on pause on one computer, the Doctor Who Series Three soundtrack (which is glorious) on pause in iTunes on the other computer, just to free my brain up so I can write this blog entry. I've also got a flash game open, and eight more Firefox tabs, Chapter One of Heirs (still untouched), AIM and an inactive IM, and PhotoStudio, except that I didn't take any photos today. There's a Thurber book on my desk from looking up the publication order of several of his books, and my sonic screwdriver, which I've been comparing with the "real" one as it pops up on screen. Who can be bored, with all that going on? As Calvin of Calvin and Hobbes says, the days are just packed! Well, the nights, anyway.

Extra Credit: Well, I'm really bored with this blog entry. Does that count? (And no, that's not a slam at the assignment. It's not you, John, it's me!)

Karen

In Which I Cure the Common Cold...With Pepper!

Kids check out 50-year-old toy cars at the toy show

Weekend Assignment #155: Recount a distinctively childish thing you did (or your children did) when you or they were children. Because things like painting your hands pink, or trying to make chocolate milk with mud, or arranging a marriage between your stuffed animals? Not something you're likely to do when you're older.

Extra Credit: The name of your favorite stuffed animal growing up.

D'oh! I forgot to do the Weekend Assignment last night! I think that's the first time that's happened in over two years.

My cubicle was colorful today in honor of my birthday.

It's interesting to look back on this, though, now that I'm officially 50 years and 50 minutes old. On the other hand, I'm sure I've told most of these stories before, and I need to get to bed so we can drive to the Civil War reenactment in the morning. But briefly:

Trophy and Diet Pepsi (although not cherry in 1965)

• When I was in first or second grade, I was sent to the nurse's office for having no underwear on. Why this was in the school nurse's purview I have no idea, but that's what happened. I had worked out, quite logically I thought, that if no one is ever supposed to see your underwear, then it doesn't matter whether you actually wear any, because no one will see it. The catch, of course, is that in those days, little girls wore dresses and skirts exclusively while at school, and it was by no means certain that they would never accidentally expose something. In short: I got caught.
• Perhaps a year or two after that, about the time I invented the peanut butter and bologna sandwich with mayo, mustard and lettuce, I was told that a nail would dissolve in a glass of Coke if left there long enough. (It wasn't true, but that was the urban legend.) Somehow from there I made my way to a theory that Diet Pepsi with black pepper in it might cure the common cold. So I conducted my scientific experiment, prepared the concoction and drank it, repeatedly. I'm pleased to say that I no longer have that cold today.
• The answer to the Extra Credit is Trophy, of course, and I still have him. He's about 44 years old now. Someone's puppy got hold of him early on and chewed off one end of the right rear leg, but my Aunt Grace, or possibly Aunt Marie, sewed it shut. I did some repairs myself at various times, restuffing him with tissues, sealing the surgical site with glue and white thread, and embroidering on a new nose made of black thread.
• My mom had polio encephalitis and other health problems in the early 1960s, and was hospitalized a few times in that period. Once I happened to mention to a friend's mother than my mom was ill. She took me and the friend to the store, where I picked out a get well gift: an embroidered handkerchief.
  
• Cindy R., Meredith P. and other friends used to trade with me all the time, swapping toys and dolls and china animals. Sometimes we would make several trades, only to end up where we started. One trade that did stick was when I traded a baby doll or china animal or gum cards or possibly a dollar for an outdated, naked Barbie doll. This was after the Twist-N-Turns came out in 1967, and Cindy didn't want her straight leg bubble cut Barbie any more. Although I was glad to get the doll - the only Barbie I owned during that period - I argued for months that it was a Midge doll. To me, the older Barbies were the ones with the pony tails, as depicted on a nurse kit my preschool classmate Nancy had in 1961.
  

And then there was the time I finally bought a 1962 Barbie with a ponytail. No, wait: that was last weekend!

I'll check in over the weekend, but I won't be online much. It's time for our central Arizona birthday jaunt! (And remember, the Museum of the Weird will be guarded while we're away, as always, by a large man and a small dog.)

Karen