TBT…

And another one out of the past…

Your mothers probably used these if you wore a certain type of clothing…

BAck in the day Jeans stretcher

These were ‘jean’ stretchers, inserted in the legs of blue jeans when they were hung on the line…

And here are a couple more old ones…

Tinkertoys… The forerunners of Legos!

Back in the day tinkertoys

 

And one more…

Hand cranked ice cream in the summer… Kids ARE good for something if they know they get to lick the beaters… LOL

back in the day hand cranked ice cream

Comments

TBT… — 33 Comments

  1. I loved Tinkertoys, Erector sets, lincoln logs, and remember how in the winter we’d get so frustrated with the tinkertoys.
    The wood would dry and shrink and nothing would stay stuck together.

  2. And Lincoln Logs.

    And if your Mom ironed clothes, she had a sprinkling bottle filled with water, stoppered with a cork that had a watering-can-looking end attached.

    And your Dad would bang on the side of the TV to make it stop skipping. Only he was allowed to do this.

    – Charlie

  3. And of a certain age, having to go to the television to turn it on, or off, or change channels, or raise or lower the volume. And as for the aerial, tin foil is not just for anti mind reading hats!

    John in Philly

  4. My mother would cut up ripe peaches to place on top of the ice cream. It was a taste no mass producer can actually imitate.

  5. I remember all of them plus Tinker Toys and Lincoln Logs. Made many forts and barriers for my soldiers/cowboys. I also liked playing with my Alamo set (made of tin and folding tips to put the walls together. Who needs iPads? I had imagination.

  6. And clothes pinning playing cards in the bicycle spokes to make that ‘motorsicle’ sound as you drove around the neighborhood.

    I remember when televisions came in real wood cabinets that sat on the floor.

  7. I remember all of these things. I also have a ’60s vintage dial telephone sitting on my desk, and it works. On the bottom it says “property of Pacific Bell”.
    Does anyone remember Pendelton shirts? If your jeans were not properly creased by the pants stretchers, and you didn’t wear a Pendelton, you just weren’t “in”.

  8. Tinkertoys,Lincoln Logs, Erector Set, HO Trains, Hot Wheels, Matchboxes etc.

    I miss the good old days. sigh.

  9. Okay, too young for the jeans stretchers, and Mom’s home made ice cream was electrically power, however, I did have an old can of tinker toys at my Grandparent’s house that was passed down from some older relative some how.

  10. “Jeans” stretcher? How about “fatigue pants” stretcher? And remember spray Sizing?

  11. Ed- Yep, remember the same problem… sigh…

    Charlie- Oh yeah, the ‘sprinkler’… I remember I broke mama’s and got my butt beat for that one…

    John- True! And you had to ‘fiddle’ with the antenna to change the channels too!

    Jess- There is NOTHING better than home made peach ice cream! 🙂

    CP- That we did! And it got us to the moon!

    j.r.- LOL, we all did that, I think I did it with a Mickey Mantle rookie card… stoopid in retrospect…

    Craig- Question is, are you STILL being billed for it??? 🙂

    ERic- LOL, now that was different! 😀

    Irish- And we had imagination!!!

    WSF- I can believe it! Strange things are ‘hiding’ in a lot of garages/storage areas!

    SPE- They were/are timeless toys!

    • Nope, not being billed. Mom sold the house a couple of years ago (made a pile of $$) and I got the phone. There may even be some pants stretchers in the truckload of stuff in storage.

  12. Tinker Toys are my favorite toy from growing up. I used to make sailing ships…

    My brothers also had a set of plastic bricks that could be used to build things with. It included windows, doors…even a garage door. I’ve never seen them again. I used to build things, then drive my model tanks through them. Ahhh, childhood…

  13. I lived next to the NaBisCo bakery in the 80s. When the wind would catch the flour being unloaded from the boxcars, they would leave a case of cookies at each doorstep, for fouling up the laundry on the clotheslines.

  14. I had Tinker Toys that came in a tube-type cardboard can with a metal screw-on top and Lincoln Logs. I always wanted an Erector Set, but never got one. I’m still a bit pissed over that. My mom had a couple of sets of those pants creasers, and gave them to my wife after we were married. And my wife has an old cast iron horse and sleigh (single horse) and a picture, taken in 1905, of it being played with be one of her cousins in Chester, Montana. Most of those horse-and-sleigh toys come with two horses, but this one has just one.

  15. LCB- Great story, thanks!

    JC- THAT is impressive of them… 🙂

    Scottie- Thanks! I’ve only ever seen ONE of those horse/sleigh combos and it was a two horse sleigh.

  16. Better than IRONING your jeans! 🙂 I got my older brother’s hand-down jeans, complete with the iron-on patches.
    I understands the skinny pants and full-view ankle style is in fashion now, but back then everybody just called ’em “floods” as in, “Are you waiting for a Flood?”
    Grandpa always brought-over the hand-crank ice-cream maker on the 4th, it helped exhaust the rambunctious kids. We took one overseas with us because that was the only way to make “safe” ice cream, but it still always tasted funny because the local cows and cow-milk wasn’t quite right…

  17. One of my favorites was the Kenner Hydro-Dynamic construction set.

    It had pumps, valves, tanks, and an assortment of other parts that would let you build a replica of an oil refinery or other chemical plant, and then pump colored water around through clear tubing, and control the flow and the paths it took.

    Pretty neat in its day!

    • drjim,
      Yeah, my brothers had one of those too. By the time I got it the pump didn’t work anymore. 🙂

  18. I loved how Lincoln logs smelled – I spent hours playing with them! My husband has all of his G.I. Joes and the various playsets. What’s amazing is that he has things like the first aid kit with the tiny rolls of gauze still inside!

  19. The little bricks for building houses and such were “American Bricks” – I still have a deluxe set.

    I used to build houses ON the slot car and/or HO train tracks.

    And they are now on their 3rd and soon to be 4th generation – they were my dad’s originally, and my kids are 24 and 26, so in a few years I expect my grandkids will be playing with them.

    Still have the lincoln logs AND the slot car track, too.

  20. I remember all of these things and more. I can remember my grandmother heating a flat iron on her wood cook stove. Taking a bath in a washtub the water was heated on the wood cook stove.

  21. Craig- That’s good! I know one lady (in her 90s) STILL ‘renting’ hers from Western Bell!

    NC- LOL, yeah I remember that term, now that you mentioned it…

    drjim- Oh you got LUCKY! 🙂 We couldn’t afford one of those…

    MRs.C- LOL, figures… I don’t have ANY of mine left.

    Thanks Jay! I couldn’t remember the name for them for the life of me! And that’s great!!!

    Rick- Same here!

  22. Not to mention the horizontal and vertical adjustments on analog TV’s to adjust the picture from rolling up or down, and slanting left or right.

    C-90

  23. Friend of mine who had just invested in 6 new pairs of jeans then quit smoking. Well with the weight gain he doesn’t dare put the now very tight jeans in the dryer and just last week asked me if I knew where he could still buy stretchers. We’ve been looking but no luck so far.

  24. yep, I’ve used all of them at one time or another. There were drying forms for BDU’s, both shirt and pants, back in the day.

  25. C-90- Yep, THOSE were a PITA! Cause as soon as you stepped away, they went the OTHER way…

    Margi- I’d check eBay.

    DB- Those I’ve never seen! Who’d a thunk it…