{"id":37530,"date":"2026-08-07T13:27:49","date_gmt":"2026-08-07T20:27:49","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/pwoodford.net\/blog\/?p=37530"},"modified":"2026-08-07T13:30:14","modified_gmt":"2026-08-07T20:30:14","slug":"a-nostalgic-photoblog","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/pwoodford.net\/blog\/?p=37530","title":{"rendered":"When America Really Was Great"},"content":{"rendered":"<p>Some random childhood memories:<\/p>\n<p>Running in the cloud of DDT behind the mosquito-control truck that cruised through our neighborhood once a month, whole gangs of boys and girls, breathing in the fumes. It was great fun, and no one ever stopped us.<\/p>\n<p>The Philip Morris bellhop from I Love Lucy visiting our school in Mascoutah, Illinois, when I was in second grade. They let us all out for a special recess. He was a little person but the word then was midget. He drove onto the playground in a kid-sized car, maybe a Crosley, towing a small trailer with a Shetland pony inside. He rode around on the pony, dressed like a cowboy, doing rope tricks. When he was done he went into the trailer and changed into his bellhop uniform, then stood on a little stage, shouted &#8220;Call for Philip Morris&#8221; (his signature line from the Philip Morris ads on TV), and passed out sample packs for us to take home to our folks, little boxes with four or five cigarettes inside. As with the DDT trucks, no one thought anything was amiss with a famous TV character giving children cigarettes. Looking back, I suspect the parents of the fifth- and sixth-graders never got their sample packs.<\/p>\n<table style=\"width: 100%;\">\n<tbody>\n<tr>\n<td><a title=\"a-kid-playing-in-harmless-ddt-in-the-1950s-more-pics-in-v0-yHAUmLmJ1b01MqugGyVJQhuuL-6EyMSWSkwP0C8mvj0 copy\" href=\"https:\/\/www.flickr.com\/photos\/halfmind\/55449393650\/in\/datetaken-public\/\" data-flickr-embed=\"true\"><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"aligncenter\" src=\"https:\/\/live.staticflickr.com\/65535\/55449393650_ed3e293b57_m.jpg\" alt=\"a-kid-playing-in-harmless-ddt-in-the-1950s-more-pics-in-v0-yHAUmLmJ1b01MqugGyVJQhuuL-6EyMSWSkwP0C8mvj0 copy\" width=\"240\" height=\"160\" \/><\/a><script async src=\"\/\/embedr.flickr.com\/assets\/client-code.js\" charset=\"utf-8\"><\/script><\/td>\n<td><a title=\"s-l400\" href=\"https:\/\/www.flickr.com\/photos\/halfmind\/55449116258\/in\/datetaken-public\/\" data-flickr-embed=\"true\"><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"aligncenter\" src=\"https:\/\/live.staticflickr.com\/65535\/55449116258_f3e322dc9d_m.jpg\" alt=\"s-l400\" width=\"240\" height=\"178\" \/><\/a><script async src=\"\/\/embedr.flickr.com\/assets\/client-code.js\" charset=\"utf-8\"><\/script><\/td>\n<td><a title=\"Radio\" href=\"https:\/\/www.flickr.com\/photos\/halfmind\/55448029952\/in\/datetaken-public\/\" data-flickr-embed=\"true\"><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"aligncenter\" src=\"https:\/\/live.staticflickr.com\/65535\/55448029952_d76c0cace1_m.jpg\" alt=\"Radio\" width=\"240\" height=\"157\" \/><\/a><script async src=\"\/\/embedr.flickr.com\/assets\/client-code.js\" charset=\"utf-8\"><\/script><\/td>\n<\/tr>\n<\/tbody>\n<\/table>\n<p>A couple of years later in Germany, listening to American radio serials from the 1930s and 40s on Armed Forces Radio. This was in the middle 50s before there was TV for overseas troops and their families. Serials like Fibber McGee &amp; Molly, Inner Sanctum, The Great Gildersleeves, The Shadow, and Our Miss Brooks were on every night until midnight. Remember that Cosby routine about the giant chicken heart? I remember listening to that very show, and it was scary as fuck. In addition to radio, we had movies at the base theater, with a kids&#8217; matinee every Saturday featuring cartoons before and after &#8230; those cartoons, if I remember right, also being from the 30s and 40s.<\/p>\n<p>Visiting my grandparents in South Sioux City, Nebraska, now back in the States but still a kid, and watching Captain Kangaroo with my little sisters. Grandpa Fay thought it was a local show, and when Mr. Green Jeans would bring on a goat or a chimpanzee, he&#8217;d tell us they must have borrowed it from the feed store up to town.<\/p>\n<p>Learning about Halley&#8217;s Comet, the interesting fact that Mark Twain&#8217;s life was bracketed by its visits in 1835 and 1910, and that it would next pass by in 1986. Since I&#8217;d been born in 1946, the math wasn&#8217;t hard: I&#8217;d be 40 when it came again. And I couldn&#8217;t grasp it. Living that long was beyond my comprehension. Mom and Dad weren&#8217;t even that old! p.s. Those of you who were around for Halley&#8217;s Comet in 1986 will remember it was nothing special &#8230; you could barely see it.<\/p>\n<table style=\"width: 100%;\">\n<tbody>\n<tr>\n<td><a title=\"images\" href=\"https:\/\/www.flickr.com\/photos\/halfmind\/55449116253\/in\/datetaken-public\/\" data-flickr-embed=\"true\"><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"aligncenter\" src=\"https:\/\/live.staticflickr.com\/65535\/55449116253_e3ff00d344_m.jpg\" alt=\"images\" width=\"240\" height=\"180\" \/><\/a><script async src=\"\/\/embedr.flickr.com\/assets\/client-code.js\" charset=\"utf-8\"><\/script><\/td>\n<td><a title=\"imagescomethalley-544-399\" href=\"https:\/\/www.flickr.com\/photos\/halfmind\/55448029937\/in\/datetaken-public\/\" data-flickr-embed=\"true\"><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"aligncenter\" src=\"https:\/\/live.staticflickr.com\/65535\/55448029937_16c736aa88_m.jpg\" alt=\"imagescomethalley-544-399\" width=\"240\" height=\"176\" \/><\/a><script async src=\"\/\/embedr.flickr.com\/assets\/client-code.js\" charset=\"utf-8\"><\/script><\/td>\n<td><a title=\"images (1)\" href=\"https:\/\/www.flickr.com\/photos\/halfmind\/55449393635\/in\/datetaken-public\/\" data-flickr-embed=\"true\"><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"aligncenter\" src=\"https:\/\/live.staticflickr.com\/65535\/55449393635_77ba5f3a4d_m.jpg\" alt=\"images (1)\" width=\"240\" height=\"176\" \/><\/a><script async src=\"\/\/embedr.flickr.com\/assets\/client-code.js\" charset=\"utf-8\"><\/script><\/td>\n<\/tr>\n<\/tbody>\n<\/table>\n<p>Reading an article in dad&#8217;s Time Magazine about an upcoming Hanna-Barbara cartoon series about cavemen, and how the creators were going to base the humor around prehistoric themes. I thought that was a neat concept and was bitterly disappointed when The Flintstones finally aired. I&#8217;ve always wondered if Gary Larson, who really did base some of his humor on prehistoric themes, experienced the same Flintstones letdown I did.<\/p>\n<p>Well, that was fun. More soon.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>Some random childhood memories &#8230;<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[7,2],"tags":[4920,4919],"class_list":["post-37530","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-culture","category-personal","tag-clickbait","tag-nostalgia"],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"","_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/pwoodford.net\/blog\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/37530","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/pwoodford.net\/blog\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/pwoodford.net\/blog\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/pwoodford.net\/blog\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/pwoodford.net\/blog\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=37530"}],"version-history":[{"count":9,"href":"https:\/\/pwoodford.net\/blog\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/37530\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":37539,"href":"https:\/\/pwoodford.net\/blog\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/37530\/revisions\/37539"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/pwoodford.net\/blog\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=37530"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/pwoodford.net\/blog\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=37530"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/pwoodford.net\/blog\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=37530"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}