Sears was selling and installing rebuilt engines in the early 60s. It only took them about 3 hours to pull and install one out of the box. I remember working for Plaza Lincoln Mercury in Houston early 70s and I had a Ford re manufactured 460 in a cardboard box. I pulled it out of the box with the engine hoist and it took several minutes before I noticed it but the block had a hole about the size of a 50 cent piece. One of the guys working there, Bobby was his name,, he had one Lincoln that kept coming back for a valve train ticking noise. Nothing wrong but poor insulation on the firewall. The owner had such acute hearing she could hear a normal noise under the valve covers due to the engine being mounted so near the firewall. The third time it came back Bobby pulled the valve covers and stuffed shop rags over the rockers. Never came back for any more noise.
So much for the good ol days in dept stores, huh? In the late1950s momma bought my first donkey aka Katy from Sears Roebuck Catalog. We picked her up at the Train station in Atlanta Ga..
I remember that moms favorite candy store was downtown Atlanta she seldom went downtown without stopping there, bon bons along with fudge. Some candy stores had toffee bring pulled in the window.
My dad managed Murphy stores for a living. -Bulk candies of all types -Fresh-roasted nuts of all types (there is nothing like hot cashews) -Caramel coated apples -Old fashioned snack bar back when you did a squirt of cola syrup (or cherry or chocolate or vanilla) and then added seltzer water
Oh yes, candied apples, lime and cherry coke at what we southerners called,' soda fountain'. Our pharmacy also caried leeches, that was when men would just black each other's eye rather than blow each other's heads off.
I can't recall what the medicinal use of leeches was for. It has something to do with wound healing or causing blood to coagulate properly or something like that. I had no idea they were in use by the general public like that. Regarding violence: Until pretty recently, not only had the number of homicides been in steady decline since 1960 (when the FBI first started keeping stats), the RATE has really plummeted as our population (and gun ownership) has skyrocketed. We all know where "America's" problem with violence is. And the numbers and the rate are still historically low. Since I'm on the subject of perceptions not being reality...the "stranger danger" drum is likewise a pile of crap. We all grew up in the era of "We were out riding our bikes after dark..." Well, the fact is that child abuse & abductions were WAY higher back then. The modern issue is almost always relatives and non-custodial parents. But the media creates our reality. It's all part of destroying civil society.
John, I don't believe their statistics about crime then or now. I just know that I knew lots of people and didn't know of anyone getting shot and killed but do remember some fights. We would take the midnight bus home from downtown Atlanta theatres at 11 yr old. Of course, we were taught not to talk to strangers. I think the news and leaders lie to take away the responsibility of those invading our nation and those who commit most of the crimes because they can.NO drive by's no violent ghettos and not nearly as many kids born out of wedlock. I'd see fathers with their wives and kids walking to church, both white and black families. I don't believe anything these people tell us now. Leeches were sold at drug store primarily for black eyes, was a standard remedy from what I remember.
I can relate, a lot of jobs I had done at different shops I had to go behind to fix what they have done wrong. I have the head-on truck now, fixing to torque it down.
Not to further the debate on what's actually real then or now, because we are not omnipresent...but how many people do you know now who have been shot? I agree about the lies, and about the destruction. And you raise an interesting point that I might research. All of today's inner city homicides that may not have existed in the past are driving today's numbers. Where were all those murders committed in the past?
I think it was easier for people to be made to 'disappear' in the past. I'd imagine a number of murders were simply assumed that someone had taken off. Things were very different in a non-technical world.