There were many days growing up that I played by myself. I would often pack a little suitcase of doll items, grab my large baby doll Elizabeth Jane, and go outside in the yard for hours. Mother gave me an old camera to play with. It was a dark maroon German bellows camera. It looked like a 4" by 8" rectangle box. Opening it up, the lens pulled out accordion style. We didn't have film for it, but I 'used it' anyway, taking posed pictures of the flowers, plants, my doll, and our cat, Tiger.

My first real camera was a box Brownie. The whole family operated it, so it really wasn't mine. Mother instructed how to load the film - we had to be in a dark place, couldn't touch anything but the edges of the film, and we had to be sure to start winding the film before we closed it. After taking a shot, you had to manually dial the roll forward. Most rolls were 24 pictures, but my parents always tried to squeeze at least one more snap. Black and white film was the norm for many years. 

Later we got a flash camera for taking pictures indoors or outside with poor lighting. The large round bulbs kind of blew up - they got very hot and melted. You had to be careful when removing them not to get burned.

My mother became the primary photographer of the family after she bought her Kodak. She got involved in making changes on all the settings, relying on her light meter. She wanted to have a special camera to take pictures on her many trips to Mexico where she completed graduate studies in Spanish. She had dozens of rolls developed into slides, the least expensive method. This meant we had to have a slide projector. Each slide had to be loaded into the rectangular tray, turned a specific way or else the image was not upright. We didn't have enough trays for all the slides, so Mother would have to unload and load trays as we went along. This was the perfect moment to be allowed to leave the room for a snack or bathroom break. Often the images were the wrong way, and she would stop, take it out, reposition it, and start again. Tough times for kids with limited attention spans. After about three or four times of watching 100+ slides of Mexico, we started to groan when Mother wanted to have a slide night. She later bought a projection screen which was better than using a white sheet on the wall. The pictures were dear to Mother and brought back good memories. Thinking back now I wish we had listened more carefully for details of her trips. 

There were very few spontaneous pictures and getting just the right pose was a challenge. We always knew which pictures my dad had taken because they were only partial shots, with our heads missing. As cameras advanced we got the Instamatic with flash cubes and ones with automatic winding. A new camera was often under the Christmas tree.

I took a trip to the Holy Land after high school and one day while out on a tour I lost my camera. I was sitting down feeling sad about losing pictures of all the special places I had been. One of the elderly gentlemen on the tour came by and snapped my picture. Turns out he was using my camera and I was so glad to have it returned. Unfortunately those printed 3" by 3" color pictures are now badly faded and most are stuck to the old self adhering photo album pages we so often used. The negatives are now gone, but I had saved them for about 20 years.

There were travel articles warning of the dangers of moving through airport security systems - developing in the late '60s - that would damage your film. In the early days we hand carried our camera and all the rolls of film, asking the airport employees to carefully protect them from exposure. Film changed as cameras updated going from the 35mm canister rolls to the drop in cartridges. 

After trying to rearrange a closet recently I found over 20 old photo albums, from '50s black and whites to Polaroids. I also have a large container full of loose photos in the garage taking up space. Downloading them myself is SO time consuming and sending them out to convert to a CD becomes expensive. For now, I'm just going to reshelve the albums and put that organization issue on hold. 

It was sad to have to clear out some of my mother's house last year and realize we just can't save everything from the past. When it comes to shelves full of old snapshots, perhaps memories can be the 'photos' we keep instead.


                                  "I thank my God in all my remembrance of you." Philippians 1:3

I grew up during the era of spies and double agents, Nikita Khrushchev, the Berlin Wall, the threat of nuclear war and the ongoing Cold War. Since the 1950s there had been many plane hijackings diverting to Miami and even up to Jacksonville. As a Florida resident "THE BOMB" was a close reality with Havana being only 90 miles from Key West.   The threat of attack compelled communities to plan Civil Defense drills and neighborhoods, schools, and churches developed evacuation procedures. 

We started practicing duck and cover drills in public school about as often as fire drills.  Our elementary school was designed as rows of separated classrooms and each room had a complete back wall of windows.  Can you imagine we thought we would be protected by covering our heads?  We were not to look at the flash, and immediately duck and cover like "Bert the Turtle."  We were to move away from the windows and get under our school desks.  I don't think we discussed in detail what to do if we were at recess or walking home when the bomb dropped.  The reality and consequences of radiation damage weren't discussed and as an elementary aged kid the drills just became routine.

We also had evacuation drills.  The county plan was that since we were so close to Cuba, in the event of an attack it would be best for Florida residents to move north towards Georgia.  When the Civil Defense alarm went off - a really loud piercing sound that pealed through the neighborhood routinely - we were to calmly and orderly walk out of the school, down through a small wooded area to a nearby road and board school buses that would miraculously arrive just in time to take us away.  This plan had many flaws.  Parents were rightly concerned that they would never be able to find their children - no cell phones in this day! Siblings would be separated. What about the family members left nearby at home or away at work?  What about the beloved pets?  Food, clothing, shelter?  There were more questions than logical answers.

In 1961 President Kennedy asked Congress for over $100 million to build public fallout shelters. This validated that point that evacuation was unrealistic, and the construction of home shelters skyrocketed. The concept was IF you could make it to the shelter before or immediately when the blast came, you would survive the radiation fallout if you were properly protected for the next two to four weeks.

It was revealed many years after the Cold War in the 1970s that a special bomb shelter had been built for President Kennedy on Peanut Island, FL. It had walls of lead and steel and it's codename was "Detachment Hotel."  The location was near his family retreat in Palm Beach and could quickly be reached by helicopter. Though the building is showing its age, it is a popular tourist stop for many. As an aside, there are supposedly three feral cats living on the island near the bunker - Jack, Jackie, and Marilyn. Kennedy also had a bomb shelter constructed on Nantucket, but it has not been opened to the public.                              

Over time most home shelters gave way to age, flooding, and decay.  Some home buyers have been surprised to find an old ground entrance in their backyards, from as far as California to Wisconsin.  Museums have accepted the aged items found in shelters, such as water barrels and cracker boxes, to add to displays of life during the Cold War. One family in Fort Meyers, FL continues to use their shelter as a hurricane get away and storeroom. 

Do you have a Cold War memory? 


                                      "For in the day of trouble he will keep me safe in his dwelling; 
                 he will hide me in the shelter of his sacred tent and set me high upon a rock."  Psalm 27:5

My hula hoop was yellow. I don't recall where or when I got it, but it was in the early '60s. It could have been a gift from my grandfather because I can visualize him laughing and trying to use it, unsuccessfully. I stored it behind the freezer on the back porch so it wouldn't roll away.  It was a perfect game in the suburbs.  If no one could come out and play, I could hula hoop outside as long as I wanted.  I could hula and walk around the yard at the same time.  I could hum, sing, talk, chew bubblegum, think, and dream all while using the hoop.   I could compete with myself, counting how many hoops I could make before it fell down. 

If there was a group of us neighborhood girls getting together, we could hula hoop in a cluster, talking, laughing, and just hanging out.  Sometimes we gathered in the street with the hoops because there was plenty of unobstructed open space, and only an occasional car passed by.  We challenged each other to see who could hoop the longest.  Most of the time we were in dresses, so they were an accepted excuse for fall out. There were other challenges as well, such as hooping on an arm or a leg or your neck.  Using multiple hoops was also tried.  You could also use a hoop like a jump rope, swinging it vertically around your body.  I was a one of the taller kids so I had to really cramp down to do this. 

Art Linkletter introduced the hula hoop on his tv show, People Are Funny, something we often watched together as a family.  (Linkletter was an investor in the hula hoop Wham-O California based company.) There were demonstrations of hula hoop skill on other shows like the Ed Sullivan show.  It was like an acrobatic circus act and truly amazing.  An interesting trick was the roll back, throwing the hoop forward only to have it come right back to you upright, much like a boomerang.  That was a hard one to copy.

There were improvements and gimmicks added to the hoop over the years, such as the Shoop-Shoop, a hoop with ball bearings inside that made noise as it went around.  The hula hoop fad was popular not only in the US but also around the world. There were local contests and world competitions with people vying to be in the Guinness Book of World Records.  

Hula Hoop Factoids:  
     -using a hoop dates back at least one thousand years to ancient Egypt and Greece where coiled reeds and grapevines were used for play and exercise; 
     -Native Americans used hoops in their interpretive dances; 
     -Wham-O American entrepreneurs may have copied the Australian bamboo version of the hoop toy; 
     -Wham-O sold 100 million hoops the first year. They sold for $1.98 each; 
     -some countries such as Indonesia considered the hoops improper and banned them; 
     -the fad died out and has been revitalized at least three times since the late '50s; 
     -a popular potato snack treat in the UK is Hula Hoops in a variety of flavors. 

             "The Lord says: “I will return to Zion and dwell in Jerusalem. Then Jerusalem will be 
              called the Faithful City...Once again men and women of ripe old age will sit in the streets 
              of Jerusalem, each of them with cane in hand because of their age. The city streets 
              will be filled with boys and girls playing there.”                                             Zechariah 8

Meals with my grandmother were a labor of love.  She often woke before sunrise to start the breads, pies, and cakes.  She had a little pantry room which my grandfather added on to their house by the kitchen with a large table specifically for canning and preparing. I often got to help make the pies and cakes. When we made a cake, she used a scale to weigh the batter in the pans to make sure each layer would come out perfectly the same.   My favorite was her chocolate cake with 7 minute frosting.  Dad loved her coconut cake.  She had a Sunbeam mixer and used it all the time.  Pies included lemon meringue - her specialty with mile high beautiful meringue, pecan - with fresh nuts from her farm, apple, cherry, peach, blueberry, chocolate cream, rhubarb, mince meat - my dad's favorite, blackberry cobbler - my favorite as we had picked the berries ourselves, and custard. When we were with her on a Sunday, we could count on the best fried chicken, mashed potatoes, greens, deviled eggs, and cornbread ever tasted after we came home from church.  And big glasses of iced tea. Lunch or dinner as we called it, was our biggest meal. Breakfast was delicious, too, with large flaky biscuits, homemade jam, and ham or bacon.  Her brown sugar pie, or "shoo-shie" as we called it, was made especially for me and my brother. It was a kid's dream, with only brown sugar, butter, cream, and cinnamon.  To this day we have been unable to replicate her recipe.  

Clean up was easy of course and the trays could be thrown away.  We ended up washing them and saving a large pile in the cupboard.  Mom was from the era of The Depression and WWII so she just couldn't see throwing away aluminum.  We used the trays for crafts and making our own frozen dinners.

Do you have a TV dinner memory?

                     Jesus said to them, “I am the bread of life; whoever comes to me shall not hunger, 
                                    and whoever believes in me shall never thirst."   John 6:35

Living in the suburbs meant we only shopped in our local stores which was a strip of about six businesses - the drug store, the shoe store, the 5 & Dime, a doctor, a dress shop, and the grocery store, with a gas station on the corner.  Winn Dixie was our grocer.  It was my job to lick and stick the S & H Green Stamps we received as a compliment to our purchases for gas and groceries - so many stamps for so much money spent.  Sometimes there were special sales that provided double stamps for an item.  Each book of 24 pages required 1200 points/stamps. It didn't take long to fill up a Saver Book and we enjoyed perusing the catalog to plan our next exchange.    

All sorts of household products were available at the Redemption Center. Walking around the store with my parents, knowing we wouldn't have to spend money for items made the place seem magical.  It was like a candy shop, trying to decide which 'price-less' item we would take home.  We toted a paper bag of filled stamp books.  The check out clerk was quite serious when it came time to exchange.  She carefully examined each page to make sure it had the correct amount of stamps.  If an item required a partial book, say 4 and 1/2 books, she counted the pages and aggressively ripped them out and returned the remaining 1/2 book.  My mother was practical and usually exchanged stamps for towels, linens, an iron, or kitchen supplies.  My father wanted unusual items that we wouldn't normally purchase and since he was the sole driver, he was always with us at the center.  Mother drove a hard bargain and won most of the time.

I recall one stamp redemption store visit that occurred near Christmas.  My parents told me and my brother to stay in the car (not so dangerous back then) while they shopped.  As kids do, we had some disagreement and I went running into the store to find my parents and tattle.  I saw my mother holding two baby dolls and she was quite upset that I had come into the store.  Sure enough, on Christmas morning "Santa" brought me those twin baby dolls, the harder plastic type without real hair. That was the Christmas I knew my parents had been Santa all along, and I just never warmed up to those dolls.

Believe it or not you can still redeem those old S & H Green stamps for Greenpoints, redeemable online for savings gift cards at many businesses such as Barnes & Noble, L.L. Bean, and Papa Johns. Just go to www.greenpoints.com and set up a free account. New Greenpoints are awarded for online purchases and at some grocery stores.  No more 'lick and stick" required.
                          "In Him we have redemption through his blood, the forgiveness of our trespasses, 
                          according to the riches of His grace."                                              Ephesians 1:7

Between the ages of about eight to ten years old I stayed with my grandparents during the summers while Mother took graduate Spanish courses in Mexico.  Farm life was quieter since Granddad had retired. He had a large aluminum sided garage/barn full of interesting old equipment and an assortment of previously important items.  While rummaging there I discovered an old, very large typewriter.  Sitting on a back shelf, it was obvious it had not been used in many years. I was intrigued.  

I also found an old copy of a touch typing instruction manual.  It was hard backed and the pages flipped from bottom to top so that it could stand upright on the desk, beside the typewriter. I began using the keyboard page to learn the proper finger placement.  There were drills in the book to practice moving your fingers about the board in a systematic manner, such as d-e-d, k-i-k, f-v-f, and so on.  Over the summer I practiced and practiced those drills on the picture, even stretching my long fingers up to the number row.  At some point my grandfather let me try out the old typewriter.

After my mother returned from Mexico, she allowed me to use her more "modern" portable Royal typewriter to practice.  It was made to lock securely into a black hard covered case.  The machine could be unlocked and lifted out of the case bottom to be set on a desk or table. The Royal ribbon invention was quite practical.  There was a special knob that allowed you to switch from the upper level of ribbon to the lower level - the whole width of which was about 1/2".  Being able to type on both rows of ribbon meant you didn't have to change ribbons as often.   I was thrilled to use this typewriter, especially when we had ribbon that was half black ink and half red ink. I became quite good at touch typing and my speed picked up. Sometimes I practiced with my eyes closed, as the instruction manual suggested.  Mother had me repeat typing, "Now is the time for all good men to come to the aid of their country" and the pangram (all 26 letters of the alphabet) "The quick brown fox jumps over the lazy dog."

When electives were available in junior high school, my mother encouraged me to take typing.  She felt it would be invaluable for college.  Our typewriters were newer than Mother's Royal, but they were still manual, requiring you to sweep the return bar from right to left when you finished a line of typing.  As you typed near to the end of a line, a bell tinkled to let you know you were running out of space.  Since I was already familiar with typing, I won many of the speed drills.  The teacher would have us turn to a specific page in the manual.  She would start a 1 or 2 minute timer.  We typed from the book as fast as we could, trying not to make mistakes because at the end we had to deduct the mistakes from our overall time.  

My first paying job was as a clerk over the summer break in my Junior year.  I was able to work at State Farm Insurance in their Employee Child Program, thanks to my dad. I had my own desk and files were routed to me for proofing and sorting.  It was a great experience that helped me get my foot in the door for a job after high school. I had to take a speed test to be placed as a typist, and did well. Those new employees that could not type worked as file clerks. I was a dictaphone typist using an electric typewriter, working for one year to save money for college.  Transcribing from a dictaphone took a little practice.  The underwriters would dictate letters into their machines which recorded on bright blue plastic "dictabelts." They dropped the belts off at my desk, and I listened to the recordings with headphones. Using foot pedal controls, I could go forward, backwards, slow, or fast to complete the typing.  Most were letters to policy holders, making multiple copies on thin carbon-ready paper.  If you made a mistake, you had to correct the top white copy (we had Correction Paper) AND erase all the carbon copies.  Note: we did not have much access to xeroxing at this time which is why all the carbon copies were required. Sometimes it was easier to just start over if there were several mistakes but it seemed a terrible thing to waste all those layers of paper and carbon.  There was one underwriter who had a thick Southern accent and he spoke really fast.  It was quite difficult to understand him, and on more than one occasion I would have a letter completely painstakingly done and at the end of the recording he would say, "cancel this letter!"

In high school I also took Shorthand.  We learned Gregg shorthand which was a combination of commas and straight lines, each stroke representing an English sound or word.  There were timed drills just as in typing class.  The teacher would dictate a letter and afterwards we would have to type out what we had sketched.  There were many blank spaces for those symbols we couldn't read or for words we missed.  I never really used shorthand in college or in any of my secretarial jobs. But it was fun to learn, like knowing a secret code.

On summer breaks from college I returned home and worked as an office Temp travelling to fill in at various businesses for short periods of time.  It was a challenge to step into an office without knowing the people or routine, only to just about get it figured out when I would have to move on to another place.  Three longer term positions were at Blue Cross/Blue Shield, the Maxwell House Coffee Plant, and Avis Rent-A-Car at the airport.  All the jobs required some typing, so I was grateful to have that skill. 

Typing did prove to be necessary during college, especially grad school, for the many research papers my husband and I had to complete.  I had purchased an old Royal typewriter in a hard cover case because it reminded me of Mother's first machine.  I still have it, and let my children play with it when they were young. Later we upgraded to an electric typewriter with built in correction tape. But really, imagine having to complete a 30 page or so paper without a computer or Word program!  If you wanted to change the order of your paragraphs or make edits or additions, you would have to start typing all over.  We had to plan ahead for the space required at the bottom of the pages for footnotes as well. Many late nights were spent getting those papers done, beginning with hand written drafts.  Those two old typewriters haven't been used in over 10 years and are stacked away in the garage.  Just can't part with them yet.

On a sad note, Mother's old machine was stolen by a drifter. She and Daddy had taken him in and set him up in my grandmother's older vacant home, feeling they were doing a good deed finding odd jobs for him.  The drifter soon vanished taking several items, including the typewriter. That old model had served my mother well for her own college papers, letters, forms, and church programs and lessons.  In her later years she was able to adapt to a computer fairly easily because of her excellent typing skills.  

Do you have typing or shorthand memories?

                                     "Show yourself in all respects to be a model of good works."  Titus 2:7

My first memory of a washing machine was the round wringer tub on my grandparents' porch. My grandfather had set up a cold water connection for the machine and made an opening from the porch to the back yard for the drainage tube.  Grandmother had to boil water and add it to the tub along with Ivory Snow soap flakes or Tide detergent. This "modern" electric machine then swished and swirled the clothes, drained the water, and filled with cold rinse water.  I loved being able to help roll the clothes between the two wooden rolling pins to squeeze out the excess water.  This was necessary because the washer did not have a spin cycle (notice the open top.) If you put items in all bunched up or you didn't adjust the space between the rollers, you could break a button or two.  We would carry the wet clothes to hang on the outdoor line in the hot Florida sunshine. The clothes smelled so fresh when we brought them in several hours later, but the towels and sheets seemed a bit stiff. We didn't have laundry softeners then and perhaps we didn't get all the soap out.  Laundry took a whole days work from the washing, to waiting for the drying, to the ironing. We ironed everything including the all-cotton sheets, linen tablecloths, men's handkerchiefs (my job), and sometimes underwear.

I was often responsible to hang and bring in the clothes.  Daddy cut slots in one end of long bamboo fishing poles in a way that the clotheslines could slip in.  This allowed us to adjust the height of the poles, lowering the line for hanging and raising the line for drying. Sheets and long pants would drag the ground if we didn't use the poles.  There were a few little hints or understood rules when hanging clothes: if you pinned the corners of two items together you could use less clothespins, but thick items needed to be hung singly or the overlapped areas would not dry as fast; sheets could be hung to dry more easily by using two lines with one side of the sheet on each line; unmentionables like underwear and bras were hung in the middle of our four lines so that the neighbors wouldn't see them.  

We had a cute little clothespin bag like this that hooked over the line.  It looked just like a little girls dress but there was a pouch behind the skirt.  We used wooden clip pins and because they were left out in the weather they sometimes got mildew and had to be replaced.

If it rained on wash day we had to cart all the wet clothes to the laundromat to dry them.  It was many years before we got a dryer that was placed on the back porch.  

Our irons were not steam irons so getting the wrinkles out required brute strength.  We sprinkled the clothes with water as we ironed them using a little spray spout that was attached to an old vinegar jar.  My mother hired a housekeeper for a few years, Palma Lee. She rode the bus from downtown to our house and worked on Saturdays doing the laundry and mopping the floors.  I used to enjoy following her around trying to help and especially liked to be around her when she ironed.  She always put a horizontal crease in the upper back of my dad's dress shirts, but I'm not sure why.

My dad wore dark green cotton uniforms to work that he liked to have ironed stiff with starch. Mother found a nifty invention called a Pant Stretcher that made ironing the pants easier.  You adjusted the long rectangular wire pieces to make the frames narrower and slipped them into the wet pants, twisting and adjusting until the metal sides were where you wanted the creases, down the center front of the pants. Then you pulled the frames out to stretch the pants until they were tight as a drum and hung the whole contraption on the line.  You had to do each pant leg separately.  It took some time, but they did work.

When I was young my mother washed my hair in our kitchen sink.  We cleared off the counter and I would lay down on towels with my head hanging over the sink.  Sometimes she used rainwater that we had collected in a big tin tub, to make my hair extra soft.  Mother liked to use lemon juice as a rinse because she said it kept my hair pale blonde.  Most of the time she had my hair cut as short as possible so that there wasn't much hair care involved.  My annual school pictures prove that the Pixie cut, made famous at the time by Audrey Hepburn from her movie debut in "Roman Holiday", was popular even in suburban Florida.   

One year when I was about nine my mother decided to have my hair permed at the downtown salon she visited.  My hair was short already, so the final outcome was almost like pin curls.  Just in case we might forget this special hairstyle, she took me to a professional photographer right afterwards for portraits.  Looking at those pictures now I just think, poor me. It was a cross between a little old lady and a poodle!  My baby doll and I almost had matching hair.

As I got older and cared for my hair myself, I was allowed to let it grow longer.  I tried bangs for awhile, but they were a constant annoyance.  In the late '50s and early '60s the flip was the rage. Everyone wanted to have the perfect flip similar to Mary Tyler Moore or Marlo Thomas or Jackie Kennedy. This required lots of preparation for most of us.  I chose various curlers to use, usually opting for the ones with clinging brushes inside.  They were held in with plastic picks that left dents in your scalp.  To get the flip to stay, there was green Dippity-Do styling goop which was applied on the wet hair ends before rolling.  My hair was thin and limp so the curl didn't last long.   I wasn't successful with teasing and didn't like the feel hairspray gave. This meant that if I wanted the flip every day, I had to roll it every night.   My hair dryer was the bonnet type which I often fell asleep wearing.  Later I had the portable hood dryer.  When my hair got really long in high school, I often used empty frozen orange juice cans for curling.  

The marketing strategy of door-to-door salesmen hit the jackpot in the '50s era when many families had only one breadwinner.  Numerous women stayed home, especially those living in the suburbs and in one car families. Women were seen as soft sells for a slick sales pitch so this worked out well for the salesmen. My mother was a school teacher and was only home in the evenings or a few summer months but we had our share of encounters with peddlers.  My earliest memory of a delivery is the milk left on our doorstep by the milkman.  I don't recall him making a sales pitch, but somehow he knew to drop by in the mornings. Those deliveries didn't last long after my father was able to pick up milk from the drive-in dairy on the way home from work.  Sometimes he surprised us with chocolate milk, and Eggnog during the holidays.   

We were on the Fuller Brush man's list for several years.  He was dressed in a suit and carried a large black, specially designed case full of interesting brushes and other items.  He readily described in detail the features of his unique items, products you could not buy in a store.  Cleaning supplies and some cosmetics were also pitched. Occasionally he offered you a free item, such as a small basting brush, nail file, or spatula to get in the door.  I'm pretty sure one of those little pasty brushes is still in my mother's kitchen drawer. 

Another visitor was the vacuum cleaner salesman.  He didn't have much luck with us because we had hardwood floors and no carpet anywhere.  No amount of attachments would persuade my father to let us make that purchase.  

One of the most familiar salesman was a saleswoman, The Avon Lady.  Always dressed up in "Sunday best" she presented herself as a polished, fashionable woman.  Her free miniature lipstick samples were such fun to play with after she left.  She also gave small, one inch delicate glass vials of perfumes, most of which we really thought smelled terrible.  My mother was allergic to the lipstick and she didn't wear perfume, so we were not big spenders.  Mom hated to 'hurt her feelings' so we let the Avon Lady in and listened to her whole spiel.  Then Mother would usually decline any purchase and say 'nothing today, thank you.'  One time the saleswoman was someone from our church and Mother felt she just had to buy something.  Avon developed uniquely packaged items, such as re-usable decanters or jewelry, supposedly in limited supply.  Those made it difficult to say no.

The World Book Encyclopedia man hit pay dirt when he offered us a chance to buy a "world of information at our fingertips."  You have to imagine living in a time when there were no computers/laptops or internet connected cell phones and your television offered only three channels.  Getting information consisted of the newspaper, tv, word of mouth, radio, and if you were in school, the school library.  Also maybe the downtown library, but not very convenient in our case. So, having 20 volumes in your own home that covered every topic you would ever want to look up was an amazing phenomenon.  If you were a savvy shopper, you might ask the salesman about newer information that would not be included.  As Floridians, we were always following the Cape Canaveral/Kennedy space program, for instance.  World Book understood that marketing need, and began providing annual update volumes which could be purchased in the future.  My teacher-mother couldn't pass up this opportunity, and soon we received our white and gold volumes.  My favorite pages were about the human body, natural for a maturing kid I guess. The section had plastic type overlays that let you view the different systems of the body in their entirety, such as the nervous and circulatory.  Apart from a few school projects, I don't think we read many volumes over the years, but Mother could never part with them.  Can you believe there is still a current World Book 2015 hardback version, at $1,150?  They offer many specialty versions now online with an annual fee averaging $30 - $50.

The more successful salesman at our door was the magazine salesman.  My mother loved reading ever since she began at five years old.  National Geographic magazine was an absolute necessity for her, and we maintained the "wall of gold" from the 1950s until her last days.  In fact, we were able to pass them on to a history professor rather than send them to the landfill.  Somehow those fascinating photos over the years made an impression that was hard to forget, much less discard as trash.  Other magazines were popular, too, and home delivery was convenient.  The top issues for us were Reader's Digest, Family Circle, Woman's Day, Good Housekeeping, Ladies' Home Journal, McCall's Needlework and Crafts, and for the men in the family there was Field & Stream, and Outdoor Life.  

The Tupperware lady probably visited us a few times, but her goal was to have US host a party, where we would reap the rewards of "free" items based on how many total sales were made.  Mother wasn't interested in the party, but she did like the neat storage containers. 

Insurance salesmen also dropped by, and over the years a few policies were purchased.  I recently discovered a large notebook of my mother's where she had methodically recorded all the family purchases, and major events.  There were notations of final payments for various life insurances, so the salesmen had been successful.   

I guess you could include the March of Dimes solicitor in the door-to-door conversation.  It seemed like a simple task to collect a few dimes and the saver cards got kids interested in being charitable.

Besides the Gideon Bible salesman (which we always supported), religious door-to-door visitors usually were not selling anything or asking for donations.  My parents were strong believers in their faith and could not be swayed to the beliefs of what they considered to be false doctrines.  Rather than debate their religious differences, Mother usually just said, "no thank you."

Do you have a special memory of a door-to-door sales person?  

        "Do not neglect to show hospitality to strangers, for thereby some have entertained angels unawares."
                                                                                                                                               Hebrews 13:2

I grew up in the church, from birth.  (That's baby me in the photo.)  My maternal grandmother was Presbyterian and she had many ministers in her family tree. She and my grandfather, from a Baptist family, greatly influenced our religious upbringing. Grandmother played the piano at church and years later so did my mother.  When I was a toddler, my grandmother kept me quiet during services by breaking a Saltine cracker into little pieces and giving me one at a time.  I remember having a wonderful time at summer Vacation Bible School.  One memorable project was a paperweight made with little artificial flowers inside a baby food jar. 

We prepared for Sunday on Saturday by washing our hair, selecting our outfits and ironing them if necessary, polishing our shoes, and preparing some of the lunch dishes or desserts. My dad gave me 10 cents to polish his shoes, which I enjoyed doing.  I wore dresses of course, with hat and gloves even as a young girl.  One favorite pair of thin white gloves was embellished with small bluish-purple rhinestones.  The men wore suits, and shirts requiring cuff links.  Boys wore jackets and ties.  This attire made gift shopping a bit easy for the men in the family, buying ties, tie clasps, or cuff links.

If it was Easter or Mother's Day, my dad would pick roses from our bushes and pieces of fern for us to wear as small corsages.  We had pink, red, white, and a beautiful fragrant yellow and red variety of roses. We also had gardenias.   Dad liked to buy orchid corsages for my mother, too, a tradition started while living in Hawaii in the '40s and carried on until she was in her 80's.  

Mother was a Sunday School teacher and Dad was on many committees, including Building and Maintenance.  For those, he often had to arrive early at church to turn on the heat and in later years the air conditioner.  I often went with him when he was called in for problems and I got to roam around all the rooms.  I recall there was a cellar type door to the crawl space below the main building that kids were afraid of, having been told 'the Devil could be down there.'  

Several times a year we had Pot Luck dinners 'on the ground' as they called it.  Nothing was bought.  Everything was homemade from scratch - fried chicken, mashed potatoes, potato salad, and all kinds of pies and cakes.  Sometimes there was hand cranked ice cream.  The social hall tables were an amazing spread of temptation, and you felt you had to take a little of everything.  The dinners were a happy social event, one that you hated to see end.  The members seemed like one big family and some have remained friends for over 60 years now.