Old smells, that immeditately transport you back in time?

[scottyrocks]

I have on my desk my grandfather's old pipe stand. It is a glass jar with the tobacco pouch still in it and there is a corn cob pipe in the holder. Every once in a while I will open the jar and the smallest whiff of cherry tobacco will permeate the air.

Also the smell of the sea, that gregarious smack of salt and brine that just sticks in the air makes me think of times when my family would journey to the San Fransisco piers on weekends when I was a sprat.

And finally, the smell of any library, that hint of an almost marsh like decay of old paper, like the wrappings of mummies sealed away in dust laden tombs, for an eternity or two.

Sorry I'm in a Bradbury mood today.

My dad had a pipe stand also. In the center of it was a cube-shaped removable wooden box. The top lifted off with a centered round knob. There was a black and red drawing of a horse head on the front. On either side of this box were two raised squares with four holes in each for the pipe mouthpieces to slip through, and the bowels rested on the bottom of the unit where there were small carved out indentations.

Imagine this unit with the box I described above in place of the jar, and another rack like the one shown on the other side of the box.

 

[AtomicEraTom]

I have that same pipe stand, as in the picture, sitting on my desk, next to my computer.

 

[dnjan]

I could have sworn I smelled coal burning the other day. Not the sanitized smell of coal burning at a powerplant, but the dirtier smell of coal being burned in a residential furnace.
The house I grew up in was heated by coal until well into the 70's ...

 

[Alex Oviatt]

Hoppe's No. 9 always takes me to my father's den...

And gear oil always reminds me of days spent on a tractor

Nothing smells better than Hoppe's No. 9, in my opinion. I was just out at a sporting clay shoot (St. Hubertus' feast day) and enjoyed the smell that evening when I cleaned my gun.

 

[Marc-Ange Draco]

The scent of the grease used in Russian camera lenses is very... interesting.

There is absolutely nothing modern about the smell, it always makes me think of old tanks and tractors.

 

[vintageTink]

I don't know why, but there is always the same "smell" when you are attending a funeral. It always makes me think of all the ones before and is a sad thought...and after I leave a funeral home, I often wondered what all makes that smell be the same?

I know this is old, but I worked in a funeral home for three years. You're smelling a combination of formaldehyde, antiseptic, and carnations.

For me, books take me back.

 

[Shangas]

For me, two smells...

1. Talcum powder.
2. Tiger-balm.

When I was a child, these two smells hit me every time I went into my grandmother's bedroom. They never went away. Every time I smell Tiger Balm, I think of my grandma.

 

[Duper]

Aircraft engine exhaust.. As a much younger man I worked at the airport as an assistant mechanic on what was vintage aircraft even back then.. DC3s, Viscounts and others. Every time I am at an airport and I catch a faint odour of burnt fuel, I am 21 all over again.

 

[ThemThereEyes]

Jergen's Original scent lotion, camphor, iodine

 

[LizzieMaine]

How about the smell of an old desk drawer? Pencil shavings, old rubber erasers, and spilled ink -- always takes me back to working in our gas station office when I was a teenager.

 

[Miss Sis]

The small of asphalt that has melted in the sun. Takes me back to being ten years old at Primary school in the Summer. There was a patch that always melted in the hot New Zealand sun just outside one of the doors. We spent all Summer barefoot at playtime - you had to remember not to run into the melted puddle on the way in/out!

 

[countryclubjoe]

Home made apple cider.

Old Spice after shave.

CCJ

 

[dnjan]

Mentioning the smell of old spice transports me back to high-school years (I used old-spice products then, and still do).
Specifically to the girl who told me that I smelled like her dad.

 

[Gregg Axley]

Yankee Candle's Fresh Cut Roses reminds me of the old Glade floral sprays my grandmother used to use.

 

[Canadian]

The burning of pine in a potbellied stove in the dead of winter. Reminds me of our trips to our beachouse which had gads of snow in winter (being Canada naturally).

Thomas

 

[ThemThereEyes]

Jergen's Original scent lotion, camphor, iodine. Jergen's reminds me of when I was very little and stayed with an aunt for a short time. Iodine, camphor, remind me of when I was about 4, living in Galveston. Also makes me think of mercurochrome that we had next to it: http://boomergrandparents.com/wp-content/image/Mercurochrome-300x268.jpg not my picture, of course.

 

[vintageTink]

Oranges. Reminds me of growing up in Kissimmee, FL.

Lizzie~~ Pencil shavings and rubber erasers remind me of school.

 

[rocketeer]

I dont know what it was as everyones house smells different but I caught a whiff of something that sent me back to an old girlfriends living room where we snuggled up together and I watched my first video tape. This was 1981 and we watched Papillon with Steve McQueen, recorded from the TV on a brand new BETAmax recorder. Clunky piano like keys an'all.
J

 

[nice hat dude!]

This is probably of topic and a little weird but every time I have a hot dog it takes me back to summer fairs that I remember as a kid, ok here's the weird part my dad was an underground miner for most of his life(hard rock
not coal) but the smell of a hardhat sweatband reminds me of him RIP.

 

[Blackthorn]

For me, it's an odd one...cigarette smoke. I've never been a smoker, nor were my parents. And there wasn't much of a relationship between myself and my parents. They really found me as more of an annoyance, I always thought. But every year we went back east to where my aunts, uncles and cousins lived, and they all treated me like their long lost son/brother. So the love they lavished on me is one of my greatest memories...and they all smoked. So now when the breeze wafts cigarette smoke to me, I have to stop what I'm doing and relive those early days. God bless 'em all for treating a little kid like solid gold.

I've even gone so far as to see someone smoking, and going over to stand near them, just because I love the smell so much.