Terms Which Have Disappeared

[plain old dave]

My Papaw's first car was a 1930-odd Packard. His daddy took it in as a trade for a city house; this was about 1939-40. Things cost considerably less back then. A new Winchester rifle was @$50 (which almost nobody had, most hunters still used either 30-30s [$30-40 or so] or shotguns) and a new Ford was somewhere in the $800-900 range AFAIK.

 

[Stearmen]

We have the same problem with getting "facts" about incomes and lifestyles from TV and movies today. Living in NYC, I regularly see TV and movie characters living in apartments that might look okay and reasonable to people who don't live in NYC, but for those of us intimate with NYC real estate, we know how silly it is to show these people living in those apartments. For example, they have two of the woman on "Friends" - neither one making a lot of money (at various times, they were a waitress in a coffee shop, a line cook, a junior exec in retail, unemployed), but though out it, they lived in a very big two bedroom apartment with a terrace in Greenwich Village. That apartment's rent would be way, way, way beyond the reach of those two women.

Someone watching "Friends" in 2060 and thinking that they are seeing how average people really lived in NYC in the late 1990s would be getting very inaccurate information.

I always wondered about The Odd Couple apartment? It is very big for NY, or any city for that matter!

 

[Zombie_61]

I always wondered about The Odd Couple apartment? It is very big for NY, or any city for that matter!

Well, it was really only a set in a filming studio, so...

 

[Fading Fast]

I always wondered about The Odd Couple apartment? It is very big for NY, or any city for that matter!

I have too. If memory serves, the apartment changed during the show. The first one was - what is called - a pre-war apartment and was quite big and would be not inexpensive. The second one was more modern and smaller, but also not cheap. That said, while Oscar was always "broke," in truth they were two single men with good jobs (albeit alimony too), so it is not inconceivable that they could have afforded the apartment together.

Although, the story line was that Oscar had the apartment himself before Felix moved it - which is harder to believe. Regardless, it is not as off-the-charts silly as the apartment the "Friend's" characters had - which, since I was single and living in NYC at the same time the show was one, I know was complete nonsense.

 

[LizzieMaine]

Although, the story line was that Oscar had the apartment himself before Felix moved it - which is harder to believe.

As we all know from movies, the journalistic profession is glamorous, respected, and pays extremely well.

Possibly Oscar's apartment fell under rent control.

 

[2jakes]

I have too. If memory serves, the apartment changed during the show. The first one was - what is called - a pre-war apartment and was quite big and would be not inexpensive. The second one was more modern and smaller, but also not cheap. That said, while Oscar was always "broke," in truth they were two single men with good jobs (albeit alimony too), so it is not inconceivable that they could have afforded the apartment together.

Although, the story line was that Oscar had the apartment himself before Felix moved it - which is harder to believe. Regardless, it is not as off-the-charts silly as the apartment the "Friend's" characters had - which, since I was single and living in NYC at the same time the show was one, I know was complete nonsense.

I've never been to the "big apple"...but growing up I used to think that the apartments in NYC
looked similar to the ones that Ralph & Alice occupied in the TV show ''The Honeymooners"

 

[V.C. Brunswick]

As we all know from movies, the journalistic profession is glamorous, respected, and pays extremely well.

Possibly Oscar's apartment fell under rent control.

In the original play (and possibly the movie version) Oscar laments about his inability to manage money even though he's been one of the highest paid sports writers in America for fourteen years. His poker buddies, one of whom is an accountant, also allude to his lack of money management skills in the opening scene. Then there's also the quirk of set design which has to also accomodate the lights and cameras that it even makes a sharecropper's shack in a film or TV show look unusually palatial in comparison to reality.

 

[LizzieMaine]

I've never been to the "big apple"...but growing up I used to think that the apartments in NYC
looked similar to the ones that Ralph & Alice occupied in the TV show ''The Honeymooners"

That one's the Nortons' apartment -- they lived in the same building as Ralph and Alice, but were far more deeply in debt to finance companies, hence the lavish appointments.

The Kramdens' place was based on the actual apartment where Gleason lived as a child in the 1920s.

The most realistic depiction of a mid-century working-class home ever seen on American television was the Bunker house in "All in the Family." Every single detail rang true to the world I knew.

 

[Fading Fast]

As we all know from movies, the journalistic profession is glamorous, respected, and pays extremely well.

Possibly Oscar's apartment fell under rent control.

It's funny you mentioned rent control as I was almost going to but thought (1) if you don't live in one of the few cities that have it, then someone might not know what the heck I was talking about and (2) there was an episode where Felix and Oscar participated in a rent strike because their rent was hiked up a lot (the implication was that they were market-rate tenants) and rent controlled people don't strike as the government sets the increases which are always modest versus market increases (to the point now that rent payments in rent controlled apartments are well-below market rent ones).

While you are absolutely correct in your observation of journalism and its modest pay, Oscar (as a character) was a sportswriter with some esteem in NYC - and his own column - which meant he probably made well-above the average journalist on his paper.

 

[HudsonHawk]

For example, they have two of the woman on "Friends" - neither one making a lot of money (at various times, they were a waitress in a coffee shop, a line cook, a junior exec in retail, unemployed), but though out it, they lived in a very big two bedroom apartment with a terrace in Greenwich Village. That apartment's rent would be way, way, way beyond the reach of those two women.

To be fair to Monica and Rachel, the storyline in the show was that it was Monica's grandmother's apartment (who'd lived there like 50 years), and they admitted that they could never afford it on their own.

 

[Fading Fast]

I've never been to the "big apple"...but growing up I used to think that the apartments in NYC
looked similar to the ones that Ralph & Alice occupied in the TV show ''The Honeymooners"

Their apartment was a much more realistic representation of what a bus driver could afford in the '50s (as was Ricky and Lucy's apartment in "I Love Lucy"). In the 1980s, I had friends who were living in apartments very similar to Ralph and Alice's - with nearly as old appliances.

That said, and I might be wrong as there were a few iteration of the "Honeymooners," but I think the above apartment was actually Ed and Trixie's apartment (they spent more money on decorations and appliances than Ralph and Alice did) and that might even be the episode where Ralph and Ed buy a TV together to share. Or it might just be a later version from Gleason's variety show that I'm not that familiar with.

Edit: I truly hadn't read Lizzie's post at 10:19 when I posted this, but as always, she had more information as her comment about the Nortons and financing was brought up in several episodes.

 

[Fading Fast]

To be fair to Monica and Rachel, the storyline in the show was that it was Monica's grandmother's apartment (who'd lived there like 50 years), and they admitted that they could never afford it on their own.

I did not know that - great catch - and does explain it. But even Ross' apartment that he gets later in the show, would be way too expensive for a young college professor. Oddly, Seinfeld's apartment on his show was realistic for the reasonably successful comedian that he played.

 

[2jakes]

That one's the Nortons' apartment -- they lived in the same building as Ralph and Alice, but were far more deeply in debt to finance companies, hence the lavish appointments.

The Kramdens' place was based on the actual apartment where Gleason lived as a child in the 1920s.

The most realistic depiction of a mid-century working-class home ever seen on American television was the Bunker house in "All in the Family." Every single detail rang true to the world I knew.

Where I come from if it looks like the temp will drop to 30º or below, we are advised by the wx man to turn on
the outside water faucets to a drip to avoid lines busting. But the freeze is only for a couple of days at most.

How the heck do you manage this where it is super cold up where you live & avoid a huge water bill. I 'm guessing
that your water lines are different ?

 

[HudsonHawk]

I did not know that - great catch - and does explain it. But even Ross' apartment that he gets later in the show, would be way too expensive for a young college professor. Oddly, Seinfeld's apartment on his show was realistic for the reasonably successful comedian that he played.

But Newman had the same apartment, albeit on a lower floor, and he was a mailman. And Kramer...he was perpetually on strike from the bagel shop, yet he afforded the apartment, even turning it into a ski lodge with a hot tub and re-decorated it as the set of the Merv Griffin show.

 

[HudsonHawk]

Where I come from if it looks like the temp will drop to 30º or below, we are advised by the wx man to turn on
the outside water faucets to a drip to avoid lines busting. But the freeze is only for a couple of days at most.

How the heck do you manage this where it is super cold up where you live & avoid a huge water bill. I 'm guessing
that your water lines are different ?

Water lines "up there" are insulated or otherwise not exposed to the cold, as they are "down here".

 

[LizzieMaine]

Exactly. And a lot of places here don't have outside faucets.

Another common thing is "heat tape," which wraps around pipes and you plug it in -- it contains resistance wire, like an electric blanket, and that provides enough heat to keep the pipes from freezing in winter. It's also responsible for a very large number of house and trailer fires each year.

We had no insulation or protection for the pipes at the gas station, and we always left the faucet in one of the restrooms trickling when it went below freezing. Even then it wasn't always enough, and I learned at an early age how to thaw pipes with a plumbers' soldering iron.

The low-bidders who renovated the theatre ran copper water pipes thru a janitors' closet that faces an uninsulated outside wall. A couple winters ago, when we went down to 15 below, those pipes froze just before showtime, ruptured, and sent a flood of water into the lobby before I could get to the shutoff. I still have the broken piece of pipe in my desk drawer -- it looks like a giant copper bubble with a slit in it. Ah, happy days.

 

[Fading Fast]

But Newman had the same apartment, albeit on a lower floor, and he was a mailman. And Kramer...he was perpetually on strike from the bagel shop, yet he afforded the apartment, even turning it into a ski lodge with a hot tub and re-decorated it as the set of the Merv Griffin show.

I have no evidence from the show, but Newman's apartment felt like a rent contred apartment as (1) it looked like he had lived there a thousand years and (2) he was always working an angle as many (not all) people do to get rent controlled apartments in NYC.

As to Kramer, since he never really had a job, nothing made financial sense with his character. Except that, he too, was always working an angle / getting a deal / etc.

 

[DNO]

Where I come from if it looks like the temp will drop to 30º or below, we are advised by the wx man to turn on
the outside water faucets to a drip to avoid lines busting. But the freeze is only for a couple of days at most.

How the heck do you manage this where it is super cold up where you live & avoid a huge water bill. I 'm guessing
that your water lines are different ?

Up here in the land of ice and snow we have a shut-off valve inside the house that controls the water flow to the outside tap. When the winter hits, the valve is turned and it generally doesn't change until March...or so. Never had a problem.

 

[dh66]

Up here in the land of ice and snow we have a shut-off valve inside the house that controls the water flow to the outside tap. When the winter hits, the valve is turned and it generally doesn't change until March...or so. Never had a problem.

Unless you forget to open the outside tap and drain out the line
I have had several calls to fix that little surprise come springtime.

 

[Stanley Doble]

That is right, there is always a shutoff in the basement for an outside tap. The basement, and the house, are heated all winter and the pipes are in the inside walls. Pipes going in or coming out are buried below the frost line which is 3 to 4 feet below the surface.

I live in an old solid brick house where the pipes to the upstairs bathroom go up an outside wall. The hot water is distinctly colder in winter but have never had them freeze. Although, if it is really cold (below 20F) I leave the taps trickling.

When I owned a mobile home the pipes were wrapped with electrically heated tapes then covered with 4" of fibreglass insulation and tar paper. This usually kept them from freezing.

I also lived in a farm house where the kitchen pipes ran through a crawl space. In extreme cold, the pipes would freeze although luckily they never burst. A good way to thaw frozen pipes is to connect an arc welder to them, this got the water running and again, I left the water trickling till the temps got more reasonable.