Vintage Things That Have Disappeared In Your Lifetime?

[Bruce Wayne]

I was referring to the phone booths...(first made of wood) later metal or plastic then just a facade of a phone booth which didn't
help much to cut down the noise.
I lost my wallet recently & after being on the phone with automated-recorded options customer assistance to recover or
report my cards...for most of yesterday....it is refreshing to be "talking " to a real human here on the forum....:blah:

BTW: I found my wallet much later..:eusa_doh:

http://www.dialahuman.com/

I never get tired of posting this.

 

[2jakes]

http://www.dialahuman.com/

I never get tired of posting this.

BTW: The only instance where I would've preferred the "automated voice recording" was when
I spoke to the police to report my lost license... :rant:

 

[Bruce Wayne]

Turns out Archie comics is coming to an end. And what an end!

http://www.vox.com/2014/7/14/5899351/archie-is-dying

 

[dh66]

Turns out Archie comics is coming to an end. And what an end!

http://www.vox.com/2014/7/14/5899351/archie-is-dying

Wow! ....I mean, just Wow!
On so many levels.
Poor old Archie has been off my radar for sooooo many years, that article really brought back some memories of several things that dissapeared in my lifetime. I had totally forgotten about Archie spreading the good news, but now I remember that there was a pretty landmark BBQ restaurant in my town that my dad loved to eat at (sadly both are now gone) that used to give away the Archie Christian comics to kids. I guess the fact that ol' Arch could refrain from judgment of someone different from himself and love his neighbor, enough even to lay down his life for him, shows that maybe some of what he was preaching back then actually sank in.
Thanks for posting that Bruce Wayne.

 

[jamespowers]

Turns out Archie comics is coming to an end. And what an end!

http://www.vox.com/2014/7/14/5899351/archie-is-dying

Oh geez! PC comes to comics.......:doh:

 

[Stanley Doble]

Does anyone remember paperweights?

Before air conditioning, to keep cool you had to open the windows and turn on the electric fans. Office workers used paperweights to keep their papers from blowing around.

Many were made of glass with flowers or other objects embedded. Snow globes. Metal, ceramic, all kinds of small objects.

 

[Zombie_61]

Does anyone remember paperweights?

Before air conditioning, to keep cool you had to open the windows and turn on the electric fans. Office workers used paperweights to keep their papers from blowing around...

I've known some office workers that weren't good for much other than being paperweights, does that count?

 

[LizzieMaine]

I use the broken piston from my Plodge as a combination paperweight/pencil cup. Reuse/Reduce/Recycle.

 

[Zombie_61]

I use the broken piston from my Plodge as a combination paperweight/pencil cup. Reuse/Reduce/Recycle.

A brilliant example of repurposing that shows a sense of style. :yo:

 

[Stearmen]

I still use a fan at my office desk. My paperweight is what ever is heavy enough to do the job. From a modern tape measure, to a 1912 Indian carb and every thing in between.

 

[nick123]

Turns out Archie comics is coming to an end. And what an end!

http://www.vox.com/2014/7/14/5899351/archie-is-dying

No joke, one of the best CDs I've ever purchased!
http://www.amazon.com/gp/aw/d/B00005J73V/ref=redir_mdp_mobile

 

[Stanley Doble]

I use the broken piston from my Plodge as a combination paperweight/pencil cup. Reuse/Reduce/Recycle.

Now all you need is a distributor cap pencil holder and a rubber tire ash tray. And possibly a Marilyn Monroe calendar.

 

[LizzieMaine]

We never gave out calendars like that. Ours always had either scenic photos of conventional vacation spots or nostalgic paintings showing little kids, puppies, or kittens. We did, however, have a lot of those rubber-tire ashtrays around, courtesy of the Firestone distributor, and our table was never without gas-pump shaped salt and pepper shakers.

 

[dh66]

When I was a kid growing up my grandfather had a barbershop. They lived on a farm in a VERY rural community, and the shop was out back of his house, and it had plenty of calendars like that in it.

 

[jamespowers]

When I was a kid growing up my grandfather had a barbershop. They lived on a farm in a VERY rural community, and the shop was out back of his house, and it had plenty of calendars like that in it.

Obviously he didn't cut women's hair.

 

[rjb1]

I worked in an auto parts store when I was in high school which had a mechanics area at the back side of the building. The mechanics had their walls papered with calendars of that sort.
There were several of us high school kids working that summer and we would virtually fight each other to do the parts deliveries back to the mechanics. (just to stare at the walls)

 

[Zombie_61]

Back in the days when most cameras still required film, a good friend worked at a local music store. One of his co-workers also had a part-time job at a local film processing facility where, by law, they were not allowed to develop photos that contained nudity and return them to their customers (and, in some cases, were required to confiscate and destroy the negative). This, of course, did not prevent them from developing copies for their own amusement, and eventually the small employee rest room at the music store was wallpapered with the "personal" photos of people in various stages of undress that my friend's co-worker had brought in to share. Mind you, the vast majority of these photos were chosen for their comedic value rather than their titillation factor--the people in them were wildly unattractive, wearing odd costumes, whatever--and right in the middle of all of this was a snapshot of Tim Conway looking quite dapper in a simple black tuxedo.

 

[Horace Debussy Jones]

I'm sure it's been mentioned before, speaking of film photos,...but Kodachrome. I REALLY miss Kodachrome. Apparently, Paul Simon's song fell on deaf ears.

 

[LizzieMaine]

Standard 8mm reversal film in any form is getting to be nearly impossible to find as well, which is a pain for we home-movie buffs who don't have the equipment to reperforate 16mm.

 

[rjb1]

The known (or very much suspected) tendency for photo lab clerks as mentioned by Zombie_61 to keep copies of any PG or R rated photos led to some interesting times for me back in the '70's.
I have always had professional-quality photo equipment and darkroom facilities and that was well known among my circle of friends and acquaintances. Every once in a while some male person would ask, "You do your own developing, don't you?" - "Yes" - "You do your own printing in the darkroom? - "Yes" - "No one except you ever sees those?" - "Yes" - "Would you take some Playboy style photos of my wife/girlfriend?" - "Yes"... After the first time or two the question/answer sequence was as predictable as clockwork.

To avoid jealousy or some sort of soap-opera shootout I always appointed the husband/boyfriend as the Art Director and he and she would work out what exactly they wanted. I would just provide the photo equipment and expertise to get it accomplished. (It was still fun...)
Modern digital technology has caused that sort of activity to have disappeared in my lifetime.
The irony is that now people take their own such photos and either post them on the Internet themselves or have them hacked by some guys in Russia and put on the Internet without their consent. That doesn't seem like real progress compared to having a few Walgreen's clerks with access...