Moving Day

Moving Day

In 1965 we moved from Flanders, NJ to Basking Ridge NJ about 40 miles up the road. The town of Basking Ridge is probably know best today as where one of the AT&T corp offices is. Back then it’s only claim to fame was the fact it was where [General Charles Lee](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Charles_Lee_(general) was captured during the American revolution. We moved into a ranch house in a neighborhood called Heather Farms. It had five bedrooms, three bathrooms, a living room and dinning room, kitchen/family room and a large basement. It sat on an acre and a half piece of property with a cul-de-sac in the front and a brook that ran to a pond on one side and a neighbors house on the other. I talk about being tomboys and meeting our neighbors. How I had one doll a Chatty Cathy and lots of stuff animals. I hope you enjoy the episode.

Birch Beer

This episode 8 of Remembrances Back in the Day, Birch Beer, a story about the Larsen Turkey Farm and the Volunteer Fireman 4th of July Picnic. Where the birch beer came in kegs and was cold and foamy and tickled your nose. Please listen and I hope you enjoy.

Remembering Easter

Growing up Easter was a big holiday in our family, although not as big as Christmas or Thanksgiving. It really started earlier in the week with the decoration of the eggs. My mother would buy a dozen eggs and we would dip them in dye. Trying to dip them perfectly into various colors, usually ending up with eggs of undefined colors. One year my mother decided to try to make Ukrainian eggs which worked out fine, except she used hard boiled eggs. Once they were done they were too pretty eat or throw away, so we had these eggs for years that everyone was afraid to move in fear we would break them and release rotten egg smell. On Easter morning my mom would get us up so we could get ready for church. There would be a dress laid out for each of us. My mom would make the dresses either from a Butterick or Simplicity pattern on a Singer sewing machine. There were very few clothes that we had that were store brought other then sweaters, sweatshirts and jeans until we reached late junior high. She would use the same pattern and make three different color dresses. Occasionally there would be an alteration in the pattern like one dress would have a collar, while the other be scoop neck or v neck. I have a vague memory of one year when she made dresses for us that were baby blue, peach and a light green. I am pretty sure the material was chiffon. With the dress there was a new pair of tights and new shoes for spring. If Easter was early we might also put on a spring coat and hat. 

Once we got back from church it was time for the Easter baskets. Which we first had to find. My mother was very good at hiding things and no one could touch their Easter basket until all Easter baskets were found. My two older sisters Easter basket were both old and large. I remember them as being black with greenish hue. If I remember the story correctly they were inherited from a great aunt, My Easter basket brown and slightly smaller. My brother’s basket was more modern and multicolored. Usually in each Easter basket were some colored hard boiled eggs, some jelly beans, peeps, a solid chocolate Easter bunny and one gift. 

Once the gift was opened it was about time for our cousins, my paternal grandmother and Jake to arrive. Jake was no relationship to me at all, but I always remember him with my grandmother. I never met my maternal grandfather he left my mother and grandmother sometime during the depression. My paternal grandparents were divorced before I was born and I only met my paternal grandfather about four times in my life. So Jake was the closes thing to a grandfather I had. We would have either roast leg of lamb with garlic and oregano or much to my horror a ham. Although I did love the crackling which is the coating of fat on top of the ham which would get really crispy. There were always two table at dinner, the adult table in the dinning room and the kids table in the kitchen. Once you reached the age of 14 if I remember correctly you got to eat with the adults, that was a big deal for all the kids. Through the afternoon we would play games like penny ante poker or Pig (also known as Spoons). In Pig each person gets four cards and you pass a card to your right until someone gets four of a kind and then they yell pig and our family you all grab for a spoon. There is always one less spoon then there are people playing, so the person who doesn’t get a spoon gets a P once a person spells pig they are out. Our family is quite competitive so almost anything went including the occasional use of finger nails. One year a game got so competitive that we broke my aunt;s coffee table. Usually either during or after a game of Pig, we would be told to go outside and play until super was ready. For super we would have sandwiches made up of the left overs from lunch and a piece of home made pie. Both my Uncle Joe and Jake liked their beer and usually by early evening they had had one too many and my aunt and grandmother would collect them for the trip home. Occasionally we would get calls later about the antics going home including trying to put up an umbrella in the car. My parents would send us to bed and soon we would drift off to sleep with dreams of candy dancing in our heads

TV Time

 Growing up we only had one TV and until the mid 60’s it was in black and white. We only received six channels and on a good day maybe seven, there was ABC, CBS and NBC along with channel 11 and 5 which were local stations out of New York City and the NET station, which was a precursor to PBS. There was no remote control or vhs or dvr, so if you missed a show you missed it. Among the kids it was first come first serve also known as I am bigger than you so I get the TV. In our family you could only watch an hour of TV at night. To be honest most of the time in the summer time we would be outside playing late until the evening when my mother would call us in. By the time we got inside it was time for a bath and then bed. There were some shows I remember growing up that either came on before school or on Saturday morning. The first one was Romper Room which came on during lunch time and you would watch it before you went to kindergarten or coming home. Early in the morning before school there was Captain Kangaroo. Then on Saturday morning you had comedies like the Three Stooges or the Little Rascals and action adventures like My Friend Flicka. Slowly those shows got replaced by cartoons. My favorite cartoon when I was really little was Mighty Mouse, a super mouse who would protect the town of Mouseville from various villains including Oil Can Harry a Cat. I also loved watching Richochet Rabbit and Droop-along on the Magilla Gorilla Show. And if you grew up at that time who can forget the Huckleberry Hound Show, with Huckleberry Hound and Yogi Bear and Pixie and Dixie All these shows were simple and you knew who was going to win and loose. The animations was crude and simple, but they all had great theme songs and whenever I hear one on Youtube I have to smile remembering a time when everything was much simpler.

The 1964-65 New York World's Fair

This is episode 5 of Remembrances Back in the Day: The 1964–65 New York World’s Fair. The New York World’s Fair ran from April thru October in 1964 and April thru October in 1965. This was at a time when everything seemed possible, we had just sent a man into space, the Beatles had just hit our shores, the Vietnam War was still in the background and the 1967 and 68 riots were still in th future. If you watch the AMC show Mad Man, this is around the time period it was based on. The fair was boycotted by most European and all communist bloc countries, so it was dominated by American industry and technology. It celebrated the US entrance into space and had an actual stage 1 rocket you could explore. There was a pavilions that showed people living on the moon and under the sea. There was a pavilion showing dinosaurs that moved and roared. 

One of the most popular pavilions was the one that celebrated computers. At this time computers were large enough they had to be housed in large rooms, so this was the first time most people got anywhere near a computer. Most of the expositions in this pavilion simply showed computers taking large amount of data and producing a list, like historic events for a certain year. The IBM exposition was different it actually attempted to show how computers worked. I do remember the PictaPhone which was a phone where you could see the person you were talking too, and in 1964 that was magical. I also remember getting a chocolate icecream cone on the way home. The NY World’s Fair was exciting and tiring for a 6 year old. It was a celebration of where we had been and where we might be going. To learn more about the 1964–1965 World’s Fair go to New York 1964 World’s Fair, which includes several good articles about the fair and a map of the fairground. Thank you for listening and have a good week.

My Little Brother

When I was born I was suppose to be the last child my parents were going to have. I was suppose to be a boy, after 2 girls the odds were going in that direction. So when I came along I was a bit of a surprise. In fact I have a card sent by a great aunt welcoming Tim in to the family. After three girls my parents decided that was it and had stopped trying. As we all know both nature and God have a sense of humor and this episode is about the surprise appearance of my younger brother Eric when I was almost five.

My Little Brother

The Crush

In this episode I talk about remembering Davy Jones of the Monkees and a more innocent time.  I had a big crush on him when I was about 10 or 11 and was sure I was going to marry him.  I brought the song Day Dream Believer as my first 45 and played it so much that it wore out.   Although I now recognize that the Beatles were the more superior group at the time the Beatles belong to my oldest sisters, the Monkees belong to my age group.  Even to this day I still think that the Monkees don't get credit they deserve, their songs were deceptively simple.   My favorite Monkees's songs were Day Dream Believer, The Crush