By Staff
A friend of mine I grew up with said she read in one of my previous articles where I told how we used to save those old tinfoil icicles from our Christmas tree and use them year after year.
She told me her mother used to save the ribbon from the Christmas gift packages and iron them to be used the next year.
They also used to save some of the wrapping paper, too.
Back in 1943 and 1944 we bought those 10-cent war stamps at school, pasted them in our book to save to get enough to buy a war bond.
Remember the slogan, "Lick a Stamp and Slap a Jap?"
How many remember the loud pop you got when you stuck a butcher knife into a ripe watermelon?
When you are old like me and need something, I ask my wife, will you please get it for me?
There is a house on High Street with a cupola on top of the roof. It may be the only one in Dowagiac.
Some people call it a widow's walk, but it is not because it has no railing on the roof.
Lots of old people like me can remember when we had coffee rationing and how you could make it go farther by adding more water to the same old coffee grounds over and over. People used to call this "Roosevelt" coffee.
Some people call an umbrella a bumbershoot.
In looking back to 1963, the year Peg and I got married, did you know Dowagiac had 15 groceries: A&P, Kroger's, Donker's, Glen's Super, North Side, Lou Ann Valley, Arney's, Hill's, Keeley's, Hunsberger's, Leitke's, George's, C.C. Paul's, Scott's and Swartz's. Sure is a lot different now, isn't?
I was a bit surprised recently when I went to a local garage sale and they had a scythe and a sickle for sale. Remember those old hand-held critters for cutting hay and grass?
Has your mother said, will you get busy and quit your dallying?
Little Miss Muffet sat on a tuffet … what the heck is a tuffet?
I bet a lot of folks remember Mrs. Sally Clynch, who was famous for her story hours for kids at the library year ago.
People also call their raincoats their slickers sometimes.
A favorite of mine back in the '30s were those "Big Little Books."
Remember? Dick Tracy and Smilin' Jack were popular back then.
Do kids these days still play jacks, where you bounce a ball and pick up the funny-looking little things one at a time?