As *spoon* as Arch comes back from vacation Hepcat will still be Hepcat. 8 8

[Hepcat]

Do you have the ENTIRE 1959 Topps set? I recall having quite a few of these as a kid. I traded them away to a neighbor kid.

 

No, I never did. I didn't buy any packs at the age of seven due to cash flow problems, and then any cards prior to 1961 had almost entirely disappeared from the schoolyard by 1963 when a buddy and I just started amassing any cards we could find. I think we had less than a dozen of the 1959s.

 

I have more than 150 nice ones today, but no big stars. I've been reluctant to pay the price asked for the best known players.

 

Edited March 8, 2012 by Hepcat

[frozentundraguy]

Do you have the ENTIRE 1959 Topps set? I recall having quite a few of these as a kid. I traded them away to a neighbor kid.

 

No, I never did. I didn't buy any packs at the age of seven due to cash flow problems, and then any cards prior to 1961 had almost entirely disappeared from the schoolyard by 1963 when a buddy and I just started amassing any cards we could find. I think we had less than a dozen of the 1959s.

 

I have more than 150 nice ones today, but no big stars. I've been reluctant to pay the price asked for the best known players.

 

 

That's a pretty impressive number of 59 cards. For 1960's Topps I always liked the 61 and 68 sets.

 

 

 

[frozentundraguy]

A couple more baseball cards from my collection.

 

1958 - Nellie Fox. Fox boasted an excellent BA of .317 in 1957.

 

1962 - Bob Gibson. Bob posted a nice 3.24 ERA in 1961. He was to get a LOT better, posting a league leading ERA of 1.12 in 1968.

He finished with a career ERA of 2.91

 

 

 

[Hepcat]

Two great players from two of my favourite sets!

 

[frozentundraguy]

Thanks,

 

They sure dont make sportscards the way they used to.

 

A quick check on E-bay this morning, shows the value of this card has changed

very little since the early 90's. If I recall 67 was about when Fran was traded to the Giants.

 

Fran Tarkenton - 1967 Phildelphia card #106

 

[Hepcat]

Soda pop and particularly the bottles in which soda pop was sold when I was a kid ended up leaving a lasting impression on me. Pop in my neck of the woods was sold almost exclusively in ten ounce refillable bottles when I started grade school in 1958. The only exceptions were that Coca-Cola was also available in 6 1/2 ounce and 25 ounce bottles and Canada Dry was available in 25 ounce bottles. Cans and non-refillable bottles were not yet on the scene. Nor were there any diet brands, perish the thought!

 

Pop was found in coolers full of ice water at corner variety and mom-and-pop grocery stores. There was no joy on a hot summer's day like reaching into an ice water cooler and pulling out a bottle of pop still dripping icy cold water onto the floor as you carried it over to the clerk behind the counter!

 

By the time I was in grade one, my father would send me to the store once or twice a week to fetch a case of six bottles for the family. I would be sternly admonished not to pick any of the coloured stuff by which he meant cream soda, grape, orange or lemon-lime.

 

There were of course dozens of brands from which to choose:

 

Coca-Cola

Pepsi-Cola

Canada Dry

7-Up

Vernors

Snort*

John Collins*

Squirt*

Hires Root Beer

Orange Crush

Nesbitt's Orange

Wishing Well (many flavours)

Kist* (many flavours)

Stubby* (many flavours)

 

The brands with the * would disappear well before I finished grade school in 1965 but would be replaced by other brands such as Royal Crown Cola which was the first brand in those fabulous sixteen ounce bottles, Frostie Root Beer, Sprite, Teem, Mountain Dew, Wink, Fanta Orange, Dr. Pepper, etc.

 

I'd get my fill of the coloured stuff though at the community dances held perhaps a couple times a year at a banquet hall out in Nilestown. The adults always took the kids to these dances with them. I mean why pay for a babysitter? And those were the baby boom years so there were swarms of other kids with which to run in packs. After a meal of cabbage rolls, sausages, kugelis and corn, the music would begin and the adults would start their drinking - big time. So how could parents possibly begrudge their kids the fifteen cents for a pop (they gouged at the banquet hall!) when the parents themselves were drinking beer and liquor? And the pop sold at the banquet hall was Wishing Well - ginger ale, root beer, orange, grape, lemon-lime and cream soda in all their splendour! Three or four ten ounce bottles of pop in one evening was about as much as any ten year old could handle.

 

But most impressive of all was the selection of brands at the annual Labatt's company picnic in Springbank Park. Hundreds and hundreds of bottles of pop and half-pint chocolate milks in long galvanized steel bins filled with ice water! Theoretically you were limited to two pops, two hot dogs and one (or two) ice cream cones. The ice cream was doled out from a pastel coloured wooden trailer in those old-fashioned tube shapes from which the paper would then be unwrapped after the ice cream tube was dropped into the cone. The thing is though you could always bum more pop and ice cream tickets from any available adult. Such fun! And such great memories now!

 

But best of all the ten cent price for a ten ounce bottle included a two cent deposit. I spent many a morning and afternoon hunting for pop bottles to cash in at the store to fuel my addictions to pop, potato chips, bubblegum cards and comic books, let me tell you that! The deposit was raised to five cents in 1966.

 

The refillable bottles in which pop was sold left such a profound mark on my psyche that for the last twenty years I've been accumulating the ones I remember together with any other ones that catch my fancy because of the graphics. I keep all my bottles in a custom built kitchen pantry:

 

 

 

 

Edited March 12, 2012 by Hepcat

[steveinthecity]

Soda pop and particularly the bottles in which soda pop was sold when I was a kid ended up leaving a lasting impression on me. Pop in my neck of the woods was sold almost exclusively in ten ounce refillable bottles when I started grade school in 1958. The only exceptions were that Coca-Cola was also available in 6 1/2 ounce and 25 ounce bottles and Canada Dry was available in 25 ounce bottles. Cans and non-refillable bottles were not yet on the scene. Nor were there any diet brands, perish the thought!

 

Pop was found in coolers full of ice water at corner variety and mom-and-pop grocery stores. There was no joy on a hot summer's day like reaching into an ice water cooler and pulling out a bottle of pop still dripping icy cold water onto the floor as you carried it over to the clerk behind the counter!

 

By the time I was in grade one, my father would send me to the store once or twice a week to fetch a case of six bottles for the family. I would be sternly admonished not to pick any of the coloured stuff by which he meant cream soda, grape, orange or lemon-lime.

 

There were of course dozens of brands from which to choose:

 

Coca-Cola

Pepsi-Cola

Canada Dry

7-Up

Vernors

Snort*

John Collins*

Squirt*

Hires Root Beer

Orange Crush

Nesbitt's Orange

Wishing Well (many flavours)

Kist* (many flavours)

Stubby* (many flavours)

 

The brands with the * would disappear well before I finished grade school in 1965 but would be replaced by other brands such as Royal Crown Cola which was the first brand in those fabulous sixteen ounce bottles, Frostie Root Beer, Sprite, Teem, Mountain Dew, Wink, Fanta Orange, Dr. Pepper, etc.

 

I'd get my fill of the coloured stuff though at the community dances held perhaps a couple times a year at a banquet hall out in Nilestown. The adults always took the kids to these dances with them. I mean why pay for a babysitter? And those were the baby boom years so there were swarms of other kids with which to run in packs. After a meal of cabbage rolls, sausages, kugelis and corn, the music would begin and the adults would start their drinking - big time. So how could parents possibly begrudge their kids the fifteen cents for a pop (they gouged at the banquet hall!) when the parents themselves were drinking beer and liquor? And the pop sold at the banquet hall was Wishing Well - ginger ale, root beer, orange, grape, lemon-lime and cream soda in all their splendour! Three or four ten ounce bottles of pop in one evening was about as much as any ten year old could handle.

 

But most impressive of all was the selection of brands at the annual Labatt's company picnic in Springbank Park. Hundreds and hundreds of bottles of pop and half-pint chocolate milks in long galvanized steel bins filled with ice water! Theoretically you were limited to two pops, two hot dogs and one (or two) ice cream cones. The ice cream was doled out from a pastel coloured wooden trailer in those old-fashioned tube shapes from which the paper would then be unwrapped after the ice cream tube was dropped into the cone. The thing is though you could always bum more pop and ice cream tickets from any available adult. Such fun! And such great memories now!

 

But best of all the ten cent price for a ten ounce bottle included a two cent deposit. I spent many a morning and afternoon hunting for pop bottles to cash in at the store to fuel my addictions to pop, potato chips, bubblegum cards and comic books, let me tell you that! The deposit was raised to five cents in 1966.

 

The refillable bottles in which pop was sold left such a profound mark on my psyche that for the last twenty years I've been accumulating the ones I remember together with any other ones that catch my fancy because of the graphics. I keep all my bottles in a custom built kitchen pantry:

 

Hepcat, just curious about soda flavors...did you have something called "birch beer"? It was a red color I used to get as a kid, and here on the west coast no one seems to have ever heard of it.

[Hepcat]

No, not birch beer. Canada Dry for a while marketed ginger beer which is entirely different from ginger ale but I've never encountered birch beer. I've heard of it, however.

 

 

[frozentundraguy]

No, not birch beer. Canada Dry for a while marketed ginger beer which is entirely different from ginger ale but I've never encountered birch beer. I've heard of it, however.

 

 

I had not heard of either birch beer nor ginger beer. I do recall being fortunate to spend a couple of weeks "up north" each summer at my grandparents farm. My grandmother made some excellent root beer. When I was about 12 my uncle, who was about my age, and I were able to quickly dispose of the homemade root beer.

 

This subsequently led us to inquire as to exactly how to make it. It turned out it was fairly easy, except for the 10 days or so one had to wait for it to ferment and be ready to drink.

[Hepcat]

you and your buttercreme icing..you are one lucky Cat!

 

Here's my own personal recipe for the richest, yummiest whipped cream topping on this side of the pond:

 

1. Buy a package of Dream Whip.

 

 

2. Substitute 35% Whipping Cream for milk in the recipe.

 

3. Follow the Dream Whip recipe otherwise.

 

4. Enjoy!

 

(thumbs u

[Hepcat]

I had a birthday party yesterday:

 

 

The menu included something from each of the four major food groups, fish, fowl, cake and ice cream.

 

We started off with an appetizer of fried clams:

 

 

Then came the main course of BBQ cornish game hen:

 

 

For dessert there was cake:

 

 

And ice cream:

 

 

A nutritious and complete birthday feast if I do say so myself!

 

 

Edited April 6, 2012 by Hepcat

[Not*Sure*]

awww I ran across that video you filmed for fatboy Slim

 

 

 

[Not*Sure*]

Bootsy Collins is probably a cat person!!

[Hepcat]

So are these two:

 

 

 

[Hepcat]

It was a Saturday morning in April or May of 1964. My mission: to go door to door in downtown London and sell fifteen Globe & Mail newspapers for fifteen cents each. The reward, five cents per paper sold plus an SPP monster wallet of my choice!

 

 

 

These wallets were perhaps the coolest things that I'd ever seen and I absolutely, positively had to reach the target.

 

But the Globe & Mail was a pig of a paper and very tough to sell in London. First of all, the Globe & Mail was Toronto based. The London Free Press was the paper of choice for most Londoners. Secondly, the Saturday Free Press cost only a dime. Thirdly, coming all the way from Toronto, the Globe & Mail had to be printed much earlier and so didn't contain that many sports scores from the previous day. Fourthly, the Saturday Free Press was loaded with features including a coloured comic section. The Globe & Mail was comparatively drab and had no comparable comic section. Finally, on Saturdays a whopping three editions of the Free Press were published, the regular Free Press published early in the morning, the London Evening Free Press published in mid-afternoon and the Night Final which included various afternoon race results for punters and sundry other horse degenerates.

 

What did the Globe & Mail have to offer in return? Just the best business section of any newspaper in Canada. So I could only hope to sell the thing to stuffy old businessmen or the odd deluded Torontophile. The maximum I'd ever sold before was six or seven papers. I really had my job cut out for me.

 

But I could not fail! I flung myself into the task with avid, wild-eyed enthusiasm! And my efforts bore fruit. Nearing the end of the afternoon I'd sold eleven papers; then one more. So close, so close, but yet so far.... Time was up.

 

But then, an idea! I bought the remaining three copies of the stupid rag myself! And there they were, a whole box of wallets from which I, one of the successful newspaper boys, could choose! "I want the Mummy, I want the Mummy" was the popular refrain I was hearing from other boys. I, however, had a mind of my own and I chose shrewdly - the Creature-Wolfman wallet!

 

And the three papers I had bought myself? No problem. I sold one to my father and two to neighbours on my own street! Easy sales indeed

.

And I was now the proud owner of a wallet like no other in the school yard! Shortly thereafter I caught on as a morning paperboy for the London Free Press (a real newspaper) with my own thirty paper delivery route which actually took me less than ten minutes since the houses were all on the same block. And there I was, proud as a peacock brandishing my super cool monster wallet as I went collecting from my customers every week, a wallet that I had incidentally earned stuffing the crappy Globe & Mail down customers' throats just a few months previously!

 

Unfortunately, my wallet's change purse started coming apart in less than a year (cheap bloody plastic) so I very sensibly threw it out. I mean what do you need a wallet for anymore if it's all falling apart? Right? Right?!

 

Now I've since managed to acquire the Mummy-Dracula and Frankenstein-Phantom wallets:

 

 

 

But another Creature-Wolfman wallet continues to elude me to this very day.

 

Edited May 4, 2012 by Hepcat

[Not*Sure*]

OMG those are so awesome Hep..definitely..

 

you are a very interesting cat..

[Not*Sure*]

and I got stuck hawking girl scout cookies..seeds..embossed Christmas cards..for way less cool swag than that!

 

 

[Hepcat]

Cool! Were the seeds and the embossed Xmas cards through those offers on the back covers of comic books?

 

And at least you sold things yourself. Parents just bring junk to work these days and sell on behalf for their kids.

 

 

Edited May 5, 2012 by Hepcat

[Not*Sure*]

well you know back in the day it was safe for kids to walk all over town and back selling junk to strangers..today you just can't let kids do it there are too many loonies.

 

My "friends" all send me those packets in the mail to order coupon books cookie dough.. merchandise for their kids..or they facebook me begging me to buy cookies or carp..

 

 

I did get 6 week of summer camp one year and a cool boat (paddle boat)

but mostly you know flashlight radio combos..radio that was a fluffy dog stuffed animal..or the huge doll house..that turned out to be made of cardboard..

 

I sold all sorts of stuff..except never sold "Grit"

 

 

But When I first got into pageants(around 14 or so) I cold called on hundreds of businesses walking in and asking outright for cash..other girls had parental endorsement like one had a mom who would not only pay for her everything but bake cupcakes for the entire troupe..another had a dad who owned a car dealership and not only would they pay for sponsorship bigtime..they had little gift bags of goodies they gave to everyone a bunch of swag labeled "Vote Mandy Von for Miss Congeniality" While I was over at the radio stations begging them for money..going to the dry cleaners and asking for donations..and working up late at night making my own dress..

 

I did not have the parental support for my endeavors business wise or otherwise..but without all the scholarship monies I would have never got me no book learnin's har har

 

without selling them cookies I wouldn't have gotten those 6 hell weeks at Camp Tanasi ..girls are just plain mean..

 

except for ones like me..who read comics and stuff..

 

haha

 

but it is so weird how it was perfectly fine for me to leave the house and spend the entire day going door to door to everyone's house asking them to buy junk..now kids can hardly trick or treat

 

 

 

 

 

 

[Not*Sure*]

Man those wallets are so freaking cool Hep..

dang you have some cool swag