Vintage Things That Have Disappeared In Your Lifetime?

[St.Ignatz]

Ice cream cups (waxed) with a long strip of wooden spoons with them in the freezer. Push ups with POINTED stick in the middle. 5 cent hamburgers at "Scotties". Hav-a Hank brand hankies individually wrapped because people knew not to snort,cough or sneeze on the folks next to them on the bus and Brioschi available at the Drug Store soda fountain. I sure do miss Roberts Pharmacy.
Tom D.

 

[LizzieMaine]

We still have Hoodsie Cups here, and if you buy them off an ice cream truck you'll get the little paper-wrapped paddle with them -- the cups, alas, are no longer waxed -- like all paper cups now, they're plastic coated. Nor do they any longer have pictures of movie stars or baseball players under the lids.

 

[St.Ignatz]

We still have Hoodsie Cups here, and if you buy them off an ice cream truck you'll get the little paper-wrapped paddle with them.

Do you still get lip splinters if you're a little too aggressive after corner scraping?

 

[V.C. Brunswick]

Models with lots of pieces and you actually had to glue them together with model glue.

As recently as several years ago Walmart had plastic model kits but on a recent visit I've noticed that they don't have them anymore.

 

[LizzieMaine]

Do you still get lip splinters if you're a little too aggressive after corner scraping?

Yep, and both the chocolate and vanilla sides have an undertone of pine flavor.

 

[Stray Cat]

As recently as several years ago Walmart had plastic model kits but on a recent visit I've noticed that they don't have them anymore.

It's that "Not for children under 3 years" thing..
It ruined all the fun!
Remember KINDER EGG?
(Do you have those there?)
We used to LOVE them, to eat the "shell" (even if we found it TOO sweet, we'd still eat it). And then, to open the container.. and to find the pieces: with the users manual inside (manual is pictorial, not all kids know German, I guess or to read at all).
..and we'll sit down and make a figurine. My favorite: Pink Panther the Painter!
number nine..

..now, figurines don't come in pieces. Kids swallow them.
I was a kid. I was 3 years old.
I NEVER swallowed a piece of a figurine.. ever.

..so this day kids......

 

[Stray Cat]

As recently as several years ago Walmart had plastic model kits but on a recent visit I've noticed that they don't have them anymore.

It's that "Not for children under 3 years" thing..
It ruined all the fun!
Remember KINDER EGG?
(Do you have those there?)
We used to LOVE them, to eat the "shell" (even if we found it TOO sweet, we'd still eat it). And then, to open the container.. and to find the pieces: with the users manual inside (manual is pictorial, not all kids know German, I guess or to read at all).
..and we'll sit down and make a figurine. My favorite: Pink Panther the Painter!
number nine..

..now, figurines don't come in pieces. Kids swallow them.
I was a kid. I was 3 years old.
I NEVER swallowed a piece of a figurine.. ever.

..so this day kids......

 

[Benzadmiral]

As recently as several years ago Walmart had plastic model kits but on a recent visit I've noticed that they don't have them anymore.

The ones near me have a couple of those snap-together kits or cars, but nothing beyond that.

Aurora, AMT, Revell, Monogram: THE names in American model kits! They offered a wide range of kits, too, from figures (Aurora's monster models like the Wolf Man and Dracula, and the Scottish Lassie) to airplanes and ships, including sailing ships like the Constitution and the HMS Bounty. (The Revell Bounty kit I built in the early Seventies even had scale figures of Capt. Bligh and Fletcher Christian.) Plus Aurora, AMT (which did the current car models), Pactra, and Testors all had their lines of paints, both spray and brush-on. All available at Woolworths and Kress's.

There are still hobby shops where you can buy automobile kits, and military tanks and airplanes, and the paint and cement. But those are specialty stores.

 

[LizzieMaine]

Speaking of toys, how about the idea of toys as *toys for all kids,* not just for one sex or the other? People rant and rave today about how awful and pernicious sex stereotyping was in the Era, but I was in Wal-Mart today to pick up a prescription and killed some time walking thru the toy aisles -- which are actually labeled like bathrooms now, BOYS and GIRLS. God forbid a girl should wander into the boy section, or vice-versa, the store detective would be on them like a ton of bricks.

The GIRLS aisle was ludicrous -- you look down the aisle and *everything* is pink, blindingly shockingly pink. Even the girls' bike stuff was pink, pink, pink. And if a girl wants a Lego set or a board game or a baseball bat, well, she ain't gonna find it there.

There were "girl" toys when I was a kid, but I don't remember the stereotyping being anywhere near as overwhelming and up-your-nose as it is today. I had Legos, Tinkertoys, Lincoln Logs, and a bunch of other stuff like that, and there was never any gender fixed to them, they were just "toys". And even the girl stuff in my generation wasn't drenched in cotton-candy pink -- sure, I had a Suzy Homemaker oven, but it was a restful shade of green, not the color of an old wad of bubble gum.

Just more of that modern "progress" we keep hearing about, no doubt.

 

[V.C. Brunswick]

There are still hobby shops where you can buy automobile kits, and military tanks and airplanes, and the paint and cement. But those are specialty stores.

And few and far in between in contrast to the number of video game shops.

The GIRLS aisle was ludicrous -- you look down the aisle and *everything* is pink, blindingly shockingly pink. Even the girls' bike stuff was pink, pink, pink. And if a girl wants a Lego set or a board game or a baseball bat, well, she ain't gonna find it there.

We used to call the Barbie section the Pink Aisle back when I used to sell Hot Wheels and would hit Walmart and Target first thing in the morning looking for fresh cases of Hot Wheels. lol

 

[earl]

When I was a youngin' on the farm, we still had party line telephones. earl

 

[Philip Adams]

Speaking of toys, how about the idea of toys as *toys for all kids,* not just for one sex or the other? People rant and rave today about how awful and pernicious sex stereotyping was in the Era, but I was in Wal-Mart today to pick up a prescription and killed some time walking thru the toy aisles -- which are actually labeled like bathrooms now, BOYS and GIRLS. God forbid a girl should wander into the boy section, or vice-versa, the store detective would be on them like a ton of bricks.

The GIRLS aisle was ludicrous -- you look down the aisle and *everything* is pink, blindingly shockingly pink. Even the girls' bike stuff was pink, pink, pink. And if a girl wants a Lego set or a board game or a baseball bat, well, she ain't gonna find it there.

There were "girl" toys when I was a kid, but I don't remember the stereotyping being anywhere near as overwhelming and up-your-nose as it is today. I had Legos, Tinkertoys, Lincoln Logs, and a bunch of other stuff like that, and there was never any gender fixed to them, they were just "toys". And even the girl stuff in my generation wasn't drenched in cotton-candy pink -- sure, I had a Suzy Homemaker oven, but it was a restful shade of green, not the color of an old wad of bubble gum.

Just more of that modern "progress" we keep hearing about, no doubt.

Interestingly Hamleys in London, one of the the oldest and most famous toy stores in the UK, changed their policy pertaining to separating toys into those for boys and those for girls just before Christmas. This was in response to an online campaign.

 

[sheeplady]

It's that "Not for children under 3 years" thing..
It ruined all the fun!
Remember KINDER EGG?
(Do you have those there?)
We used to LOVE them, to eat the "shell" (even if we found it TOO sweet, we'd still eat it). And then, to open the container.. and to find the pieces: with the users manual inside (manual is pictorial, not all kids know German, I guess or to read at all).
..and we'll sit down and make a figurine. My favorite: Pink Panther the Painter!
..now, figurines don't come in pieces. Kids swallow them.
I was a kid. I was 3 years old.
I NEVER swallowed a piece of a figurine.. ever.

..so this day kids......

Kinder eggs are now considered "contraband" in the United States. If you try to bring in a Kinder Egg, border/ customs officials will seize it. They cannot be sold or traded legally here.

 

[Stray Cat]

Kinder eggs are now considered "contraband" in the United States. If you try to bring in a Kinder Egg, border/ customs officials will seize it. They cannot be sold or traded legally here.

OH my God!
For real?!

Now I'm really sad.

So, one more old thing disappeared into the mist..

 

[Philip Adams]

Kinder Eggs or 'Kinder Surprise' as they are called here are still available in the UK.

However the way things are going I wouldn't be surprised if they were banned here too before too long.

 

[Stray Cat]

Kids in UK can still enjoy it (that is: the "taste" of figurine they swallowed), eh?

There's a woman (I saw her on TV) in my country.. she's got 8000 Kinder figurines. Her favorite? The ones from Lords of the rings.

Speaking of figurines.. it's been AGES since I played Ludo (board game). Here we call it "Man, do't get angry" ..and we all do.
Do kids today know how to play it????

 

[V.C. Brunswick]

I often wonder if kids today even know what a board game is.

 

[Stray Cat]

Yes.. do they?

WE had it all.. but Monopoly was too "fancy" for us (translate: we couldn't afford it). AND.. I got accused of hiding the money under my.. behind. I said: I was "sitting on my savings"

 

[AmateisGal]

I often wonder if kids today even know what a board game is.

My eleven-year-old daughter does! We've played Monopoly many a time (and she usually wins).

 

[rue]

I often wonder if kids today even know what a board game is.

We used to have board game night, so my kids know what they are