Vintage Things That Have Disappeared In Your Lifetime?

[LizzieMaine]

It strikes me as funny and odd that you have pseudo-"Dukes of Hazzard" folks way up North there in Maine and down here in the mid-South I had never even seen or heard of the strange "rolling coal" practice.
(In the days since it was mentioned I have been actively watching for it - so far still zero...)

There's a lot that can be said about the media-driven "Southernification" of the Northern working class in recent decades, but I just wish it would stop. Gentrification is a real problem here, but you don't solve it with peckerwoodism.

 

[3fingers]

There's a lot that can be said about the media-driven "Southernification" of the Northern working class in recent decades, but I just wish it would stop. Gentrification is a real problem here, but you don't solve it with peckerwoodism.

Part of the reason for why certain behaviors are seldom seen in the areas where they supposedly come from (at least according to movies and TV) is that somebody will "wear you out" if you engage in those behaviors. I am familiar with the practice of rolling coal, but it is something far more often discussed or bragged about by young men with too much of somebody else's money available than actually done.
Peckerwood has unfortunately been co-opted by prison gangs and aryan groups and no longer means what it once did. I get your point though.

 

[LizzieMaine]

We have that kind of peckerwood here, too -- the state prison is just up the road, and WAR is well represented in this area. I suspect there might be just a bit of overlap between that crowd and the coal-rolling set.

 

[TimeWarpWife]

Evidently I need to get out more because I'd never heard of "coal rolling" or "peckerwood" (had to look up the meaning of the latter ). I've lived most of my life in the south and what amounts to the equivalent of peckerwood in my neck of the woods has been either "white trash" or "hillbilly." We have a friend who proudly tells folks to call him "Hillbilly" - I don't even know what his given name is. He owns a junkyard business, only wears overalls, comes across as brusque, never puts on "airs" for anyone, and if you needed it, would give you the shirt off his back.

 

[Woodtroll]

Evidently I need to get out more because I'd never heard of "coal rolling" or "peckerwood" (had to look up the meaning of the latter ). I've lived most of my life in the south and what amounts to the equivalent of peckerwood in my neck of the woods has been either "white trash" or "hillbilly." We have a friend who proudly tells folks to call him "Hillbilly" - I don't even know what his given name is. He owns a junkyard business, only wears overalls, comes across as brusque, never puts on "airs" for anyone, and if you needed it, would give you the shirt off his back.

The “Northern redneck” conversations make me laugh; around here “redneck” and “hillbilly” were not derogatory terms until the last few years, and almost nobody native to our area would be offended by those terms even now. The folks behaving the way you describe would be referred to as “white trash” here.

Certainly, bad attitudes and poor behavior know no boundaries of race or class, they just manifest themselves differently among different groups.

 

[tonyb]

And when terms become undoubtedly disparaging it’s common for those at whom the names are hurled to wear them proudly.

I recently encountered a fellow who refers to himself as “toxically masculine.” I wouldn’t adopt such a tagline myself (not yet, anyway), but I admit to understanding where the guy is coming from.

Sticks and stones, and all that.

 

[vitanola]

On the 4th, whilst we were celebrating the national holiday with a nice feed and a sort of ice-cream social in the back yard ( which is rather exposed as the Big House stands on a corner lot)

There was a sidewalk dust-up between a couple of fellows who work for me and a few of our local toughs of the sort who prattle on about their "Redneck Pride". My boys, being ironworkers and operating engineers rather outmatched the locals, and the affair was over almost before it started.

I just fifteen minutes ago found its cause. It appears that some of the local yahoos were intent upon breaking up our party because of the offensive "foreign" music which they heard coming out of the little Victor II which I had set up next to the punch bowl. Now, what amongst the waxings of patriotic tunes by Sousa's, Pryor's and Prince's bands and the WWI songs by Billy Murray and Henry Burr so incensed them as being disrespectful of our national holiday?

THIS:

I NEED A BLOODY AUXETOPHONE!

 

[Zombie_61]

^ Yeah, but ain't Caruso one o' 'dem Eye-talians?

 

[Haversack]

The only time I have heard the term 'peckerwood' used was by a senior marine captain instructor at Fort Sill during the mid-1980s. It was his favorite phrase when one of his students made a 'dumb' mistake. (As opposed to a 'smart' mistake). Of course he had an Arkansas accent you could cut with a hay knife.

I've never heard of 'coal rolling' until now. Targeting Prius drivers out here in the San Francisco Bay Area would mean pretty much running the system full time as Prius and other hybrids are more common here than VWs were in the early '70s. With 50+ mile one way commutes becoming increasingly common, a high gas milage car transcends politics. Check out the number of Prius cars in the parking lots of Lawrence Livermore or Lockheed Missile Development.

As an aside, the laws against 'coal rolling' would pretty much make the Hannibal Twin Eight illegal.

 

[vitanola]

The only time I have heard the term 'peckerwood' used was by a senior marine captain instructor at Fort Sill during the mid-1980s. It was his favorite phrase when one of his students made a 'dumb' mistake. (As opposed to a 'smart' mistake). Of course he had an Arkansas accent you could cut with a hay knife.

I've never heard of 'coal rolling' until now. Targeting Prius drivers out here in the San Francisco Bay Area would mean pretty much running the system full time as Prius and other hybrids are more common here than VWs were in the early '70s. With 50+ mile one way commutes becoming increasingly common, a high gas milage car transcends politics. Check out the number of Prius cars in the parking lots of Lawrence Livermore or Lockheed Missile Development.

As an aside, the laws against 'coal rolling' would pretty much make the Hannibal Twin Eight illegal.

One of the fellows who works for me recently purchased a lifted Dodge/Cummins 3/4 ton pickup truck which was fitted out to "Roll Coal". He is in the process of removing that feature, for the yob who modified that machine made a real hash job of it, and.may have damaged the engine.

 

[LizzieMaine]

On the 4th, whilst we were celebrating the national holiday with a nice feed and a sort of ice-cream social in the back yard ( which is rather exposed as the Big House stands on a corner lot)

There was a sidewalk dust-up between a couple of fellows who work for me and a few of our local toughs of the sort who prattle on about their "Redneck Pride". My boys, being ironworkers and operating engineers rather outmatched the locals, and the affair was over almost before it started.

I just fifteen minutes ago found its cause. It appears that some of the local yahoos were intent upon breaking up our party because of the offensive "foreign" music which they heard coming out of the little Victor II which I had set up next to the punch bowl. Now, what amongst the waxings of patriotic tunes by Sousa's, Pryor's and Prince's bands and the WWI songs by Billy Murray and Henry Burr so incensed them as being disrespectful of our national holiday?

THIS:

I NEED A BLOODY AUXETOPHONE!

Let's hear it for the good ole Untied States of Moronica. "100%!"

 

[LizzieMaine]

The “Northern redneck” conversations make me laugh; around here “redneck” and “hillbilly” were not derogatory terms until the last few years, and almost nobody native to our area would be offended by those terms even now. The folks behaving the way you describe would be referred to as “white trash” here.
.

When I was growing up, such types were known as "Harveys" -- pronounced "hah-vees" -- who lived in "Harveytown." The term "redneck," and the cultural displays that come along with it, was completely unknown here until the '80s. And the thing with "harveys" is that they were completely unselfconscious about their behavior -- and thus had far more integrity than the neo-rednecks, who model their behavior based on examples they've seen on television or on Yoo Toob, and in doing so think they're being "true rebels."

I respected harveys -- anyone who could build a combination snowmobile/wood-skidder out of the carcass of a Model A Ford has my respect. I have no respect at all for the yee-hawing neo-rednecks up here. General Chamberlain needs to rise from the grave and whack them across their pimply punk faces with a riding crop.

 

[Fading Fast]

When I was growing up, such types were known as "Harveys" -- pronounced "hah-vees" -- who lived in "Harveytown." The term "redneck," and the cultural displays that come along with it, was completely unknown here until the '80s. And the thing with "harveys" is that they were completely unselfconscious about their behavior -- and thus had far more integrity than the neo-rednecks, who model their behavior based on examples they've seen on television or on Yoo Toob, and in doing so think they're being "true rebels."

I respected harveys. I have no respect at all for the yee-hawing neo-rednecks up here. General Chamberlain needs to rise from the grave and whack them across their pimply punk faces with a riding crop.

I have no idea if it is true, but I've read that the mob and its portrayal in TV shows and movies have been in a (now) almost 100 year feedback loop with each affecting the other.

 

[ChiTownScion]

When I was growing up, such types were known as "Harveys" -- pronounced "hah-vees" -- who lived in "Harveytown." The term "redneck," and the cultural displays that come along with it, was completely unknown here until the '80s. And the thing with "harveys" is that they were completely unselfconscious about their behavior -- and thus had far more integrity than the neo-rednecks, who model their behavior based on examples they've seen on television or on Yoo Toob, and in doing so think they're being "true rebels."

I respected harveys -- anyone who could build a combination snowmobile/wood-skidder out of the carcass of a Model A Ford has my respect. I have no respect at all for the yee-hawing neo-rednecks up here. General Chamberlain needs to rise from the grave and whack them across their pimply punk faces with a riding crop.

I wonder if Larry, Darryl, and Darryl were Harveys..

 

[LizzieMaine]

Give Larry a red-and-black checkered hunting cap, and you'd have it.

 

[ChiTownScion]

Give Larry a red-and-black checkered hunting cap, and you'd have it.

Perhaps George (Tom Poston) would gift his:

 

[LizzieMaine]

George Utley would have been the Mayor of Harveytown.

 

[ChiTownScion]

I think that the Three Brothers and George could have just as easily been from northern rural Wisconsin or the Upper Peninsula of Michigan as New England. Never saw a sitcom about Yoopers…. and I likely never will.

 

[3fingers]

I know Tom Poston wasn't always George Utley, but I'm still amazed that Suzanne Pleschette was actually his wife.

 

[LizzieMaine]

It's hard to square the dim, vague Poston of "Newhart" with the witty, urbane Poston of "To Tell The Truth."

Witty, urbane panel shows are another Vintage Thing That Has Disappeared in My Lifetime. What's My Line?, TTtT, I've Got a Secret....