Vintage Things That Have Disappeared In Your Lifetime?

[3fingers]

As an aside to the private club discussion, a city where I used to work had at least two private unlicensed clubs that were only for people of their own ethnic group. One only allowed membership if you were black, the other was only for people from Mexico and their descendants. As far as I know, both are still operating today. One of my friends belonged to the Mexican club through his father. They pay dues to support the building and expenses and alcohol was bought in large quantities from various sources and resold by the drink at a small profit.

 

[LizzieMaine]

There are still "private club" drinking establishments here in Texas, and they are almost always in an otherwise dry county or dry city. They were originally a way for private organizations, lodges, VFW halls, etc, from getting around the fact that selling alcohol was illegal in that particular jurisdiction. The permit allowed them to offer "free" liquor to members, while recouping expenses via a "service fee". Pretty soon, these "clubs" started using public establishments such as restaurants as their service mechanism, and it was eventually ruled that these "private clubs" could be owned by the same owner as the restaurant, and said owner could hire himself as the operator of his "private club". This is still the practice today. The bar of a restaurant is a different legal entity as the food service portion, and when a patron orders a drink, he signs up as a voting member of a private non-profit organization. He doesn't pay directly for the drink, he pays a "service fee" to his club for serving him free liquor. So the point was not racial discrimination, but rather getting around the archaic liquor laws (though I'm sure there were plenty of establishments who refused to grant memberships to certain ethnic groups).

The Red Sox got enmeshed in a scandal over such a club when they had their training camp in Winter Haven, Florida back in the 80s. The Winter Haven lodge of Elks -- my, how those boys do get around -- had a bar and offered the Red Sox players complimentary VIP cards so they could come in and drink. Well, the *white* Red Sox players. Those Sox of color were explicitly not invited and not welcome. Most team members thus excluded just rolled their eyes at another example of Americanus Peckerwoodius in action, but coach Tommy Harper had about damn had it by that point. He'd put up with it as a Sox player in the 70s, but it had galled him deeply, and he was sick and tired of just blowing off the insult -- not only did team management know about this, they condoned it -- so he went to the papers with the story and ignited a firestorm that led to his losing his job. But the Elks passes disappeared from the clubhouse and not long after, the team left Winter Haven for Fort Myers, where the local pillowcase brigade were at least kept out of the locker room.

 

[tonyb]

As I said several posts back, among the more pressing challenges facing the traveling drinker is learning the local code.

I’ll spare y’all the boring particulars of the legalities regarding the dispensing of alcohol in the state of Washington and how those regulations changed with the times, but having had friends and family members in the business over the decades, I can offer that the laws as they used to be all but begged the licensees to game the system one way or another.

On many occasions I heard it said that if a bar operator followed the rules to a T, he’d be out of business in a week. Perhaps such commentary was a bit overblown, but only a bit.

 

[HudsonHawk]

As an aside to the private club discussion, a city where I used to work had at least two private unlicensed clubs that were only for people of their own ethnic group. One only allowed membership if you were black, the other was only for people from Mexico and their descendants. As far as I know, both are still operating today. One of my friends belonged to the Mexican club through his father. They pay dues to support the building and expenses and alcohol was bought in large quantities from various sources and resold by the drink at a small profit.

Ethnic social clubs were very common in the Era, particularly in cities with large immigrant populations. Growing up in Tampa there were still the old Centro Espanol, L'Unione Italiana, and Centro Asturiano. These clubs not only served as social centers for their particular ethnicities, but acted as mutual aid societies providing services for members such as banking, health care and hospital services, cemeteries, legal services etc. They were vital to the local communities, but also provided other "services" such as drinking, gambling, prostitution, etc.

 

[tonyb]

Ethnic social clubs were very common in the Era, particularly in cities with large immigrant populations. Growing up in Tampa there were still the old Centro Espanol, L'Unione Italiana, and Centro Asturiano. These clubs not only served as social centers for their particular ethnicities, but acted as mutual aid societies providing services for members such as banking, health care and hospital services, cemeteries, legal services etc. They were vital to the local communities, but also provided other "services" such as drinking, gambling, prostitution, etc.

I wondered aloud if the public smoking bans that (ahem) caught fire 15 or 20 years would spawn "smokeeasies,” underground establishments where nicotine fiends might find camaraderie and ashtrays, and alcoholic beverages, just like they had just about everywhere back before the “nanny staters” had their way.

I once had a personal interest in this, but I gave up the drink and the smokes at the same time, 13 years ago this September. Still, I can see how an unreconstructed smoker would long for a smoke-filled bar.

Most of my friends smoked back when I (and they) were young. Few of us survivors smoke anymore. So it appears that tobacco smoking may be a “vintage thing that (mostly) disappears in our lifetime.”

 

[KILO NOVEMBER]

Okay this post is not exactly in line but it could come true in just a few years and then fit. I am an opera fan and there is a strong movement within certain circles in the opera community to sanitize or expunge the "dated' concepts. There is a movement to somehow change (don't ask me how as I have no idea) the narrative of opera to eliminate the misogyny, classism, racism, etc etc etc. and bring it into a more modern and acceptable perspective.

From the Memory Hole in George Orwell's 1984 to the Taliban destroying the Bamiyan Buddhas to the destruction of the statues of Confederate soldiers, the same impulse is at work.

 

[belfastboy]

From the Memory Hole in George Orwell's 1984 to the Taliban destroying the Bamiyan Buddhas to the destruction of the statues of Confederate soldiers, the same impulse is at work.

Yes, and I fear the trend is inexorable.

 

[Stormy]

Are debutante balls still around?

 

[Trenchfriend]

Are debutante balls still around?

Wien.

 

[HudsonHawk]

Are debutante balls still around?

Very much so in the South. Debutante balls, cotillions, and in local Hispanic communities the "quinceanera" are still very common.

 

[Stormy]

Wien.

?

 

[Trenchfriend]

?

Vienna opera ball (incl. debutantes).

 

[Stormy]

Pantyhose seem to be on-the-chopping-blocks nowadays. Ladies are moving on to bare legs or even back to stockings. And tights or leggings are all the rave during the chilly seasons.

 

[LizzieMaine]

That bare-leg fad started in the 90s -- at the time they said it was because of the "Sex And The City" influence. You still see sheer hose up here, but very rarely on anybody under the age of fifty unless it's mean to be ironic.

As for me, I wear ankle socks in the summer, and heavy cotton stockings in the winter. Tights/pantyhose bug me because when one leg gets shredded by the cat you have to throw the whole thing away. Very wasteful.

 

[Stormy]

As for me, I wear ankle socks in the summer, and heavy cotton stockings in the winter. Tights/pantyhose bug me because when one leg gets shredded by the cat you have to throw the whole thing away. Very wasteful.

LUVIT

 

[3fingers]

And tights or leggings are all the rave during the chilly seasons.

I don't often offer an opinion on womens fashion, but tights, leggings and "yoga pants" worn without anything over them should be somehow licensed or at least policed by other ladies. It must be for some reason that looking in a mirror before leaving the house is no longer a common practice. Too many times I see people who look approximately the same way in these garments as my overfed self would or am somewhat embarrassed for them for what is displayed. As much as I don't care for pajamas as shopping attire, better that than me seeing what only your partner and gynecologist should.

 

[LizzieMaine]

I'm not one to tell other women how to dress -- that's up to them, and I have no say -- but I do find the "yoga pants as streetwear" trend interesting from a sociological point of view. The idea seems to have started out as a way of projecting a sense of having just come from a vigorous workout -- even if you haven't, looking like you did projects an image of being someone who not only puts a high priority on personal fitness but who also has the economic and class privilege of being able to afford to go to a yoga class or a gym. There's a deep streak of such conspicuous-consumption in the public display of workout wear, and variations of the public-display-of-fitness-as-bourgeois-class-marker theme can be found dating all the way back to the Victorian era if you know where to look for it.

That being so, you could suggest that the deliberate flouting of that marker by people who don't meet bourgie standards of "fitness" is a juicy bit of class-conscious nose-thumbing. I try to give people the benefit of the doubt and hope that such is the case. And even if it isn't deliberate it has the effect of taking the p. out of the whole business, which in the long run is kind of a good thing. Almost makes me want to stuff my own avoirdupois into Spandex and go stand out in front of the Hot Yoga place downtown. Wonder how long it'd be before they called the cops?

 

[3fingers]

The idea seems to have started out as a way of projecting a sense of having just come from a vigorous workout -- even if you haven't, looking like you did projects an image of being someone who not only puts a high priority on personal fitness but who also has the economic and class privilege of being able to afford to go to a yoga class

Only loosely related, but this brought up the memory of people of the tribe you describe being outraged when they came into the YMCA to do their exercise routine of choice being unable to park in the spots closest to the entrance. The large lot across the street required a walk of no more than 50 yards, but to hear them complain, it should have been a mile. Telling them it was a good warmup didn't generally get a positive reaction.

 

[Zombie_61]

Only loosely related, but this brought up the memory of people of the tribe you describe being outraged when they came into the YMCA to do their exercise routine of choice being unable to park in the spots closest to the entrance. The large lot across the street required a walk of no more than 50 yards, but to hear them complain, it should have been a mile. Telling them it was a good warmup didn't generally get a positive reaction.

"I want to perform all of my exercise on a treadmill, as the Good Lord intended."

 

[BobHufford]

Barn side advertising. Disappearing maybe ... mostly because the barns are.

These used to be plentiful on Route 66 / I-44. Still a few around.