Vintage Things That Have Disappeared In Your Lifetime?

[Fifty150]

I don't know where the bar is set for "vintage". But the original Leatherman tool is gone. Since replaced by bigger, chunkier versions, with more features. While I have a special attachment to the original "pocket survival tool" version.

Even the Swiss Army, now has a 1-handed opening knife. And the current military issue model does not have a corkscrew.

 

[Edward]

I don't know where the bar is set for "vintage". But the original Leatherman tool is gone. Since replaced by bigger, chunkier versions, with more features. While I have a special attachment to the original "pocket survival tool" version.

Even the Swiss Army, now has a 1-handed opening knife. And the current military issue model does not have a corkscrew.

I remember first encountering the Leatherman tool in the early 90s. The shop I worked in as a student carried those, as well as a cheaper version. The Leatherman was beautifully made, and around £45, as I recall. The alternative was made by Draper, very functional, and about £15. I recollect that a lot of men bought the Draper for themselves, and we mostly sold the Leatherman option around Christmas and Father's Day to ladies looking for a present for a man.

Re the Swiss Army Knife, I don't believe any issue model ever had a corkscrew. The nicest issue model they ever had imo was the 1961 model that was the norm right up until 2008 when the current, doubtless effective but to my eye much less aesthetically pleasing, model was introduced. The 1961 "Soldier" model is no longer officially made by either Victoria Knox or under the Wenger brand, though you can now buy it in the "Alox" range from Victoria Knox under the Pioneer name. I brought back a Victoriaknox SA knife from a school trip to Switzerland in 1992. I opted for the Huntsman model at the time, had the plastic (the traditional red, of course) engraved with my name and everything. Many times since I've wished I'd bought the milspec model instead - or even a simpler one. Funny thing, over the years I've found that it's a rare instance indeed where I needed any of the fancy tools beyond a decent blade.

 

[tonyb]

Twenty-five years ago or so I bought a collection of knives from a friend for five bucks each, three or four Swiss Army knives among them. The knives had belonged to the friend’s recently deceased father and the friend, a heroin addict, was unloading his dad’s meager possessions to get him through another day or two.

I suffered no guilt over getting such a bargain; if I hadn’t come up with scratch right then and there someone else surely would have.

I gave away all but one of the Swiss Army knives, which I long ago misplaced. I still have the Buck 501. It’s in my right front pants pocket at this very moment. It’s been my nearly constant companion all these years. Hell, I use it in the kitchen, where “better” knives are within easy reach.

I once had to mail it back to myself from the airport, at an expense considerably higher than what I paid for it. I’ve forgotten it was in my pocket when I entered courthouses and other facilities where such items are not allowed. So I give it to the cop at the snitch box and reclaim it later.

 

[Fifty150]

Sears.

I think all of their stores are closed now.

 

[Zombie_61]

Sears.

I think all of their stores are closed now.

Not quite. The Sears store closest to us is open until 6:00 p.m. today, and another location a little farther away is open until 8:00 p.m. (according to their website, that is).

 

[LizzieMaine]

Sears was dead to me when they got out of the catalog business. Growing up I spent many rainy afternoons drawing glasses, horns, and goatees on every single face in the Big Book.

 

[Zombie_61]

Sears was dead to me when they got out of the catalog business...

Considering Sears and Montgomery Ward were "catalog" stores I would have thought they would have been far more "on the ball" as far as the Internet is concerned. For the longest time it seemed every retailer except Sears had a website, and when Sears finally got one it was terrible; their "Suits" should have hired kids to handle the 'Net sales.

 

[LizzieMaine]

A hundred years ago Sears WAS Amazon, with a network of distribution centers, unequaled mass buying power, and a foolproof sales interface. In 1925 they decided to go into real estate and open brick-n-mortar stores, and in doing so they sowed the seeds of their own destruction.

 

[Fifty150]

As a kid, Sears was an experience. The store my parents took me to had popcorn which you could smell from the parking lot. I was their demographic. I bought their car batteries, windshield wipers, overalls, boots, appliances, and tools. Once upon a time, Sears actually sold "the best". From personal experience, Craftsman tools were the best value, with their lifetime warranty. Some things I just didn't buy there. Sears wasn't exactly known for fine jewelry. And their men's suits were not Brooks Brothers. Then they bought Lands End, and sold it in the Sears stores, which I liked. Style notwithstanding, the Lands End Squall jacket and Stadium Coat were consistently reliable in bad weather. My local Sears stores are all closed. I knew that they still sold online. But I'm not rushing to buy anything from them. The Craftsman tools I bought decades ago don't need to be replaced. The last set of DieHard boots I bought, about a dozen years ago, are still in great condition. I'm not so crazy about buying a Kenmore in the mail, if I can't get parts locally.

 

[Edward]

Woolworths disappeared in the UK in 2008, one of the most high profile victims of that crash. Other brands have since followed, British Home Stores among them. Woolies and BHS I have fond memories of. They're also well know in Belfast for - alongside Marks & Spencer - being the only big, British brands that stayed in Northern Ireland for the duration of the troubles. A lot of bigger UK names didn't invest into the Six Counties until after 1997. Prior to 97, we had our own big supermarkets, some part of chains with branches both sides of the border, some unique to NI. Stewarts, Crazy Prices. Wellworths were unique to NI. Supermac, a one-venue place from memory, was NI's first big supermarket I'm told - opened in 1964, closed in, if memory serves, 2008ish to be redeveloped as a mall. Most of them bought out from 1997 onwards by Tesco, many of the locations subsequently sold off to others. Tesco bought the Stewarts Supermarkets chain which ran both Stewarts and Crazy Prices in competition with each other. On the ground, former Crazy Prices locations turned into Tescos and former Stewarts tended to turn into Sainsburys. It was a funny time, things were moving on and for all that was great, there was also an element of nostalgia for lost elements that were unique to the place. The last Wellworths branded store disappeared about twenty years ago, I think, originally rebranded Supervalu, then bought out and operating as Safeways before that in turn was absorbed by Morrisons.

 

[Harp]

A hundred years ago Sears WAS Amazon, with a network of distribution centers, unequaled mass buying power, and a foolproof sales interface. In 1925 they decided to go into real estate and open brick-n-mortar stores, and in doing so they sowed the seeds of their own destruction.

When the Chicago Stockyards folded my dad was forced to scramble and found a sales position
at the Chicago Sears big boxer on Damen Avenue, which from what I recall did a landslide Southside biz.
For the time Sears management was current with the city culture and ran the catalogue and in store
pitch quite well. I remember a catchy sales slogan inscribed on a #2 lead pencil advertize,
"First to Sears then to school." Sears was a formidable presence. But its management walked in to
a right cross with the internet, failed to read the tea leaves for warning, and got killed at the cash register.

Ironically, Amazon has a bricks n mortar grocery here in Oak Lawn, Illinois right down the street,
which I find most convenient for after work stop shopping. And because of the Vid closing my favorite
local bookshop-buy-sell-trade Bookies, I've had to fish in the Amazon Books website.

The Sears debacle is ideally suited for a Biz School case examination of the whys and wherefores
of such managerial myopia.

 

[Fifty150]

Woolworths disappeared in the UK in 2008

There was a Woolworth in the neighborhood when I was a kid. It was much smaller than the downtown location. The local store had coin operated mechanical rides in front, popcorn, and an Icee machine. The neighborhood store would stop people if they didn't like the way you look, and frisk you to check for unpaid store merchandise. Most people I knew in the neighborhood, including me, were stopped and frisked repeatedly. Even as a kid, I thought that there was something wrong with that. It was just harassment. But back in the good old days, nobody cared much for civil rights. By the time I was an adult, and knew that practice was illegal, Woolworth stores were already out of business and it was way too late to take legal action.

The location downtown had an entry below street level, where the gates of the subway transit trains were. There was a lunch counter, and a photobooth machine that teenagers used for memorializing dates and other people used for passport photos. As you came up the escalator from the subterranean railway platforms, the smell of the lunch counter fried chicken was ever present, as your reminder that you were at Powell Street Station. No other station smelled like fried chicken. Go up to the street level, and it was the end of the line for San Francisco's iconic Cable Cars. The street level entrance to Woolworth, the main doors, were at the Cable Car turnaround.

When I was first entering the work force, I was partnered with a guy on his way out. He had more than enough years working to retire, but he was still hanging on. He told me that it was because a retirement income was less than a paycheck, and he needed the money. Every time we passed the Woolworth downtown, he would remark, "F.C.U.K. them". He would them remind me to never forget that they were racist. There was a time when they would not allow Black people to eat at the lunch counter.

Cable Car conductors have to physically push the car on the manual turntable downtown, to face it in the opposite direction to return to Fisherman's Wharf. The same thing happens at Fisherman's Wharf, where they have to turn the car around, to return downtown. Then and now, tourist would be lined up to ride the Cable Car, and take pictures. The Cable Cars themselves are lost to the locals as a transit line. When I was a kid, we actually rode those cable cars for transportation. The fare was exactly the same as all other public transportation, so there was no extra fee per ride, and you could hop on & off at any street corner, as the Cable Car stopped at every intersection along the line. As long as you could grab onto something and hold on, you rode. Your problem if you fall off.

Today's Cable Car is an amusement park ride. It's a tourist attraction. As a resident who needs transportation, The City's buses and trains will get you where you need to go much more efficiently. Nobody wants to wait in line for an hour with the tourist, to ride a slow moving car which makes stops at every intersection for the tourist to take selfies. And with all of the tourist, the car is so crowded, that there is no way to hop on. Nor would I pay $8, for a single trip; when the rest of the municipal transit system is $3. For $3, you can get on and off every bus or train in The City, and make all of your connections, within 2 hours. But if I want to ride the Cable Car just to go a mile up a steep hill, I have to pay an extra $8.

 

[LizzieMaine]

The thing with Woolworth's that always sticks with me is that their stores smelled like the linseed oil they used to keep the old wooden floors from getting dried out. And they were always dark, like they only used 40-watt bulbs in the fixtures. McLellan's and Newberry's were the same way. There's a reason "dime store" was never a phrase associated with opulence.

 

[Turnip]

Beerwarmers and beer glasses at 0,3l for a small and 0,5l for a large beer in pubs.

 

[Fifty150]

"dime store"

As a kid growing up in Chinatown, we had "National Dollar Stores". The founder was also one of the founders of Republic of China (Taiwan). A lot of "word of mouth" folklore & gossip. He was a "friend" of Chiang Kai Shek. Chiang Kai Shek spent time in San Francisco, and used the Chinese Masons Lodge as his headquarters. A few years ago, The FBI raided the Chinese Masons Lodge in connection with the arrest of Senator Leland Yee. A locksmith was needed to force open Chiang Kai Shek's safe.

https://drive.google.com/file/d/0B4pdvMvLhJfddm84TVZDaEtWUU0/edit?usp=sharing

 

[tonyb]

Beerwarmers and beer glasses at 0,3l for a small and 0,5l for a large beer in pubs.

I gave up the sauce the same time I quit smoking, 15 years ago next month. (The news the doctor delivered was indeed sobering.)

When I hear what it costs to go out for a night of alcohol-fueled debauchery these days, I can attribute a goodly percentage of my current financial assets to NOT drinking for the past decade and a half. The smokes would have cost a pile over that span as well. A quick calculation says something in the neighborhood of 80 grand. Add a like amount for the hooch. I didn’t save or invest all that scratch I was no longer spending on my everyday vices, of course. But it was good to have it for other things. And I’m still alive.

 

[Inkstainedwretch]

Airmail stamps and separate airmail slots in post offices. I don't know when it happened but they disappeared.

 

[tonyb]

^^^^^
Isn’t it that most mail destined for other-than-local delivery goes by air anyway? I believe that’s been the case for decades now.

 

[belfastboy]

Considering Sears and Montgomery Ward were "catalog" stores I would have thought they would have been far more "on the ball" as far as the Internet is concerned. For the longest time it seemed every retailer except Sears had a website, and when Sears finally got one it was terrible; their "Suits" should have hired kids to handle the 'Net sales.

Read yesterday that Amazon is opening up 'bricks and mortar' store fronts. I have long thought it interesting that Sears had the Amazon model down pat before the internet. Small store fronts in small town America where you could pick up your catalogue orders or to your door in the cities. Granted back in the day before we demanded immediate gratification and were used to waiting for things. Sears had it but their management did not adapt and let Bezos modernize their model and dominate retail. It could very well have been Sears with a more visionary leadership.

 

[LizzieMaine]

^^^^^
Isn’t it that most mail destined for other-than-local delivery goes by air anyway? I believe that’s been the case for decades now.

Since the mid-seventies, although the "Priority Mail" and related services basically fill the niche that Air Mail did. I still have a few of those old red-and-blue striped envelopes in the bottom of my desk somewhere.