Vintage Things That Will NOT Disappear In Your Lifetime

[scottyrocks]

If you're like me and need a toothpaste for sensitive teeth then you're in luck. Any of the brands I've seen and tried are basic pastes with light flavors, usually some form of mint. They're not meant for the young folks.

 

[Inkstainedwretch]

I had never heard of brushing one's teeth with baking soda until I saw Sam Elliott do it in a movie in the late 1980s. Not long after I discovered a toothpaste with the Arm & Hammer logo on it, so I thought I'd give it a try; been using it ever since. It's pretty much as Miss Lizzie described--a white compound with a touch of grittiness, and a relatively mild sweet/salty taste that's far more tolerable than the sickly sweet and gooey gel types.

My grandmother, born in late 19th century Texas, brushed with a mixture of baking soda and salt. I will still do this occasionally when I feel the need to give my teeth and gums a good scouring. Probably bad for my blood pressure, though.

 

[LizzieMaine]

Consumers Union Reports, in a scathing 1936 expose of rackety advertising claims in the toothpaste business, recommended that people do "as most dentist do" and use a powder mixture made of baking soda and precipitated chalk USP, "available at any pharmacy."

 

[ChiTownScion]

I mouth rinse with hydrogen peroxide. It seems to make my dentist happy.

 

[sheeplady]

Baking soda whitens your teeth. Every few months I give a brush with it on my back teeth. If you mix it with hydrogen peroxide it really whitens your teeth, but I don't know if that weakens your teeth or not.

Whitening my teeth at the dentist has never occurred to me. The child of a former dental assistant (who worked on patients without dental care) I go to the dentist at least once a year (even in the past when I really couldn't afford it and was choosing eating versus dental cleaning). But whitening just isn't something I've thought about... but in my "set" they do it (at least) for any major event (marriage, graduation, big promotion with pictures, etc.)

Maybe someday I'll get mine whitened... if I figure out how to navigate this with a dentist.

 

[scottyrocks]

Actually, neither baking soda nor hydrogen peroxide are bad for teeth. Damage occurs more from the way they are brushed. Don't brush as if you are scaling grout in the bathroom shower.

 

[sheeplady]

That's good to know!

 

[LizzieMaine]

My mother whitens her teeth by leaving their glass on a sunny windowsill.

 

[Trenchfriend]

Chlorodont-formula:
Pumice stone-powder, calcium carbonate, soap, glycerin, potassium chlorate, natural peppermint-aroma.

 

[2jakes]

How much costs old-fashion "real" pistachio-icecream n the US?

Real:

Unreal: But looks good on Polo’s wall.

 

[LizzieMaine]

Potassium chlorate was a rather notorious ingredient in the Era in Pebeco toothpaste -- Arthur Kallet and Frederick Schlink, in their landmark study of pharmaceutical quackery, "100,000,000 Guinea Pigs," published in 1933, discussed the poisonous nature of this substance and pointed out that there was at least one known case of suicide by eating an entire tube of Pebeco, containing about 40 grams of KClO3 -- an amount sufficient to kill three adult men.

Consumers Union never ceased to mention this incident, but as long as Pebeco remained on the market in the US, into the 1950s, it contained this ingredient. Pebeco tooth powder, introduced after the Kallet/Schlinkl book was published, very conspicuously did not.

 

[2jakes]

I recall singing this jingle.

 

[tonyb]

Baking soda was my go-to for a number years. Now my loyalty is to whatever brand of toothpaste has the best price. Same with disposable razors. My loyalty to Barbasol could easily be bought away, but no other shaving cream has knocked if off the bottom shelf.

 

[vitanola]

I recall singing this jingle.

The mere thought of Ipana makes me want to dance!

 

[2jakes]

The mere thought of Ipana makes me want to dance!

Sweet sounds!

Images of Hal Roach & "Our Gang"
from the roaring 20s come to mind.

Think I'll take a ride on my Iver Johnson
around the neighborhood.

 

[Trenchfriend]

If I've ever owned a watch that wasn't made by Timex, I don't remember it. I'm not a "watch guy" so I like Timex watches--they're relatively inexpensive, and they get the job done. What more does the average person need?

Damn, buddys! NOW, I finally want to drive to the next bigger city's department-store to get a Casio F91, still the no-nonsense digital wristwatch!!

 

[Fading Fast]

I can't image this one hasn't been noted before as I seem to remember a candy emphasis in this thread at one point, but M&M's will last IMHO because they are different in a successful way - they don't melt in heat / your pocket. Obviously, there are more recent competitors, but I bet I'll leave this earth before M&M's do.

Also, if memory serves, M&M's were invented in WWII so that soldiers could have a candy that didn't melt. That all makes sense, but in almost all the documentaries I've seen and books I've read on WWII, Hershey bars are the chocolate candy that pops up. So, were M&M's distributed to our military in any meaningful amounts in WWII (and subsequent wars)?

 

[Edward]

Dentuires aren't going anywhere fast.... I thought they might be threatened by implants, but it seems now you can get an entire upper or lower jaw's worth of implants to bolt in as a single piece - and what are those is not simply bolt in dentures? I'm excited by the idea (I'd have it done now if I had the money, natural teeth are overrated). Particularly keen on an upper jaw if it meant that they'd agree to modify the incisors and canines ever so slight to create a subtle fang effect.

 

[LizzieMaine]

The main American non-melting candy product of the war was the "D Ration," a product developed by Hershey as an emergency field ration/survival bar. It contained a high quantity of "chocolate liquor", a low concentration of sugar, and oat flour. They specifically made it to be as unpalatable as possible to keep the GIs from eating it casually -- it was meant to be a source of concentrated emergency energy, not a sweet treat to eat. It came in a thick block a bit bigger than a deck of cards, was scored into six break-off segments, and tasted a bit like bad baking chocolate with the texture of beaverboard. But it served its purpose.

Hershey later marketed this disturbing product to the public as the "Hershey's Tropical Chocolate" bar, altering the recipe a bit to make it sweeter, and eventually dropping the oat flour.

M&Ms were developed primarily as a civilian product, but did end up in the "accessory packet" portion of Army C-Rations during the war, alongside Assorted Charms and various types of chewing gum. Only Plain M&Ms -- or simply "M&Ms" -- were so issued, with the Peanut variety not introduced until well after the war. They came stacked in a little paper tube.

 

[Fading Fast]

⇧ Awesome. And like with Fanta, Corporate America won't let a product die a natural death so D Rations become Hershey's Tropical Chocolate Bar.

But more to the point, M&M's were not invented for the military? I've been carrying that bit of misinformation around in my small brain for way too long.