The year 2000 was a big one. We used to dream about someday seeing the year 2000 when we were kids. Arthur C. Clarke figured that by that year, commercial spaceflight would be commonplace (in fact, there is a bit of commercial space flying, if you want to buy a spot on a Soyuz rocket for 20 million bucks). We sweated 1999, figuring that computer systems worldwide would lock up when the clock ticked 12:00 the last night of the year. And, in 2000, one of the most beloved companies in history was officially dissolved.

I aim I Remember JFK at an American audience, because, duh, that's where my memories come from. It's nothing personal, and I'm delighted when I get comments from other countries. I don't know how many Boomer kids all over the world grew up with Kenner toys. I know that they had a British presence. But the fact is that probably 99% of American Boomers had them. That's because of a very simple fact: Kenner knew what kids liked, and they provided it. Their best salesmen were us, hounding our parents into submission to get us the likes of Easy Bake ovens, Spirographs, SSP Racers, and Star Wars toys. Yep, Kenner had the foresight to lock up the Star Wars franchise in the 70's, and the result is that some of the most valuable toys cherished by collectors today bear the Kenner name.

Continue reading "Kenner, We Hardly Knew Ye" »

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There has always been a group of musicians who were just a bit off-center. When my mom was waiting for my dad to get back from the war, it was Spike Jones. Jones, a gifted musician and bandleader, used guns, whistles, pots, pans, cowbells, hammers, bird calls, klaxon horns, bricks, gargling, breaking glass, and God knows what else to make some truly wonderful and unforgettable music.

Jones was quite the celebrity in his day. But when the Big Band sound died, his music slipped into obscurity. Sure, Big Band stations can still be found, but what are the odds that a serious deejay would dare play the William Tell Overture that segued into a truly bizarre horse race (...and Beetlebaum...)?

Well, Mr. Jones, who died too young at the age of 53 in 1965, would have been quite pleased with the emergence of a 1970 jock at KPPC in Los Angeles. His name was Barry Hansen, but the persona he created that year was Dr. Demento.

It all started when Hansen got a deejay gig while still in high school. He was in charge of serving up sock hop music at local dances. The young jock had discovered, in his childhood, a store that sold 78's for a nickel apiece. The music was quite hit and miss, but some of the misses were hysterical.

Continue reading "Dr. Demento" »

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Woke up late this morning and just decided to skip school, i.e. not write a column today. I'll be back next week. In the meantime, try my first shot at a Facebook app: The I Remember JFK Boomer trivia quiz. If you see any problems with the app, please let me know. It's the first I've developed and I'm not sure I polished off all the burrs.

One last thing: It's a pretty tough quiz! The last question in particular is pretty diabolical ;-)

All Baby Boomers are familiar with Don McLean's 1971 hit American Pie. But did you ever totally figure out its meaning?

The following is trimmed from writer Jim Quinn's website, The Burning Platform. I strongly suggest you browse over and read the full version. It's an eye-opener.

In the meantime, here's the short take:

American Pie is the national anthem of the Baby Boom generation. McLean documents the progression of music and national mood with his haunting lyrics. Don McLean was 14 years old in 1959 when he read the bad news on the doorstep. (the deaths of Buddy Holly, the Big Bopper J.P. Richardson, and Richie Valens in a plane crash.) His idyllic life changed on the morning of February 3, 1959 when he read the headline in the newspaper he was about to deliver.

A long long time ago
I can still remember
How that music used to make me smile
And I knew if I had my chance
That I could make those people dance
And maybe they'd be happy for a while
But February made me shiver
With every paper I'd deliver
Bad news on the doorstep
I couldn't take one more step
I can't remember if I cried
When I read about his widowed bride
But something touched me deep inside
The day the music died

So bye, bye Miss American Pie
Drove my Chevy to the levee but the levee was dry
And them good old boys were drinking whiskey and rye
Singing this'll be the day that I die
This'll be the day that I die

McLean's lyrics in this next verse reflect the music of the 1950s with sock hops, slow dancing with girls and making out in pickup trucks. Then it all ended on the day Buddy Holly, Richie Valens, and J.P. Richardson died. In the chorus, American Pie represents rock and roll music. His Chevy represents America. McLean and his friends used to drink at a bar called the Levee in New Rochelle, NY. When it closed, McLean and his friends moved on to Rye, New York drinking away their sadness at the loss of Buddy Holly. The final reference is to Holly's That'll Be the Day lyric, that'll be the day that I die.

Did you write the book of love
And do you have faith in God above
If the Bible tells you so?
Now do you believe in rock and roll?
Can music save your mortal soul?
And can you teach me how to dance real slow?
Well, I know that you're in love with him
'cause I saw you dancing in the gym
You both kicked off your shoes
Man, I dig those rhythm and blues
I was a lonely teenage broncin' buck
With a pink carnation and a pickup truck
But I knew I was out of luck
The day the music died
I started singing

Bye, bye Miss American Pie
Drove my Chevy to the levee but the levee was dry
And them good old boys were drinking whiskey and rye
Singing this'll be the day that I die
This'll be the day that I die

Continue reading "Boomers, Check This Out" »

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For some reason, the males of society have, by and large, long prevented women from enjoying the same freedoms that they have had. In western society, however, women have declared that they're not going to take it. They have done so in three waves, the last one having been evident since the 1990's. The first wave was in the suffrage movement of the late 19th-early 20th century, which resulted in women being given the right to vote. However, the second movement is the one that is of particular interest to Baby Boomers.

Women's Lib, as the movement came to be called, began in the early 60's. The show Mad Men makes this evident, as can be seen from the character Peggy Olson climbing from a secretarial job to that of an advertising executive, thanks to a forward-thinking boss. I'll bet she's not making the same money as her male cohorts, though.

Women's Lib gained a big jolt in popularity with the 1963 release of Betty Friedan's book The Feminine Mystique. The book was written from the perspective of a housewife and mother, and it focused on what it was about society that was keeping her and her type from excelling. It made a lot of women mad, and made Friedan a leader in the movement.

As the 60's progressed, Women's lib became a familiar catchphrase. Truth be told, the Libbers were a minority, but there's no denying that their loud voice caused western society to make changes for the better.

Continue reading "The Women's Lib Movement" »

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What a wild, strange trip was music of the 60's. On the one hand, we had Jim Morrison disrobing on a Florida stage in a drug-induced mania. On the other, we had a squeaky-clean family, complete with mom singing harmony, appearing on Sullivan and charting a couple of #2 hits.

The Cowsills started off with brothers Bill and Bob singing at local school and church dances in the 50's, at ages seven and eight. As other family members got old enough, they joined in on the fun. By 1965, they were a quartet, and had a permanent gig at Bannisters Wharf in Newport, Rhode Island, belting out Beatles tunes. They had a record contract with a small company, but in 1967 they signed with MGM. By now, mom Barbara was singing harmony, and the group was up to seven (originals Bob and Bill, brothers John, Barry, and Paul, and sister Susan). Additionally, father Bud, retired from the navy, managed the group. The Rain, the Park, and Other Things was released that year and hit #2. Add in appearances on Today, Sullivan, and other national shows, and the world was going Cowsills crazy circa 1968.

The American Dairy Association took notice of the hit family's name, and they were hired to pitch the goodness of milk on TV, radio, and print ads. And another hit single climbed the charts in 1968, Indian Lake. Two years later, the group shocked the world by releasing their version of Hair, which was their second #2 hit. But we all knew that the Cowsills hadn't crossed over to the dark side, they were just having some innocent fun. Indeed, in 1969 brother Bill had been axed from the group for smoking pot with the Beach Boys. Working for your father can be tough!

As the 70's drew on, the Cowsills began fragmenting. One by one, members left for solo careers. By 1972, they closed up shop and went bankrupt. However, Bob, Paul, and Susan eventually reunited and are in fact performing as the Cowsills today.

Continue reading "Family Bands, Real and Fictional" »

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...And eleven long-haired friends of Jesus in a chartreuse microbus...

When Convoy came out in 1975, the world knew exactly what C.W. McCall was singing about. An offshoot of the hippy generation, Jesus Freaks tended to grow their hair long, just like their hippy brethren, but overall lived lives that were a bit less, shall we say, "free?" Many of them viewed Jesus as the ultimate radical, and they shared the same pacifistic view of war as did the hippies. They were also quite at home with the commune lifestyle, frequently selling handicrafts and the like on street corners and sharing any profits. In fact, it wasn't out of the question to stumble upon a Jesus Freak commune that was identical to the back-to-the-earth movement version.

But of course, Jesus Freaks had a message to go with their lifestyle. They would grab whatever pulpit was handy and let loose. Thus, they were found on street corners, in their own hand-pitched tents, and sometimes in the jailhouse, having been run in for creating a public nuisance.

Continue reading "Jesus Freaks" »

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Boomers, you can now browse through every single issue of LIFE magazine, thanks to Google Books. I've spent an hour this morning re-reading the amazing article they did about Woodstock. And I was amazed to see some homey articles written about Nazis in the days before WWII had begun.

Need a starting point? Check out this issue, which has an article on the various Paul Is Dead rumors.

First of all, I'm taking a two-week break. We're off to Sunny St. Pete Beach for a vacation. See you when we get back.

The sounds that we grew up with were things we took for granted. I always assumed that I would hear the five-days-weekly noon whistle at the B.F. Goodrich plant in Miami, Oklahoma. The sound that accompanied making a phone call would always be a spring-wound noise that accompanied the rotary dial. And purchasing something at most stores would involve hearing keys pushed and a ringing bell.

My first real job was sacking groceries at Phillip's Food Center in Pea Ridge, Arkansas. I watched in amazement as the ladies would punch those keys at lightning speed, calling out each price so that the customer would hear them. And when it was all over, the drawer would open with that classic "ka-ching!"

My grocery sacking job has, for the most part, disappeared, along with those manual registers. Nowadays, most checkers scan items over a laser, and also bag the customer's groceries (unless the customer must do so himself). But today, the past comes alive once again for just a bit, as we experience the comforting mechanical sounds that accompany a 1960's supermarket buy.

Continue reading "Vanished Sound Alert: the Ka-Ching of the Cash Register" »

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Among the culinary delights that we loved when we were kids was a treat that our parents craved when they were our age, and possibly that our grandparents did also. They are commonly known as animal crackers, although cookies is a much more accurate moniker. And despite the ravages of new-age political correctness, they are still around for our own grandchildren to beg for at the grocery store.

It all began back in the late 19th century. Animal-shaped cookies were a hit over in Britain, and they began to be imported to the US. They were a hit over here, too, and US bakeries took note. Stauffer's Biscuit Company began producing them on this side of the pond in 1871 in York, Pennsylvania. Several other bakeries jumped on the bandwagon as well, and some of these later merged to become the National Biscuit Company, aka Nabisco.

In 1902, Nabisco gave the diminutive cookies the name "Barnum's Animals," and began marketing them in a wagon-shaped box with a string attached. The boxes I remember had perforations on the bottom, which allowed the wheels to be extruded from the package, allowing the whole thing to sit up like a real wagon. Some kid probably got a paper cut, and the likely ensuing lawsuit likely made them vanish. (sigh)

Continue reading "Barnum's Animal Cookies" »

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As long as there has been human society, there have been eating establishments. Let's face it, some nights, cavewomen just didn't feel like cooking.

We Boomers grew up with a lot of familiar names on billboards which have sadly slipped from the scene. The good news is that some of these chains have living examples still around. The chain may be gone, but the last survivors stubbornly hang on, to the delight of local residents who appreciate the treasures that they have.

Such is the happy case with a number of Griff's Burger Bars. Griff's was a familiar sight in the midwest in the 60's. Founded early in the decade in Kansas City, at one time they must have had hundreds of locations, I wasn't able to find an exact number. They spread south to Texas and Louisiana, and at least as far west as Denver. The earliest buildings were amazing A-frame models which a hungry kid in the back seat of the Plymouth instantly recognized. The clown mascot logo was also a familiar sight. And the 15 cent burgers were fat-laden heaven.

Griff's (the franchise) bit the dust sometime in the 80's, I believe. But at least thirteen restaurants are still open today, with Griffy the clown sitting atop the sign outside, beckoning you to enter. In 2004, he even coaxed Zippy into stopping by.

Continue reading "Vanished Restaurant Chains" »

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First of all, let me state that the names have been changed to protect the innocent.

A good e-friend of mine turned me on to Awkward Family Photos, and I'm hooked. I've been looking for a suitable substitute to Mirsky's Worst of the Web since he decided to hang it up back in the mid 90's, and I think I may have found it. This week's installment of I Remember JFK is dedicated to Awkward Family Photos, and I hope you enjoy this rather offbeat presentation.

This is a picture of me, Shirley, and Madonna. These cute girls (and you should have seen them circa 1972! RRROWF!) are pictured with me, my trusty spring horse, and a doll which, unfortunately, didn't interest me, to the girls' chagrin. Note the free standing ashtray, an essential part of any 1960's home.

For the record, Shirley and Madonna had a brother, Rudy, who was an "artist", if you know what I mean. The parents didn't bring him up in conversation much. Oh, and FWIW, Shirley and Madonna turned out to be sisters of Sappho themselves. Those poor parents... ;-)

Continue reading "Photos from the Past, in the Style of Awkward Family Photos" »

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"Mama, don't take my Kodachrome away" sang Paul Simon in what is clearly the greatest song ever written that paid homage to slide film. Unfortunately, mama, i.e. Kodak, didn't listen.

Earlier in this year of 2009, Kodak announced that Kodachrome was going away. They had actually been making it disappear gradually for some time. For instance, Kodachrome 25 passed form the scene in 2002. Super 8 Kodachrome went away in 2005. Kodachrome 200 sailed off into the sunset in 2006. And the last holdout, 35mm Kodachrome 64, was discontinued this last June.

I spent ten years as an avid photographer. My specialty was 120 and 35mm B&W, developed in my own darkroom, and 35 mm Kodachrome slides. I preferred 64, although I picked up a couple of dozen rolls of 25 that were about to expire for half price and kept them in the freezer until I finally shot them all up.

Continue reading "Kodachrome" »

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We're all in this together. That was the message of Falstaff commercials I used to hear on the radio in the 70's. Well, we may all continue to be in this together, but it's sadly without Falstaff.

Falstaff beer had its start way back in 1840. That's when German immigrant Adam Lemp established the Western Brewing Company in St. Louis. Lemp created a beer he called Falstaff. Eventually, Lemp's brewery went out of business. In 1920, during Prohibition, a brewer by the name of Papa Joe Griesedieck stepped in and purchased the Falstaff brand name.

Papa Joe, possessing one of the most instantly recognizable names ever pronounced, was struggling, as were most other brewery and distillery owners. His brewery (which was officially renamed the Falstaff Corporation in 1920) produced de-spiked beer, soft drinks, and smoked hams. The mob was giving the public all of the hootch and beer that they wanted, so near-bear was a pretty sad performer in the marketplace (even though I now buy a case of Busch NA every couple of weeks ;-).

In 1933, the government finally repealed Prohibition, and the Falstaff brewery began a period of success that would peak in the mid 60's, my beloved era of childhood memories.

Continue reading "Falstaff Beer" »

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There's an old adage in the business world: Don't get mad, get even!

It was that sort of positive thinking from Texas oil millionaire Lamar Hunt that caused the formation of the most successful upstart professional sports league since MLB's American league sprang on the scene in 1901. Editorial aside: now, if they would only get rid of the asinine designated hitter!

Hunt wanted a football franchise in his hometown of Dallas. He led a consortium that attempted to purchase the struggling Chicago Cardinals in 1958, with the idea of relocating them to Big D, but failed in his endeavor. Next, he tried to convince league commissioner Bert Bell that it was time for the NFL to get a couple of expansion teams, one, of course, being located in a certain north Texas city. Bell pooh-poohed the idea. Hunt's dealings with the NFL were done.

On his plane back home from his ill-fated meeting, Hunt conceived the idea of a new football league. When the plane landed, he got on the phone to a few other movers and shakers and sketched out a plan for what would be the American Football League.

Continue reading "The American Football League" »

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Update: My eldest Boomer brother is in town, and we're getting together with middle bro to take flailing swings at little white dimpled spherical objects, so I'm taking the week off. Look for a new Boomer memory next week. In the meantime, my article count for the site is up to 551, so browse around! You may find something you've never read, or haven't read in years ;-).

You may have noticed that I Remember JFK vanished for several hours last Wednesday (7/17/2009). That's because of some technical issues that accompanied the setup of SSL encryption at my latest fossil site, The Fossil Exchange. My apologies, but every incident like that makes me a bit wiser in terms of how the internet works. And the internet may be the ultimate Boomer legacy.

Now, regarding your feedback: I have discovered an interesting way for a webmaster to squeeze a few bucks out of his/her site in uncertain financial times. I need to know if you readers are okay with it.

It involves the rather strangely named Project Wonderful. They have a bidding system set up so that advertisers can place ads which are precisely targeted for a website's demographics. I have added a 125-pixel-square box on my front page, and have basically offered it out on the open market.

I intend to make it text-only in time, as its demand grows. The thing is that it takes a bit of time for that demand to grow. It takes buzz, and that is something that comes and goes with alarming frequency on the web, as you fellow site owners know well.

So in the meantime, I'm allowing very modest graphical ads, with the future goal of locking the ad box down to a strict text-only situation.

My question for you, my site visitors, is are you okay with the temporary appearance of modest graphical ads on the front page? Remember, it was your valuable feedback that made the third-party tagging system Jiglu go away. So please, leave a comment (or, if you prefer, shoot me an email at biglazycar(at)gmail.com) and let me know if I'm staying within the limits of non-annoying at I Remember JFK. I have managed to develop a cherished relationship with a large number of nostalgic Boomers, I don't want to jeopardize that!

When I envision a new article for I Remember JFK, I am often surprised by the amount of information that is out there for me to research. As regular readers know, I like to ferret out the history of whatever subject I cover. In the case of the bikini, that meant going all the way back to the 4th century! But with today's entry, the long-lost oil can, I was surprised to find very little on its past, and its subsequent replacement by plastic screw-top containers.

Fortunately, my memory banks are still in good shape. So off we go...

The oil can, as we know, excuse me, knew it, came about in the early twentieth century. It was then that a standard quantity of one quart was sold by most companies. The earliest cans had a solder seam. Collectors prize these oldest examples of oil cans.

By the early 40's, the soldered seal was gone, replaced with a crimped version. During WWII, when metal was in short supply, oil was sold in cardboard boxes, similar to the milk cartons we drank from in grade school.

Continue reading "Oil Cans" »

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It wasn't unusual for a Boomer kid of the 50's or 60's to have a Saturday or Sunday afternoon ritual: strolling through the living room to find dad glued to the screen while skaters went round and round a circular track whilst beating the crap out of each other.

Such was roller derby, a sport which captivated the nation over a time period of about forty years.

It all began during the Great Depression. Film publicist Leo "Bromo" Seltzer was struggling, along with the rest of the nation. He saw the success of dance marathons, and decided to cash in on the fad with a twist: he would sponsor similar marathons, only with everyone on roller skates. Sometimes, this would amount to a large number of skaters on a circular or oval track of limited size. It was inevitable that tired skaters, who might have been at it for days, would occasionally get into massive pileups.

Writer Damon Runyan saw potential for the sport cashing in on its potential violent side, and convinced Seltzer to sponsor an "all-out" contest, in which elbowing, punching, and whip-cracking were encouraged.

The public loved it, and roller derby was born. Male and female teams were organized, and the rules were the same for all, a unique situation in the world of spectator sports.

Continue reading "Roller Derby!" »

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Reader Scott Irv sent me an email asking what ever happened to all of the glass containers.

Well, Scott Irv, and any others who might be curious, they have largely disappeared. But today, I'm going to take you back forty years, back to a day when we took it for granted that the products we obtained at the store, or perhaps delivered to us, would be in glass, tin, or perhaps paper containers.

Walking into a grocery store circa 1966, you would be surrounded by thousands of items packed in glass containers. Notice the soft drink aisle. Row after row of bottles, in six ounce, twelve ounce, and sixteen ounce sizes. There are also a few Coke bottles in 24 ounce size. All of them are in six-pack containers, and buying them requires either paying a deposit on the bottles, or else trading in an equal amount of "dead soldiers." Sometime in the 70's, a larger size was introduced: the quart. I recall most major soft drinks being sold in quart returnable glass bottles with twist-off resealable caps.

Continue reading "Pre-Plastic Containers" »

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I hate it when someone just a tad older than me drops dead. This has been a bad week for that, but I'd like to say a word or two about the most recent as of presstime, Billy Mays. Billy was a Boomer, born just a bit before yours truly. I never paid him much mind until I stumbled upon Pitchmen, Discovery Channel's real life drama (as opposed to reality TV) about what Billy Mays and fellow pitchman Anthony Sullivan go through before they begin hawking a new product. The show made me appreciate the genius and heart behind the loud-mouthed purveyor of products famous as well as obscure. It also made me realize that he has a family, and they are very much in pain now. My deepest sympathies to all of you, friends and family of Billy Mays. My sympathies also to those out there like me, who will miss his whiz-and-vinegar bombastic blasts on the tube.

I have been spending a lot of time lately rediscovering a love for fossil hunting that I had as a child. I have put together a website showing some of my finds called What Is this Fossil?

I'm hoping that eventually, I'll be visited by some serious paleontologists who can help me identify my finds down to the genus level. And if any of you are sharp in the field, please either leave a comment of shoot me an email and help me identify these creatures.

Feel free to subscribe to the rss feed, too. I've posted seven or eight articles in the last couple of weeks, and they will keep coming as long as I'm out there hunting!

River's End, thanks for suggesting this week's column.

The 50's and 60's were collectively known as the Jet Age. That moniker implied that life was being lived at an accelerated rate, compared to previous decades.

I suppose that means that the 21st century should be known as the Warp-Drive Age, because the pace we experienced forty or more years ago was quite laid back in comparison to today.

One thing about life back then that may have escaped your mind was how quiet Sundays were. I grew up in NE Oklahoma, definitely Bible Belt territory. Sunday meant

(a) That you were at church
(b) That after church, about the only thing you could go purchase was gasoline and food. Everything else was closed. Main Street was abandoned. The entire town was noticeably quieter.

Continue reading "When Sunday Was a Lazy Day" »

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Today's I Remember JFK is the result of an anonymous idea from one of our readers. Please keep them coming!

One of the familiar sights that we Boomer kids grew up was an image of a sad-eyed child. The child might be accompanied by an equally sad-eyed kitten or puppy.

The paintings had a haunting quality to them. They were simple, almost primitive, but great detail was given those huge, sad eyes.

The paintings were hated by some, loved by many more, and eventually became the largest selling artwork of the 1960's. That meant that we grew up with them all over the place. Art prints, of course, but also greeting cards, magazine covers, advertisements, and probably even lunch boxes, though I'm only speculating on that last one.

The artist, Margaret Keane, was born in 1927. She describes herself as a sickly, withdrawn child who took comfort in drawing. Eventually, she met and married another artist, Walter Keane, and they ended up in Paris after WWII was over to study the subject.

A sight they frequently encountered was that of homeless, destitute children, orphaned by the war.

Continue reading "Sad-Eyed Kid Paintings" »

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The things we Baby Boomers were destined to accomplish! We would be the generation that would usher in cheap, clean nuclear power! We would be driving flying cars by 2000! And we would take the lead in adopting the efficient, easy-to-use metric system!

OK, enough with the exclamation points already. Obviously, all three of these particular dreams were overblown.

However, it may surprise you to know just how close we are to being a metric nation. Read on.

It all started by those lovable masters of illogic, the French, who decided we needed a logical system of measurement. According to metric scholar Pat Naughin:

The metric system used all around the world has three parts. In France in the 1790s, it was named the "decimal metric system". The system part came from John Wilkins in England, the metric part came from Burattini in Italy, and the decimal part came from the USA. Benjamin Franklin, Thomas Jefferson, and George Washington were very active in getting the French "philosophes' to use decimal numbers for the "decimal metric system".

OK, raise your hand if you knew that our founding fathers were part of the team behind the metric system. THIS history buff didn't!

Continue reading "When We Converted to the Metric System - NOT!" »

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Boomer ladies, I'm sure that if I cross the chauvinistic line in today's piece, you'll be more than happy to let me know.

What would a beach party movie be without Annette Funicello in her bikini? Fortunately, the world of the 60's didn't have to find out. That's because the two-piece bathing suit, once considered so risqué that ladies who sported one risked arrest, was a commonplace sight on American beaches of the 1960's, much to the delight of all of us who possess a Y chromosome.

The bikini's history is a venerable one. 4th century CE artwork discovered in Sicily depicts Roman ladies exercising while wearing what today would be considered bikinis.

But the Dark Ages, the Victorian Era, and predominant social mores kept the two-piece outfit that was intended to be worn in public by members of the fairer sex pretty much out of circulation until 1946. It was in that year that Frenchmen Jacques Heim and Louis Reard designed and released what was called for the first time the bikini. The diminutive swimsuit was named after Bikini Atoll in the Pacific, the site of the much hailed (at the time) atomic bomb tests which began taking place that same year.

However, bikinis were still rarely spotted on US beaches for several years afterwards. It was Brigitte Bardot's performance in Roger Vadim's scandalous And God Created Woman in 1956 (but not released in the US until the next year) that opened the floodgates.

Continue reading "The Bikini" »

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There are a few basic staple foods that every single Boomer kid partook of, no matter the race, creed, or social status. For example, there was Campbell's Soup. There were various incarnations of TV dinners. And there was the grilled cheese sandwich.

Today's column isn't specifically about the grilled cheese sandwich. No, rather, it was about the technological innovations that led to the ability of our mothers to open the fridge, pop out a slice of American cheese, put it between two slices of bread, and quickly and easily create a bit of culinary heaven.

I could trace history back to Bedouin shepherds who lived thousands of years ago, but instead, I'm beginning with James L. Kraft.

Kraft had moved to Chicago from Canada in 1903. He opened a cheese production business with the $65 he had in his pocket.

Kraft was a sharp cookie, and he soon devised a method of transforming cheddar scraps, which would otherwise be disposed of, into a processed cheese. It was so innovative that he patented his idea in 1916. Kraft's cheese would also last much longer on the shelf than classic cheese, and consumers loved its taste!

Continue reading "American Cheese" »

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