Hahaha! I was laughing myself while reading
your very descriptive story!
Poor guy…
The whole scene is still playing out
in my head…
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The other that I remember was “Spiegel of Chicago, six-oh-six-oh-nine.”
… I remember what a “s.a.s.e.” is.
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Saturday morning television on the BBC had the same number for years.
01 811 8055
I expect UK readers to be going OMG about now.
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Me, too. My dad still has it!
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We don’t have ours, but I just realized I still remember it!
I wonder if I should call it to see if it’s been reassigned…
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I remember when pocket calculators had red displays…
(and yes, it still works, but needs a power supply as the batteries are dead)
(for the next post, I need to find my father’s slide rule… 
)
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Just type it into the googles! When I get incoming calls with unfamiliar numbers, that’s what I do. 90+% of the time it’s spam or a scam.
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OK, let’s see. I’ll answer first, then read through everyone else’s lists:
- My first phone number started with a WORD (the name of the local exchange);
- My grandparents still had the outdoor pump that was their only source of water until they put in plumbing shortly before I was born (best tasting water ever);
- It was a big deal (new, expensive technology) when we got a solid state transistor radio;
- I watched the moon landing on TV;
- Girls were required to wear white gloves and a hat when dressed up;
- Pluto was not only a planet, it was the 9th planet, not the 8th.
Fun exercise!
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Do you think it odd that I might be curious about who has our old number?
I mean, I’m not going to do it now, but I would also kind of like to knock on the door of my old house and see if they’d let me come by someday to reminisce.
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I remember when 8-track tapes were new. They would always change tracks in the middle of a song. It would go quiet then CLUNK then continue the song. Drove me nuts.
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Mutual of Omaha is people
you can count on when the going’s rough…
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Did anyone here ever fly Braniff? Even as a kid, I loved their color schemes.
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That alligator looked a bit angry so we got Jim to go wrestle it into submission.
For reals though Jim wrestling an anaconda…
Edit that may not be Jim but you get the idea.
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Fantastic stuff! I love seeing sketches, sometimes more than the finished work.
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I’m glad you enjoyed it, and hope you enjoy what everyone else has posted so far. I certainly have.
This made me think of “Translvania 6-5000” and (of course) the song “Pennsylvania 6-5000”
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For some reason I can’t find any of earlier commercials, but here’s Boushelle’s carpet cleaning from the late 1970s:
How do you know if someone grew up in Chicago? They can sing that number without thinking, even copying the low notes no matter what their normal range.
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Vacuum tube testers at the hardware store!
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In Cleveland, it’s “Garfield One, Two Three, Two Three, Garfield One, Two Three, Two Three!”
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