Sepia Saturday- The Scopitone Repairman

In the 1960's I went to Las Vegas with a group of friends from the ad agency that I worked for. One of my friends was named Mark Draper. He reminds me so much of the main character on "Mad Men"- Don Draper. Both of them invented new names and lives for themselves. Sometimes I wonder if the writers on "Mad Men" knew Mark.

I didn't know Mark had invented a new name for himself until we ran into his father in the casino bar in Las Vegas. He called him Skip. Not a name (or even nick- name) that would befit the suave, sophisticated Mark who we all assumed came from a high class, well-to-do family. We certainly didn't picture his father being a Scopitone repairman.

What's a Scopitone you might ask and why is it in this Sepia Saturday post with a juke box theme?
Well, a Scopitone is a juke box with the addition of a movie/video. They were invented and popularized in France in the '50's and then imported to the U.S. (Warning!-This video is waaay too long so you might not want to watch it all. And mute it for the first 16 seconds.)


They didn't last long in the U.S. because of bad marketing and bad management. (or so I read) Apparently they were marketed to cocktail lounges and hotels instead of the teen hangouts as they should have been. Also they were expensive. A song on the juke box would have cost 5 cents... on the Scopitone- 25 cents!!!
Also their production values weren't very high. Here's another example:
(After you watch this go to sepiasaturday.blogspot.com for more juke box stories)

Sepia Saturday: Tea Party-- Then and now

A TEA PARTY THEN

I've posted this picture before of my mother pouring tea at a Women's Club luncheon. This was in Pomona, Calif. in the 50's. Note the gloves and hats.

At the meeting she probably talked about taking care of the needy, having better schools, better health care for everyone and things like that. She was very socially conscious. She cared about people.

She was president of the Democratic Club here in Fallbrook for several years.This is such a conservative community so being a Democrat was almost like being a Communist. She had a small group of fellow Democrats who were quite active. They were all senior citizens but traveled to the state convention in Sacramento and worked at voter registration at the county fair and anyplace else they were needed.  She was a very responsible citizen.

My mother would be turning over in her grave if she could see what's happening now.

 For more Sepia Saturday click here. 

Sepia Saturday: My grandfather- the sheet music designer

 My grandfather, Petrus Finwall

The Finwall family: Della, Petrus, Glenn, Bob, Don.

The Finwall boys, Glenn, Don, Bob, and Gil (my father).

The photo is dated Sept. 1918. Petrus was killed

 the next month in an accident with a firetruck.

The car in the background might have been

 the one they were in.

One of my earliest jobs was as a record cover designer.  So it was quite a coincidence that my grandfather had a similar career as a sheet music designer. He really passed down his "artistic gene". The oldest child in his and each of his descendant's families became an artist.

His oldest son, Glenn didn't realize his artistic abilities until he retired. I wrote a post about him.

He was a wonderful artist.

http://banardesigns.blogspot.com/2011/11/sepia-saturday-celebrating-100-posts-my.html 

The oldest son of my Uncle Don had a printing company.
( I think he started out as a designer.)

Uncle Glenn's oldest child, Carol Ann was my inspiration. She made the most beautiful paper dolls.

She and I would sit and draw, color and cut for hours. Unfortunately she took her own life in her early twenties before she could have had an artistic career.

Now my niece, Megan is an artist.  She started out as a graphic designer and now is a film maker.

Carol Ann and I discussing paperdolls

None of my grandfather's sheet music covers have survived. Some relatives think they were destroyed in a fire. I'm constantly on the look-out for covers from Chicago publishers in about 1918. Not many are signed by the artist so I've never found any by him.

To see more sepia saturday posts click here.

Sepia Saturday- Mae Day

The theme this week is May Day. Until I read Alan's post I didn't think of May as a name...Duh! It's my middle name, (although spelled Mae) and has been a family middle name for five generations on my mother's side and 4 generations on my father's side.

Bessie Mae White (Reis) - my mother's mother

Della Mae Mefford (Finwall)- my father's mother

Arleen Mae Reis (Finwall)- my mother

Me

 My daughter Antoinette Mae Brown (1957-1972)

4 generations of my mother's family- only 2 with middle names of Mae. (Bessie Mae and Arleen Mae)

The next 4 generations of my mother's family- with 3 Mae's.(Bessie Mae, Arleen Mae and Me- Barbara Mae)

4 generations of my father's family -2 Mae's. Della Mae and Barbara Mae.

See more May Day stories at http://sepiasaturday.blogspot.com

Sepia Saturday 114 The Agony of De Feet

This post was written by Nancy:

When the theme for this week came up and it was "shoes", all I could think of were the lovely little shoes of the Chinese women. They were embroidered in beautiful colors, and oh, so petite.

But wait a minute. No one's feet could be that small. How did they fit into these gorgeous little shoes? Well, I suppose we all know now that their feet were bound in childhood, by wrapping and squishing until they were the proper size to fit into those little torture chambers.

When my sister and I were traveling in China way back in the 80s, we actually saw women with bound feet, even though the practice, thank goodness, had been outlawed in 1949. I doubt if there are too many more of these women hobbling along in misery.

Now who in the world came up with that idea? I'd love to know who that first person was (probably some emperor), who said "take her away, her feet are too big!" And then the binding started. If you're interested, this is a bit of information about the practice: foot binding 

It's usually men who come up with these tortuous beauty decisions. And then the women who want to please the men say to themselves "O.K., beauty knows no pain" and they follow right along and wear some pretty ridiculous footwear. 

Currently, the trend in tortuous footwear is reaching new heights (so to speak). And women are just falling (so to speak) for these new torture chambers. Here's some fine examples.

   

Have we really come so far from the days of that emperor and the binding of feet? Cmon women, are you crazy? You would actually wear these "designer" shoes?

Even experienced runway models who are used to wearing ridiculous designer get ups can't manage with these shoes. Here's my point, watch this:



And here's the thing. If you wear these, you're going to fall down and break a leg or an arm or a spine or something. These aren't safe, they're not sensible. Sure they make your legs look longer, but what good is that when one of your legs is in a cast?

Look for other Sepia Saturday stories by clicking here http://sepiasaturday.blogspot.com/.

Sepia Saturday- Tar Baby

The theme this week is Dogs.

This is Tar Baby. (I love the little curl on top of his head!)

This is the earliest dog I can remember, although my mother has told me about a beagle we had when I was a baby. Tar Baby was named after a character from The Uncle Remus book by Joel Chandler Harris.

Br'er Rabbit and the Tar-Baby, drawing by E.W. Kemble from The Tar-Baby, by Joel Chandler Harris, 1904.

Me and Tar Baby

My sister, Nancy and I and Tar Baby. (I'm not really sure that's Nancy. Hard to tell from this photo.)

My father and the pup.

Tar Baby sitting up. What a smart dog!

My brother, Bob and Tar Baby.

In this picture you can see the gate that was left open and cost Tar Baby his life. ( Bobby didn't do it).

We loved the Uncle Remus stories from the story books and then from the Disney movie, "Song of the South".
I've, since, found out that the Uncle Remus stories and the name "Tar Baby" is sometimes considered racist. If my mother had known that we would have had to find a new name. She was the most unprejudiced person I've ever known.

In one tale, Br'er Fox constructs a doll out of a lump of tar and dresses it with some clothes. When Br'er Rabbit comes along he addresses the tar "baby" amiably, but receives no response. Br'er Rabbit becomes offended by what he perceives as the Tar Baby's lack of manners, punches it, and in doing so becomes stuck. The more Br'er Rabbit punches and kicks the tar "baby" out of rage, the worse he gets stuck. Now that Br'er Rabbit is stuck, Br'er Fox ponders how to dispose of him. The helpless but cunning Br'er Rabbit pleads, "but do please, Brer Fox, don't fling me in dat brier-patch," prompting Fox to do exactly that. As rabbits are at home in thickets, the resourceful Br'er Rabbit escapes. Using the phrases "but do please, Brer Fox, don't fling me in dat brier-patch" and "tar baby" to refer to the idea of "a problem that gets worse the more one struggles against it" became part of the wider culture of the United States in the mid-20th century. The story was originally published in Harper's Weekly by Robert Roosevelt; years later Joel Chandler Harris wrote of the tar baby in his Uncle Remus stories. A similar tale from African folklore in West Africa has the trickster Anansi in the role of Br'er Rabbit.

If you'd like to see Uncle Remus singing "Zipp-a-dee-doo-dah" click here-http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=LcxYwwIL5zQ

Don't forget to go to http://sepiasaturday.blogspot.com to see more dog stories.

Sepia Saturday- Doll Decapitated

This was my beloved childhood doll. I saved her in my old "hope chest". When I gave the hope chest away lately I cleaned it out... wedding dress, veil, several other "hopeless" things and my doll. Alas, she was also hopeless. She seems to have been made of some kind of rubber that deteriorated. Her head was made of something else and and is still alive...she still opens and closes her eyes. 

One cute little hand is also O.K. but looks like the fingers are about to fall off.

Her beautiful velvet dress is in pretty good shape.

It looks like the same dress in this blurry old photo, but on a different doll.

In the background is my sister, Nancy's Donald Duck bank. She still has it. 

Somewhere there's a picture of her with her much loved bank but, try as I might, I couldn't find it.

And in the near background I think that's a hitching post...could it be? Maybe just a water spigot.

And in the far background is an old car that I'm sure one of you "old car buffs" could identify.

See more doll stories at http://sepiasaturday.blogspot.com

Sepia Saturday- Celebrating 100 posts. My post-My Uncle Glen

Good old Sepia Saturday! This is their 100th week of posts.

My Uncle Glen almost made it to 100. He died at 99. He was an interesting person who became quite an accomplished artist in his second life, after he retired.

We dedicated one of our books to him.

To see more sepia saturdays click here- http://sepiasaturday.blogspot.com/

Sepia Saturday- Running boards

The theme this week is "running boards".

I posted this photo last year and wrote about the rumble seat. So here it is again, doing double duty as a "running board" photo.

( I just went back to "Sepia Saturday" and noticed that I remembered it wrong. The theme isn't running boards, it's "bumpers". Boy, do I feel dumb!!! Well, this car does have bumpers. )

I'm not sure who the people are. The woman looks like my Aunt Phyllis and the man behind her looks like her husband, my Uncle Glenn. But it also looks like Glenn's brother, Bob. If it's Uncle Bob....shame on her. But maybe Glenn is taking the picture.

I think the man in the front is Jimmie O'Conner, a friend of my father's.  The only thing I know about him is from a picture of him pointing to the lake with a caption that says, "this is where Jimmie fell in the lake. That photo always made my father laugh.

For more Sepia Saturday click here.

Sepia Saturday- Easter

I didn't think I had anything for Sepia Saturday today. Then I remembered my great uncle's post card scrapbooks. They were full of Easter cards. Most of them not too interesting.

  

This one is slightly funny.

It says "A Happy Eastertide". 

It should have a P.S. " I hope you don't find a bug in your Easter egg!"

To see more Sepia Saturday click here. http://sepiasaturday.blogspot.com

Sepia Saturday- Camels, politicians....

When my sister, Nancy, saw the Sepia Saturday photo and theme this week -Camels, politicians, etc...(President Roosevelt riding a camel) she said "you've got the perfect camel photo".
And, indeed, I have.

(Sorry, it's not sepia)

 You would assume that this photo of me might have been taken at a "photo op" in Egypt. But if you look closely you can see The Great Wall in the background. I didn't know they had camels in China. I suppose they do in the dessert but that's not where this was. This was not too far from Beijing.

So there's the photo of me riding a camel and here's one of me and a politician (two of the possible themes):

 These were taken in about 1985 (before The Tianamen Protests of 1989).

We were there on a business trip. A sort of strange business trip. Our business at the time was needlework kits and books. Making things with doilies was popular at the time. We had several kits and books on the subject. So we imported doilies through an importer in San Francisco. He was the main (and at the time, only) importer of doilies from China. He was called "The Doily King". He took us with him on one of his buying trips. It wasn't a fun trip but it sure was interesting.

There weren't many foreigners in China at the time, so we often attracted attention.

Here's Nancy and I strolling on The Great Wall. 

It was actually quite steep, at least at this point and not at all good for strolling. More like climbing, and very exhausting.

To see more Sepia Saturday click here. 

Bottoms Up- Pub songs for Sepia Saturday

A book of drinking songs from 1933 with drink recipes and toasts. These should come in handy for your next party. Sorry, I don't have room to show you all the songs. I just chose a couple of the funnier ones.

At the bottom of the page it says: The yodel refrain may be omitted, ad lib. In the verse, experts in hiccoughs can insert a "hic" after each phrase, if desired.

To see more Sepia Saturdays click here.

Love poems, etc. in my great grandmothers autograph book

 

La Moille, Jan. 8th, 1888  Remember me when far, far off 

Where woodchucks die of the whooping cough. 

Your friend, E.L. Anstith  

Roseland , March 13, 1890 

Friend Katie,  

Let your moto(?) be honest and truthfully, 

and I hope someday you will make 

some man a happy wife. 

Your true friend, R.S. Bayler

What care I for gold 

or silver, or all the money 

in the land, Give me a 

wife and sixteen children, 

a bobtail horse and a 

peanut stand.  

Van Orin Shambaugh

 This one is legible.  It must be from one of my Aunts.

Sublette, Ill., Dec. 28th, 1887

To Katie, 

You may fall into war, 

You may fall from above, 

But be careful, Katie, 

Don't fall into love. 

Boys are handsome, Fellows 

are plenty, But don't you 

get married Before you are twenty. 

Your friend, Henry Biester.

 As sure as comes your wedding day, 

a broom to you I will send, 

in sunshine use the bushy part, 

in storm the other end.   J.W. Stoll

Sublette, Ill, Feb. 2 1905  

Dear Mother: I love you little, 

I love you big, 

I love you better than 

The groundhog day.  Your Daughter Mabel

 And finally some good advice:

Sublette, Ill. Feb. 2, 1905  

Dear Katie, Don't have any more 

children then 1/2 dozen, 

for those are plenty for you.  

From your friend Katie Shraemer (?)

 My great grandmother, Kate Daehler on the right

click here to see more Sepia Saturday