Wednesday, March 24, 2021

On Main Street, November 1970

Here are the first two scans from a batch of 1970 slides. They are nice, but there's something about the color... as if we are looking at them through smoked glass. I tried to mitigate the issue in Photoshop, but they still look kind of weird.

A group of adults went to Disneyland unencumbered by kids. Not a bad way to go! They must have been mighty pleased with Town Square, and paused to pose for this triple portrait. I still think of the yellow and green building in the background as the Wurlitzer store, even though they returned to their musical planet in 1968.


Further up the street, one of the men from our group steps off the curb, risking life and limb from an assortment of passing vehicles. The Coke Corner is to our left, maybe he'd just enjoyed a refreshing beverage. Several guests carry their large striped shopping bags. A bag that size can carry a lot of fun stuff.


Years ago I acquired one of those bags on eBay!

22 comments:

Nanook said...

Major-
Hey - that man is carrying a pack of Viceroy cigarettes in his shirt pocket. "Viceroy's good taste never quits".

Thanks, Major.

Chuck said...

The guy on the far left in the first photo kind of reminds me of a tall Wallace Shawn.

I covet the olive and aqua shirt behind the curb tree on the left in the second picture.

I don't remember those bags from anywhere but GDB, but I love 'em.

Stu29573 said...

Well, there was a lot of smoking in 1970, so that's probably why they look so smoky. That's my theory and I'm sticking with it!
I wonder is our intrepid band rode the new Haunted Mansion? I heard that it was so terrifying, someone had a heart attack and they had to tone it down! Spoooooooky!

Stefano said...

Will Rogers at the Main Street Cinema -- a variety of entertainment unthinkable at the park today. I saw one his silent shorts at L.A.'s Silent Movie Theatre, he was funny without his famous drawl.

This is just a few months after the famous Yippie invasion, and people in the second photo look a bit wary. Out of this crowd, only the youth to the left of the streetcar has hair that could be construed as overlength.

DrGoat said...

A lot of guys came out of the WWII smoking. All the crews got free cigarettes according to my Dad. The 50s and 60s were the heyday of cigarette manufacturers I suppose. Dad smoked Lucky Strikes. That cute little penguin on that pack of Kools was there to help you feel better.
That is one colorful bag. And big too! You could stuff that thing full of 1970's goodies.
Thanks Major.

Nanook said...

@ DrGoat-
Come up, come up, come all the way up to the great taste of KOOL Cigarettes.

And everyone, it turns out, needs a bag like that.

Major Pepperidge said...

Nanook, my experience with cigarettes is limited, but I can’t imagine one brand tastes better than another. They’re all gross! Except for “Spud” cigarettes of course; like Smuckers, with a name like that, they have to be good.

Chuck, that guy really does look like Wallace Shawn’s brother. I wonder if Wally is tired of people saying the words “It’s inconceivable!” to him? That olive and aqua color combo sure does evoke that time period somehow. It seems that those striped bags were used for two or three years, but they sure don’t show up on the collector’s market very often!

Stu29573, your theory makes a lot of sense! Everywhere you went, there was the rich, heady smell of cigarette smoke. I can’t imagine that anybody would have gone to Disneyland in late 1970 and NOT gone on the Haunted Mansion, unless the line was so long that they didn’t want to wait. Maybe the Hatbox Ghost was still there.

Stefano, I haven’t seen much of Will Rogers in “talkies”, and have seen none of his silents. I guess Walt used to play polo with Rogers. Even now I am afraid that Yippies are going to invade!

DrGoat, I saw an exhibit in Chicago, a sort of “life in the 1940s” thing, and it showed a typical box of goodies that would be given to soldiers during WWII. I remember a Snickers bar because I didn’t know that brand had been around that long, and of course there were two packs of cigarettes in there. Those big tobacco companies knew that they would get thousands of men and women hooked. Pretty insidious. And yes, just think of all the good stuff a bag like that could hold!

Nanook, thanks to that jingle, I need a cigarette BAD!

"Lou and Sue" said...

I love that shopping bag! I don’t recall it coming in any other size except for that [plastic] shopping bag style...am I remembering correctly?

My dad saved all of his Disney shopping bags and I used to think he was silly to do so. Now I know better.

Melissa said...

Oh, yes, back in the olden days you were a weirdo if you didn't smoke. And your "brand" was part of your identity. I also immediately recognized that Viceroy package because it was my favorite aunt's brand. And everything DID look smoky if you were looking through the car window, because those things were coated with more smoke residue than the ceiling of a Renaissance church.

I can't tell if the little girl in #2 is adjusting her sash or just walking like a chicken. Hey, it's fun, bok bok bok!

I had the first dose of the Pfizer vaccine on Friday, and it knocked me flat on my back. I think I slept for 48 hours straight, and it was days before I could move my arm. And I temporarily hurt my good eye in a freak hand-sanitizer pump accident at the vaccination site. And with all that, I'm still so happy that I was able to get the shot and I hope everyone will be able to have it soon.

Anonymous said...


Mom's cousin was a smoker, he always visited in the summer so he could sit outside and not smoke in our house. He was very thoughtful that way. Mom kept an ashtray just for him. He was a career sailor and lived on Guam for many years.

The man in photo 2 is sensibly wary of being run over by a speeding motor car.

Have there been any guest injuries from Main Street vehicles? Seems like over 60+ years, the law of averages would mean some have happened. Imagine being hit by the horse-drawn streetcar! Hay all over the place...

Did Knotts ever have an incident with their train? The spot in front of the Mine Train ride was fine when people had common sense, but that time is long past. Visitors today would probably lay across the tracks for a selfie.

Chuck, I think my Dad had a shirt like that.

JG

DrGoat said...

Sue,
Some people just have it together and your Dad is one of them. I'm sure he passed that on to you.

Omnispace said...

Major, I think it's just a weird overcast/smoggy day in Anaheim lending that nicotine cast to the photos.

The weird thing about growing up around cigarettes is that occasionally I'll catch a slight whiff of one now and am instantly transported back to the 60's/70's.

The only bags I remember from Disneyland are the ones that my dad bought the candied nuts in. Something tells me that they were smaller versions of the large striped bags, or the wavy stripes.

I can attest that the Haunted Mansion was much scarier when it opened. My family wanted to go on it again, (using an additional coveted E-coupon even), but I cried and ran off and my mom had to sit it out with me. But I was only 5 so that might have had something to do with it.

"Lou and Sue" said...

DrGoat, I don’t know if he passed that down to me, but he did pass down his bags to me.

JC Shannon said...

I had a pair of pants similar to the shopping bag. Hey, it was the 70s. I was going for a Keith Partridge, Greg Brady look. Melissa, the company I work for is giving the shots out free, so I will get mine this week. I don't want to lose anyone in GDB or anywhere else to the blankety blank virus. I bet if Sue shows these to Lou, he could tell in an Anaheim second what went wrong with these photos. If Major couldn't Pepperidgeize em, it must be bad. Thanks Major.

Nanook said...

@ Melissa-
I've had both of the Moderna shots, and had sore arms from both injections. Only the second shot affected me - about 24 hours following the procedure, I began feeling 'logy' (I just love that word - but quite apropos, here), and felt a little chilled. Hence the 99.4° fever. But after a good night's sleep, it was all over.

Hope your eye is well - although I can't lie - hearing about a " freak hand-sanitizer pump accident..." does generate a bit of a chuckle - undoubtedly not for you-!

Pegleg Pete said...

I saved quite a few of my WDW bags from the 1970s and '80s (as a child I pretty much saved any ephemera associated with our family's travels) and, since then, I always save my bags from any of the Disney parks I go to. Needless to say, I now have a mountain of Disney park plastic bags.

I got my first AstraZeneca shot last week; other than a lingering pain where the shot was administered I didn't have any side-effects at all.

Stu29573 said...

I got the Pfizer. The first shot knocked my on my tail for two days. I get the next one on Good Friday. I'm hoping it doesn't mess up my Easter!

Major Pepperidge said...

Lou and Sue, I agree, I have only seen that striped bag in one size - but I’ve learned that there were many pieces of Disneyland ephemera that I haven’t seen. I saved a few of my Disneyland bags, and about 10 years ago I put them in a sturdy box to prevent them from getting further worn.

Mellissa, I asked my Grandmother why she smoked, since she was raised in a very proper family, and she said that “Everybody did it”. When she was sent away to school, that’s when she got the habit. She had some nice paintings on her wall, and they were covered with a layer of yellow gunk, when she paid to have them professionally cleaned it was astonishing. I used to go over to her house when she had her bridge group, and the air was practically unbreathable. I’m glad you got your first vaccine shot, I’m still waiting for my turn! Maybe the Pfizer version is harder to handle; my 85 year-old Mom seemed to do OK after both Moderna shots.

JG, my brother is the only one of my siblings to take up smoking - I tried it with him and other friends a million years ago, and my thought was, “Why would anybody want to do this?”. But he stuck with it. Now a carton of cigarettes is almost $100, and he is not exactly rolling in money, what a waste. He smokes outside, but considers the garage “outside”, and the whole house wreaks. Ugh. I am not aware of any injuries from the Main Street vehicles, but you’re right, in over 60 years, you’d think that something would have happened. I’m also unaware of any issues with Knott’s Berry Farm’s trains.

DrGoat, Sue B. is both funky and fresh!

Omnispace, the overcast doesn’t help, for sure. But the slides do have a strange grayish cast; I think they are Ektachrome, which can look great, but I have often found that Ektachrome slides have various problems that Kodachrome avoided. I wonder of the bags that you are describing (with the candied nuts) were from the Candy Palace? I still need to get one of those for my collection! Bags from certain shops can fetch very high prices on today’s collector’s market. I was VERY scared to go on the Haunted Mansion my first time, especially after hearing the kids at school talking about it. “A ghost goes right through you!”, one kid told me (I assume he was talking about the Hitchhiking Ghosts); I did not want that to happen AT ALL. They also said that the boats on “Pirates” went under water, which was not exactly accurate, but I dreaded it all the same.

Lou and Sue, I hope he didn’t glue them into a photo album!

Jonathan, whoa, you must have looked like the fifth Monkee! I had some pants with vertical stripes, but they were very thin, multicolored stripes. I loved them. More and more people I know have gotten their shots (my sister, my nephew, a good friend who is a flight attendant), but so far I don’t qualify. I would love it if Lou could figure out what the deal was with these photos!

Nanook, it sounds like Washington must be way ahead of California. I’m glad you got your shots! And I have heard that the second shot often is harder on the body than the first one. The thought of alcohol-filled hand sanitizer getting in the eyes sounds very painful!

Pegleg Pete, I’ll bet TokyoMagic! has more than a few bags, he saved EVERYTHING. It was more fun when they had unique bags for each shot (Merlins Magic Shop, the Candy Palace, the Swift Market House, the Art Corner, and so on). I do have some plastic bags from the ‘80s and ‘90s, but don’t have much attachment to them, admittedly. Great news on your vaccine shot!

TokyoMagic! said...

JG, I haven't heard of Knott's having an incident with their train, which runs right through the middle of the park, but it doesn't mean that one hasn't happened. Some years back, they did add gates across the tracks, which are swung out into place, right before the train starts to roll. Prior to that, employees used to stand there and try to keep people back by holding up their hands, but there were always people that tried to dash over the tracks at the last minute.

While I was working at Knott's, there was a kid who fell off of the stagecoach loading platform and onto the ground. It startled the horses, so they moved forward a bit, causing the wheels of the stagecoach to roll over the child's chest. They added metal gates to the loading area after that, replacing the single metal chain that had been previously used to keep guests from falling off of the platform.

Major, I have one of those striped plastic bags, which my mom had kept stashed away over the years. I posted a pic of it and also a 1975 pic of her holding it in front of the Castle, a few years ago. I also have one of the plastic bags that replaced it in the late seventies...the one with the old-fashioned Mickey and Minnie on it. As for the paper Disneyland bags, I have the psychedelic ones (from the late sixties/early seventies), the goldenrod ones with the multi-colored Castle images and "dots" (from the mid-seventies/early eighties), and then the white ones with the pastel line drawings of the various attractions (from the eighties). I think the only area-specific or shop-specific paper bags I have, are the gold and black ones for New Orleans Square, and the light blue ones with the Disney Gallery logo on them.

I've done a Disneyland "matchbook" post, and a Disneyland "drink cup" post. I was going to do a Disneyland "bag" post, but just kept putting it off for some reason.

DrGoat said...

I got my first Pfizer shot on the 14th and due for second on Easter Sunday. I have COPD and I expected an uncomfortable reaction, but only felt loopy for a day. I have a feeling I won't get so lucky with the second one, or so everyone says including my primary Dr. He's not a goat so what does he know. Keeping my fingers crossed.
Sorry you had a bad time Melissa. Glad everyone seems to be getting vaccinated.

Anonymous said...

Glad to hear so many of you are getting shots. My wife got shot #1 with little effect, but BIL says the second is worse. She gets #2 in a week.

I can't get mine for who knows how long, but I'm pretty isolated in my office and don't get out much except outdoors.

Dr. Goat, I trust goat doctors implicitly.

Tokyo, thanks for the Knotts info. It's amazing so little has happened over the years. I hope the speed bump kid wasn't injured.

Major, my granddad was a smoker (passed before my time) and my Dad said he told the boys, if they wanted to smoke, here's the tobacco, be honest and take it if you like, only don't steal it and hide behind the barn. None of his brothers took it up either, but some of my cousins picked it up in the service. I've been lucky to not be around it much. For a few years, I liked an occasional cigar, but stopped that over 30 years ago.

JG

Chuck said...

I lucked out today and scored an appointment for this Friday for the first Pfizer shot. I'm a little leery after reading about all of your reactions, but my wife has had both shots and was just a bit tired and sore 24 hours after the first shot and sore in her arm for a day after the second one.

Major, my sister had a kid-sized lawn chair in an olive-and-aqua color scheme in the early '70s, and my mom had a handbag in those colors, too. It does evoke the period strongly for me.

DrGoat, never trust a physician that isn't a ruminant.