Tuesday, May 17, 2022

Sue's Birthday!

 I'd like to wish our good friend Sue B. a very HAPPY BIRTHDAY today! I told Sue that I'd like to post something special for her, if she was willing, and she scanned some fun family photos to share.

Awwwww! There's little Sue, in her frilly bonnet, held in the arms by her mother Donna. I love the expression on her face! She's a happy baby.


Here's Donna and Sue again. Sue is looking very dramatic, I think she might be quoting Shakespeare. "Now is the winter of our discontent!". When I look at my own family photos, it's always so amazing to see my mom when she was a new mother, she looked so young.


And here's LOU AND SUE! What an awesome photo, with Lou proudly holding his daughter, they will be pals for decades to come. Thank you for sharing these wonderful images, Sue!


I do have some Disneyland images for you today as well; not "Lou and Sue" scans, but still pretty nice in my opinion. Both are from April, 1959.

A good photo of the original Moonliner is always a thing of beauty; even though it was half-scale, it still looked like you could climb aboard (maybe you'd need a jet pack to fly up to the cockpit?) and take that baby for a spin. It had an AM radio, so you know they spent all the money. I like the little family gazing at the sign at the base of the rocket.


Next we have the wonderful Monsanto House of the Future, where "wood" is a four-letter word. Plastic is where it's at, baby! It's always fun to see it juxtaposed with the castle - Disneyland is a kooky place. I told Walt that the Monsanto house should rotate, and suggested 45 rpm - a good round number. As usual, he ignored my brilliant idea.

27 comments:

Nanook said...

Major-
"It had an AM radio, so you know they spent all the money". I don't know about that - if 'the suits' failed to include the "light group", it sounds to me like 'being thrifty' was the attitude applied here-!

Oh Sue, 'very dramatic' is an understatement to describe your pose in the 2nd image. (Are you certain you never met up with Lee Strasberg-?) Many happy returns of the day, to be sure.

Thanks, Major.

andrew said...

That third picture is now 100% how I picture the behind the scenes interaction every time there's a L&S post.

In his right hand, his daughter. His left outstretched hand holds another batch of slides which the Major has to take without disturbing Sue before slipping back into the time machine to scan them for the present-day post.

JB said...

In the first photo, Sue is happy because she's thinking of Disneyland.

In #2, that's a nice photo of Sue's mom. Happy anniversary of your birth, Sue. We all enjoy your comments and contributions to Major's blog.

Andrew got all deep and philosophical on us. I knew he was a smart and talented guy, but now we have to add poetic dreamer to his résumé.

Even though the Moonliner pic is very nice, you can tell that it's not a Lou Perry original because the top of the rocket isn't in frame.

I too, like the Castle peeking over the edge of the House of the Future. Somehow it just looks right.

Thank you, Major.

TokyoMagic! said...

Awwww, these Lou, Donna and Sue photos are all wonderful!

Sue, are you blowing bubbles in that first pic?

How did Lou take that third shot? He was a master of the "selfie," before there were ever smartphones!

Happy Birthday, Sue! And thank you for sharing more of your family's personal photos!

Major, I don't think the HOTF should have just rotated. I think it should have spun violently, pinning people.....and all of the furniture, to the walls.

MIKE COZART said...

HAPPY GREAT BIG BEAUTIFUL BIRTHDAY Sue!!! You are so adorable in that baby picture!!! I think you knew your picture was being taken!! So cute!!

Major : I know the feeling …. Looking at family pictures and seeing my parents … mom etc so young : it’s almost like they are different people. When I see pictures when I was real small that I remember having pictures being taken …. Even in the early 70’s … I can remember that day like it was yesterday ….. recently my sister was showing pictures she ran across of my 5th birthday party … 1973 …. I can remember everything - conversations … peoples voices etc… seriously like it was last week. But I don’t remember how BRADY BUNCH everyone looked!! When it’s was the 1980’s …. We didn’t feel like it was so “1980s” ……..as I get older it’s just weird to remember times …. Days …events that I lived Thru and seeing how “period” it looks …. Life is really like The Carousel of Progress it’s fun to look at all the changes in music, fashions and technology …. But as you get to the last acts …. There’s a combination of nostalgia and also sadness…….mainly because many of the “characters” are nolonger on stage in your later acts ….

It’s hard to envision what it would be like to really stand in front of the original MOONLINER ….. or walk thru the MONSANTO House of the Future …. But I love hearing details from people who did! Like some Disneyland employees talking about how throughout the day you’d hear the aluminum of the Moonliner clink and clang as it heated up in the California sun …. And then Ping , Pang and clunk as it cooled down in the evening!! Two friends of mine described their memories of the Monsanto house as “smelled like a dentist office” and another said if felt like the waiting room of his Junior HS principal’s office!!

For me : the Sears tool department always smelled like the loading platform of the GoodYear PeopleMover!!! ( in case anyone was wondering!!)

Do something fun today Sue!!!

Chuck said...

Happy birthday, Sue! I love these photos!

[In my best Sterling Holloway voice:] Here is a baby with eyes of blue, straight from heaven right to you.

Or…straight from heaven up above, here is a baby for you to love.

Sign here, please.

(No I don’t think you have big ears.)

The top of the Moonliner is cut off. I wonder if my grandmother took this photo?

An AM radio and no air conditioning, which meant rolling down the windows to get some ventilation. At 25,000 mph, that can get kind of loud. Need to make sure your Richfield map to the Moon and your Luna Park ticket books are in the glove compartment so they don’t blow out the window.

I think your idea of having the HOTF rotate at 45 rpm is brilliant. I’m sure it would have set some sort of record.

Andrew, I think your guess is probably accurate. Curious if Sue’s detonator was attached to a mercury switch like my oldest was - you’d rock and sing him to sleep at night on your shoulder, and then slowly, gently, imperceptibly rotate him into a horizontal position to lay him in his crib, and then inches from hitting the mattress, he’d go off. It wasn’t pretty.

Mike, well said.

Anonymous said...

A Very Merry Un-Unbirthday, Sue!

Major, they teleported you into and out of the Moonliner. Duh.
Great pics today! Now I gotta work!

Bu said...

Knock Knock. Who's there? Sue. Sue who? Baby Sue that's who! Happy Birthday Sue! This is an important day in history!! You share a day with "Nasjonaldagen" which is Constitution Day in Norway! It is a big deal and a national holiday! Time for lefse, waffles, brown cheese, and cloud berries! Your proud parents look like they are on their way to Disneyland in their pressed whites! You seem a little non-plussed in your bonnet, and do kids wear bonnets anymore? I'm wearing one now in honor of ConstiSUEtion Day! Moonliner: check. There it is. House of the future: awesome. There it is- blocking the dent. Guys in suits, ladies in pretty dresses...when do we think the turning point was when people did not dress up to go to Disneyland? Does it coincide with not dressing for airplane travel? Mike: YES! The tool department at Sears smelled like the Peoplemover load! The rubber and metal fusing together. I'm not sure if Sears is TRE, but it would be nice to smell the smell of popcorn (Sears had a snack counter) and cheap fabric and the "ding ding ding" of the "dinger". Happy Birthday Sue! The Taurus Gemini cusp! That is a lot of energy!

Grant said...

Happy Birthday Sue!!! Without you this blog wouldn't be the same.

JG said...

Cute kid, great parents. Many Happy Returns of the Day, Sue. Thanks for all you have shared, thanks to Lou too, of course!

Andrew, very good indeed.

Major, I’d ride the Moonliner even without a radio. Reminds me of my Dad installing aftermarket radio in his ‘39 Chevy. If the HOTF was two stories, they could counter-rotate. That would be a blast.

Mike, agree with all that.

Bu, yes the smell of popcorn and tires says Sears, but also PeopleMover. I remember the old Tractor Supply Co. store in Fresno, smelled like tire rubber, radiator hoses, lubricant oil etc. but I couldn’t see over the counter. many years later, aircraft hangars had that same aroma.

Thanks Major.
JG

Major Pepperidge said...

Nanook, what would a “light group” consist of? I am unfamiliar with that term. A lava light and a black light? I don’t think Sue is normally “dramatic”, but she can have her moments!

Andrew, yes, I picture the same thing! Although, based on hints from Sue, Lou would be holding a LARGE batch of slides, because it sounds like Sue has just scratched the surface of what we might see!

JB, ha ha, Sue had a psychic vision of Disneyland and knew that it was THE place for her. I love that photo of Sue and her mom, it’s easy to imagine just how much Donna adored her baby. Hey, maybe Andrew will become a famous writer and historian of vintage amusement parks! Photos of the Moonliner with the top cut off are common, I guess the photographers didn’t want to bother to walk back 30 steps or so!

TokyoMagic!, Sue only uses one of those official Disneyland bubble blowers, you know that! I don’t know if cameras had timers back in those days, but I suppose that Donna took that third pic (I didn’t even think of that). You have great ideas about the HOTF, if it had done all those things I think it would still be at the park today.

Mike Cozart, I don’t remember posing for too many of the photos that are in our boxes, but once in a while a location (or even a particular shirt!) will jog some old memories loose. My mom found an envelope with some portraits of me and my brother that were taken by a photographer who came to our house. I remember he was a nice Asian man, and he made us laugh by saying, “Say cheese! Say Japanese!”. Kids are easily amused, ha ha. I’m sure that your experiences looking at family photos is not unusual - you know that it is a record of your life, and yet it also feels almost like looking into a parallel universe. You pick up on details that you never noticed before. I think The E-Ticket magazine mentioned the noises that the Moonliner would make as it expanded during the day. I love that your friends remember how the HOTF smelled, so cool!

Chuck, ah, quotes from one of my very favorite Disney animated features. It is practically perfect (though some of the characters did not age well). Your mention of rolling down the windows reminded me of a trip we took up into the Sierra Nevada mountains in our old station wagon. The dumb car would overheat if we ran the AC, so of course my dad turned it off, and going through the Mojave Desert was sure fun. Even rolling down the window didn’t help. Luckily we had a cooler full of cold sodas, we would periodically pull over and have a cool drink. Funny about your son’s “mercury switch”… I thought that babies at that age could sleep through anything! Including being moved from shoulder to shoulder, or from parent to parent. It’s kind of amazing.

Stu29573, teleportation is the only logical explanation!

Bu, I can’t believe that I didn’t know that this was Constitution Day in Norway. I should have worn my special outfit. “Cloud berries”, are those anything like “crunch berries”? I doubt Sue wears bonnets very often these days, but you never know. They are “babushka adjacent”. I don’t know when people started dressing like slobs at the park, but it is surprising, even photos from the late 1960s often show people who at least look “casual but nice”. As for Sears, my main memories of going there involve getting tires, so that rubber smell is definitely a sense memory.

Grant, you are so right!

JG, I guess I wouldn’t need a radio if I was blasting off to the Moon. But wouldn’t the trip be better with a little Hall and Oates? I’ve always tried to imagine a HOTF with more than one story; rotating in opposite directions would be interesting. I didn’t remember that Sears had a snack counter; my grandma once took me to Bullock’s Wilshire for lunch, and I remember that ladies paraded around modeling dresses, which seemed weird to me. But kind of cool in retrospect.

DrGoat said...

Happy Birthday Sue!
Those are wonderful images. I have the same feelings as everyone else it seems. I look at the hundreds of old photos of my parents and it blows me away how young and stylish they were. Hats, suits, fedoras on the guys, lovely dresses on the gals.
I agree Andrew. What a shot! The clothesline really pulls it together. I'll always think of Lou like that. (Not the clothesline, but Lou and Sue).
Sue, you went out of your way to call and email me when I was going through a rough time and I'll always be grateful for that. Your wishes and prayers helped immensely in getting my head straight about things. And interacting with you and Lou when he was having his rough time was a genuine honor and gave me warm fuzzy feelings (the good kind). Thanks for everything and may you have a wonderful Birthday and 364 wonderful Unbirthdays!
Thanks Major, couldn't have been any better.

Anonymous said...

Happy Birthday Sue! Have a great day!

Major- Thanks for the Moonliner & HOTF pics.

-DW

Kathy! said...

Happy, happy birthday Sue! Celebrate the day! And yes, why don’t people put bonnets on babies, just for photos at least? They’re so cute! I just wondered for the first time if it would be really hot in the HOTF, with those thick plastic walls. And why hasn’t some superfan attempted to build and live in a replica by now? Thanks Major.

Irene said...

Such cute photos! Happy Birthday Sue :)

DBenson said...

I still wonder why we never saw whole tracts of Houses of the Future. Maybe not all plastic and maybe not elevated, but still.

Anonymous said...

A Happy Birthday to you Sue!! What wonderful pictures!! And, looking at the background of your home, a remembrance of the simpler times of life that we experienced growing up. While we have it so much better today with all the modern conveniences, I don't feel we missed much at all. KS

JB said...

Tokyo!, yer thinking of the Rotor flat ride, right?

Chuck, "At 25,000 mph, that can get kind of loud". But only for a second or two; then we'd be above the atmosphere, no air, no sound... no life.

Major, your Sierra Nevada car trip reminded me of one of our family's camping trips. We were on our way, in the car, and my little brother (about 3 at the time), who was notorious for getting carsick, got sick. He was sitting on my older brother's lap next to the window, and he warned us by saying, "I'm gonna throw up!". So my mom shouted to my older brother, "Quick, roll down the window!". The intent being that the puke would then be on the outside of the car instead of the inside. So my panicky brother quickly cranked down the window, except... the window was already rolled down. So he ended up rolling it up instead! The puke splashed all over the window and down inside the door. You can imagine the smell. We still tell that story at almost every family get-together.

TokyoMagic! said...

JB, yes....I was thinking of the "Rotor" flat ride!

Major Pepperidge said...

DrGoat, when I see photos of my parents from around when they were first a couple, she looks like she’s a schoolgirl. Well, she was in college, so technically she *was* a schoolgirl. And my dad, while a few years older, is still SO young. Reading all these comments makes me want to dig through those boxes at my mom’s house again! I know that Sue has been so good about contacting GDB folks personally, especially in their time of need, and that’s a pretty special thing. I mostly “don’t want to bother” folks! I’m so glad that you are doing better than those dark days.

DW, thanks for checking in!

Kathy!, my mom must not have been a bonnet person, I don’t recall any photos of me or my siblings ever wearing one. Not even my sister! Maybe it was just “one more thing to wash”, ha ha. If I had lottery money, I would be the superfan who would build a replica of the HOTF. Maybe I’d scale it up a bit (if the engineering would allow it), but it would be pretty neat to place it up on a hillside, like John Lautner’s “Chemosphere” here in Los Angeles! (I just learned that the hillside is so steep for the Chemosphere, that there is actually a little funicular that ferries people from the street up to the house).

Irene, hooray!

DBenson, apparently the HOTF was just a “proof of concept” and was never intended to be mass produced. And as we’ve talked about here on GDB, it is clear that people still want traditional-looking houses, not crazy white mushrooms. Too bad.

KS, although my grandparents lived in Minnesota and not Illinois, the bits of what we can see in the background sure reminds me of their neighborhood. Rows and rows of neat, tidy houses.

JB, ha ha, I think anybody with siblings has had an experience with one of them barfing in the car! Just thinking about it is making me queasy. Luckily, none of us suffers from motion-sickness, but on one trip I think my brother got an actual bug of some kind. We were huddled in the back of the station wagon with piles of blankets and sleeping bags, when he hurled. SO GROSS.

TokyoMagic!, I always imagine that I am inside a giant clothes drying when I’ve been in the Rotor.

Sunday Night said...

Happy Birthday Sue...The official GDB greeter! Thanks for being part of the blog and thanks for suppling us with Lou's wonderful pictures.
In that second Sue pic it looks like she is singing opera.
I love that HOTF pic as you can see the castle through the opposite window.

"Lou and Sue" said...

Thank you, Nanook, Andrew, Jim (JB), TM!, Mike, Chuck and Stu, for the nice birthday wishes. I relaxed ALL DAY. I purposely scheduled nothing for the day. (That's a sign of getting old-er. You prefer peace and quiet, to nonstop partying.)

Yep, Andrew, this was the start of the 'Lou and Sue' team. As a matter of fact, over the more-recent years as my dad's getting older, especially since my mom passed, I regularly remind him we're a team and that I'll always be there for him. He was always there for me.

"In the first photo, Sue is happy because she's thinking of Disneyland."
JB, it's funny you say that. You truly are looking at a baby who rode the Matterhorn, the previous year. My mom brought me on it, unknowingly.

TM! Come to think of it, I don't have tons of early photos (selfies) of my dad. I especially treasure the ones I do have.

"There’s a combination of nostalgia and also sadness…….mainly because many of the “characters” are no longer on stage in your later acts."
Mike, what you said is so true. It's a reminder to love and cherish the folks we do still have in our lives.
Mike, I never knew the Moonliner made noises. How cool is that?! Now I'll have to ask my dad if he remembers that. I hope he does.

I'll be back...

"Lou and Sue" said...

Thanks, also, to Bu, Grant, JG, Major, DrGoat and DW.

Bu, I don't know much about Norway's history, but I think I better brush-up on it, especially since our special days overlap.
I remember Sears' popcorn/candy counter. And the Craftsman tool section...which was my husband's favorite department. Broken tools were replaced for life. I guess that ended recently.

Grant, thank you. But it does take an entire troop of junior gorillas to make a fun blog. It wouldn't be the same without you, either.

Thank you, DrGoat, for your kind words. By the way, you haven't updated us recently on your wife's progress. I hope everything's still heading in the right direction.

I'll be back, again, shortly.

"Lou and Sue" said...

Thank you, Kathy, Irene, KS and Sunday Night, too, for the nice birthday wishes.

DBenson, I would buy a HotF if in a tract subdivision. I wouldn't want a 'stand-alone.' A few weeks back, I recall our Jr. Gorillas discussing the fact that most people still want traditional homes, plus building laws make it difficult to introduce something 'new.' Oh, well...we can dream.
[Edit: Just before hitting the publish button, I see that Major already said some of what I just commented.]

KS, we truly didn't miss anything growing up back then. I treasure those days and simpler times.

JB, hahahahaha! And, Major, your story is pretty funny, too!

Dean Finder said...

Hope you had a great birthday, Sue!

I vaguely remember the tire smell in the tool/automotive section at my local Sears. More recently, I was in a Harbor Freight (sells the opposite of Craftsman tools-cheap and disposable) with my wife who commented that the entire place smelled like a tire. I figure it was previously a tire store, but told her it was evaluated by a focus group and found to be the "manliest" scent and selected as the chain's signature fragrance.

"Lou and Sue" said...

I did, thank you, Dean!

Rubber-tire scent. hahaha!

Melissa said...

Happy birthday to Sue! You always make the world a little brighter!