When Pharmacists Were Useful
Category: Vintage
Made In USA vs. Made In France
Today we study another page of our favorite condescending Parisian magazine, Réalités. Just saying it makes me feel pretentious. Réalités. Zee reality of ziss Frenchman sans shirt makes me gag. But nice Studebaker!
I like how they advertise that the Dyna Panhard (incidentally, the name of an exotic dancer at Austin’s Yellow Rose, a strip club which serves free steak/shrimp buffet on Fridays–that’s today!) will drive 80 mph and then show an image of it in a park. Do Parisians drive cars on sidewalks promenades? I am not familiar with these customs. That’s even more arrogant than American cyclists riding 25 mph in lanes made for cars driving 65 mph.
And how would you fit six passengers in that? Is it Sunday morning coming down for Simone? Is she lost, doing the drive of shame back to her appartement? Even in a car the size of a Ford Festiva, driving off-road with children and prams nearby seems unsafe. She could go barreling out of control and hurtle toward the pond. Girl, please! Oh, look–that’s what her license plate says. 1954, please!
In No Way Condescending
Right off the bat, you can tell that this 1953 magazine is committed to the modest Parisian nature. The tagline implies: PRINTED IN (COMMONER’S) ENGLISH FOR YOU (AMERICAN IDIOTS FORTUNATE ENOUGH TO BE) IN PARIS. And don’t get me started on the little Arab genie proffering fruit to her highness in sage.
Inside, you will find a fair and fun article on Tibet, which supplies the worst drink in the world.
I like the use of grocery in quotes. It makes it seem precious, like a toddler’s version of a real legit grocery, where adults make transactions while standing.
Next, you see a woman with a suspension bridge behind her. No, that’s a hat.
The woman “at left” is this one, wearing a starfish on her head:
Here we see a crew of caravaneers eating yak meat, which is forbidden in their religion, but who cares because they’re probably drunk on low-grade brick tea.
You can just picture the disdain of the author dripping off his lips as he says, “Yaks and mules constitute the entire Tibetan transport system.” Why can’t they be civilized like us? Read on to find out.
No sweeping generalizations here. Also, all Tibetan men are Capricorn.
Some Happy, Some Sad, Some Plotting Homicide
This is what happens when they run out of Coca-Cola. A few gals are still teetering on the tail end of a sugar caffeine high, but the rest will cut you with a rusty prison shank.
Bless This Mess
I’m at my best in a messy, middle-of-the-road muddle.–Harold Wilson
See You Later, Can I Have Them Please?
Sometimes I Think All They Did In The 50s Was Stand Around Drinking Coke
Sunday Best
I nearly always post pictures from my own collection, but this picture from Shorpy was too good not to share. Shorpy has amazingly high resolution images that blow my mind. Do yourself a favor and let this one fill up your entire monitor. You can jump inside the prints on their clothes.
God Is Great, Beer Is Good
Mother’s in the kitchen washing out the jugs
Sister’s in the pantry bottling the suds
Father’s in the cellar mixing up the hops
Johnny’s on the front porch watching for the cops.
–Prohibition Song
Celebrate October With A Fall-Theme Tie
Velma looks like a dog that got its head stuck in a black tambourine and shook herself violently until it fell down to her neck and then she decided to just own the look.
Jazz Hands On A Bus: Always Better Than Snakes On A Plane
Trailers For Sale Or Rent
Three blocks from my subdivision, I can throw a stick in any direction and hit a mobile home. And a chainlink fence. And some curious tire “art” formed into flamingos. And that old man in torn boxer shorts, standing wobbly near his bottle tree (yes, that’s a thing) that keeps his barking doberman company. But that’s not the point. The point is that none of the dozens upon dozens of mobile homes look like this swanky residence.
I want to live in this mobile home. I want that couch and those views of what appears to be a golfcourse (because most mobile homes usually have views of the green), and those curtains, and that record player, and throw in the little girl, please. I don’t have one of those yet.
And while I’ve driven past a whole mess of trailers in my lifetime, apparently my state doesn’t have nearly what the top ten states do.
Last year’s Miss South Carolina announced her home state with pride: “From the state where 20% of our homes are mobile ’cause that’s how we roll, I’m Brooke Mosteller, Miss South Carolina.” Here, she demonstrates how to prop one up during a thunderstorm.
Come on, you know they are not safe in high winds (and fires, by the way). This is not news. And they depreciate instead of appreciate. But none of this mattered when I was young. Back then, I romanticized mobile home life, like an adult version of a fort. No attic, no basement, no five thousand dollar roof to replace every ten years. Just my size. And heck, you can take it with you when you relocate.
Come to think of it, while every home in my subdivision has .20 acres of land, our mobile home neighbors down the road all have a sweet acre. Enormous expanses of land on which to put all sorts of things, but mostly immobile vehicles. Next to a mobile home. That is ironic, right? I am not trailer-bashing; this is reality. I have been inside nice mobile homes. But dang–not that nice. Not 1952 nice. I just want to know where those trailers are, like the one above. I never see those. Do they exist?
Well, they sort of exist. Parrish Manor in Raleigh, North Carolina boasts manicured lawns (sans vehicles and tire art) and a nice pine-lined creek. Looks pretty peaceful and clean, huh?
An estimated 20 million Americans live in mobile homes, more than any other country. And they aren’t living in new ones. According to the Manufactured Housing Institute, in the late 1990s, nearly 400,000 new manufactured homes sold a year, down to 55,000 now. This necessitates more upkeep and maintenance on existing homes. Do not neglect your mobile home.
Whether it’s motivated by the freedom and mobility of the American way or simply a cycle of poverty that prevents site-built home ownership, mobile homes are here to stay. Just please–put your shirts back on.
Need more trailer posts? Check out last year’s Teepees and Trailer Homes.
I Don't Get It 