Vintage Things That Have Disappeared In Your Lifetime?

[V.C. Brunswick]

It was also common for silver coins of various countries to circulate thru the Orient -- with chop marks used to affirm that they were deemed by their various owners to be legitimate and not counterfeits. Often these coins would be so marked up that it was difficult to figure out what denomination they were.

Interestingly enough, although the Trade Dollar was intended for Far Eastern trade, many were circulated in the US where eventually there was a glut of them. So much so that it was not unusual for unscrupulous employers to pay their workers in Trade Dollars whose face value was worth only 85 cents at the time.

 

[jamespowers]

Interestingly enough, although the Trade Dollar was intended for Far Eastern trade, many were circulated in the US where eventually there was a glut of them. So much so that it was not unusual for unscrupulous employers to pay their workers in Trade Dollars whose face value was worth only 85 cents at the time.

Now they are worth considerably more.

 

[Stewart Field]

Nickel telephone calls. Penny candy. Basic grocery items that are actually worth the price marked on them (eggs, bread, milk, etc).

 

[Shangas]

Sadly, I just thought of another thing.

Tram-tickets.

Melbourne, Australia, where I live, has one of the oldest streetcar/tram-systems in the world, and one of the largest (it's made possible due to the relatively flat ground, and ridiculously wide streets, supposedly so that bullock-carts could perform U-turns).

Established in 1885, Melbourne has had a tram-network of one form or another for nearly 130 years. And for nearly all of those 120-odd years, to ride the rails, you required a ticket or a token.

These days, we have these phony plastic "Myki" cards which are next to useless. They're not 'tickets' in the conventional sense, and I personally find them very irritating due to having to constantly top it up, and what happens if you lose it, or you need to buy one for relations or friends who are visiting from overseas and all that stuff...

Why can't we go back to ordinary paper tickets!? WHY!? Get on, drop in the coins, rip the stub out of the machine and sit down. End of story.

Now we have to fumble with charging-stations, tap-on boxes that don't work half the time, and ridiculously huge fines ($200+) if we lose our cards or can't top them up.

 

[Stewart Field]

When's the last time anyone googled "the FBI's Ten Most Wanted List?" I'd be surprised if anyone under 40 even knew that such a thing existed.

The FBI posted it's "Twenty most wanted terrorists" on public transportation in Seattle. C.A.I.R. (Council for American Islamic Relations) considered it Islamaphobic and obtained a court injunction to have them removed...

 

[dnjan]

Tram-tickets.

These days, we have these phony plastic "Myki" cards which are next to useless. They're not 'tickets' in the conventional sense, and I personally find them very irritating due to having to constantly top it up, and what happens if you lose it, or you need to buy one for relations or friends who are visiting from overseas and all that stuff...

Why can't we go back to ordinary paper tickets!? WHY!? Get on, drop in the coins, rip the stub out of the machine and sit down. End of story.

Now we have to fumble with charging-stations, tap-on boxes that don't work half the time, and ridiculously huge fines ($200+) if we lose our cards or can't top them up.

If it is like the system we have in Seattle, the electronic cards allow "tracking". Patterns of where a specific user gets on can be stored. Along with time of getting on.
This Big-Brother approach can be especially interesting if a person's card is purchased (at a discount) through an employer.

"so Smith - why were you getting on a bus at a stop across from the office when you were supposedly at work ...?"

 

[jskeen]

I think that one of the things that I miss the most was the casual assumption that Lizzie's tagline was correct, factual, and self evident to anyone who took the time to think about it.

The humblest citizen in all the land, when clad in the armor of a righteous cause, is stronger than all the hosts of error. -- William Jennings Bryan

Should be a governing principal enshrined alongside the constitution, the bill of rights and the ten commandments. Sadly, is is as gone as the passenger pigeon and the pauper's oath as a prerequisite for public assistance (and a disqualifier for the exercise of franchise) .

 

[Flicka]

People who remember both world wars. There were plenty of them when I grew up, and now there are none (not that *remember* both).

I used to work taking care of elderly people when I was a student (about 15 years ago), and I remember one lady telling me about the first time she saw a car (it frightened the horses), and how she started a private girls school when she became a teenager, adding "that was the year before the war." She meant WWI, obviously. People younger than me won't ever meet anyone who remembers a time before there were cars...

 

[HudsonHawk]

People who remember both world wars. There were plenty of them when I grew up, and now there are none (not that *remember* both).

I used to work taking care of elderly people when I was a student (about 15 years ago), and I remember one lady telling me about the first time she saw a car (it frightened the horses), and how she started a private girls school when she became a teenager, adding "that was the year before the war." She meant WWI, obviously. People younger than me won't ever meet anyone who remembers a time before there were cars...

Interesting you say that, as the last man born in the 1800's died a few weeks ago. Jiroemon Kimura of Japan was born on April 19, 1897, and died on June 12, 2013. There are still a few living women born before 1900, however.

 

[Otis]

I think that one of the things that I miss the most was the casual assumption that Lizzie's tagline was correct, factual, and self evident to anyone who took the time to think about it.

The humblest citizen in all the land, when clad in the armor of a righteous cause, is stronger than all the hosts of error. -- William Jennings Bryan

... pauper's oath as a prerequisite for public assistance (and a disqualifier for the exercise of franchise) .

Hi, that W.J. Bryan quote may be true in the eyes of God, isn't often true in earthly history. A look at Bryan's own career reveals that. Other than the 'Cross of Gold' speech, he's best remembered for his miserable performance in the Scopes Monkey Trial. He was so utterly inept that even opponent Clarence Darrow felt sorry for him. The long-term result was Christianity was set back 50 years in the court of public opinion.

Gotta totally agree with your last line, paraphrased "go on welfare lose the vote".

 

[jskeen]

Hi, that W.J. Bryan quote may be true in the eyes of God, isn't often true in earthly history.

Gotta totally agree with your last line, paraphrased "go on welfare lose the vote".

You are correct, I should have said "I think that one of the things that I miss the most was the casual assumption that Lizzie's tagline Is Supposed to be correct, factual, and self evident to anyone who took the time to think about it. "

Nowdays the concept of "might makes right" has become the accepted MORAL reality. as opposed to the OBSERVED reality. Tilting at windmills is no longer considered a Noble, if slightly unusual profession for a Gentleman.

Perhaps I am bemoaning the loss of an outright hypocrisy, but at least people used to say they wished that "the good guy" always won, even if outnumbered, outgunned, outfinanced and outlawyered. Now it seems that most people snicker at him for trying.

 

[vitanola]

Gotta totally agree with your last line, paraphrased "go on welfare lose the vote".[/QUOTE]

Would agree that only the "right sort" of person should have the franchise. Include, of course, all of the forms of transfer from the public exchecquer which cost us so vastly much more than those things commonly called "welfare" by the folks who are so filled with resentment. Things such as the oil depletion allowance, commodity support programs, military contracts, subsidies to the airline and trucking industries, bank bailouts, the implicit TBTF subsidy, the home mortgage interest deduction, federal contracts of all kinds. Then the franchise would truly be limited to the "right sort" of person.



All three of us.

 

[Stanley Doble]

Does anyone remember IBM punch cards? They used to be in common use in factories offices and schools. The gas bill and the electric bill were on IBM cards. Then they disappeared overnight.

 

[jamespowers]

Does anyone remember IBM punch cards? They used to be in common use in factories offices and schools. The gas bill and the electric bill were on IBM cards. Then they disappeared overnight.

That has been a long time here. My mother used those punch cards when she was in accounting in 1955. They were a pain to work with.

 

[kiwilrdg]

I remember using computer cards into the 80s. The first Submarine I was on had cards, paper tape, and magnetic tape drives. The area that was once the computer now holds 9 bunks and extra storage space.

 

[jamespowers]

I remember using computer cards into the 80s. The first Submarine I was on had cards, paper tape, and magnetic tape drives. The area that was once the computer now holds 9 bunks and extra storage space.

It is hard for some to imagine how big computers once were. You also needed some type of cooling system for the danged things so they wouldn't burn up with the heat they generated.

 

[Gregg Axley]

That has been a long time here. My mother used those punch cards when she was in accounting in 1955. They were a pain to work with.

I have an older sister that showed me one back when I was a kid.
This would have been late 70's.
When I got into HS computer knowledge had progressed to the point, that we were taught how to write programs as part of the grade for "computer" class.
My program showed a picture of a dark room, then a single bulb light came on, showing a table and 2 chairs under it.
Wasn't as cool as the one that flashed the words (by verse) of Pink Floyd's Wish You Were Here.
Actually the agency I work for did use these cards to register the vehicle getting fuel at the gov't station.
The only issue was leaving the cards in the sun until they bent into a "U" shape.
Then you were screwed, unless someone put the card under a Mr Coffee urn and turned the burner on the flatten it back out.

 

[Stanley Doble]

That has been a long time here. My mother used those punch cards when she was in accounting in 1955. They were a pain to work with.

I didn't know they had already been discussed. My apologies.

 

[LizzieMaine]

Would agree that only the "right sort" of person should have the franchise. Include, of course, all of the forms of transfer from the public exchecquer which cost us so vastly much more than those things commonly called "welfare" by the folks who are so filled with resentment. Things such as the oil depletion allowance, commodity support programs, military contracts, subsidies to the airline and trucking industries, bank bailouts, the implicit TBTF subsidy, the home mortgage interest deduction, federal contracts of all kinds. Then the franchise would truly be limited to the "right sort" of person.

All three of us.

Quite so. Bryan *loathed* the Trusts and the concentration of wealth in his time in a few haughty hands, and crusaded against them. The ordinary citizens and the righteous cause he fought for were those oppressed by the wealthy. He was, after all, "The Great Commoner."

It's unfortunate that people today know Bryan only as a bitter, dying old Bible-thumper, an image owing more to "Inherit The Wind" than to the nuances of his actual beliefs. Bryan rejected belief in Darwinism not so much out of biblical literalism -- he didn't believe in the six-day creation week, for one thing -- as out of a rejection of the idea of *social* Darwinism. He believed that without the moral brake applied by religion, man would inevitably follow a course that would lead to oppression of the many by the arrogant few.

As I've mentioned before, I spent much of my childhood on welfare, and the experience left me with a work ethic that would put most Internet Cowboys to shame.

The virtue of compassion in the public discourse is a vintage thing that has disappeared in my lifetime.

 

[jamespowers]

I didn't know they had already been discussed. My apologies.

No, they weren't discussed. I just meant that they had been in use a very long time here. Then again, IBM started here so we got it directly.