June 02, 2005

• $6.88 for a fifth of Early Times! Scandalous! Seriously, love these time capsule things, nice post.
• ah yes! if only there were a time capsule for buying bourbon!! great post, chyren! the pictures are utterly compelling, the decor, utterly...something
• The clown portraits on the walls will scar me forever.
• plaid doubleknit polyester bananas
• I had no idea the Bee Gees' parents owned a liquor store.
• Old
• No, not Huntington Beach, if one of the last photos in last page is correct. In the background was a sign that said "Cinema Props" which was a prop house here in Hollywood, which operated until about six or eight years ago on La Brea Blvd.
• Well spotted, squidders. I love those two 'bee gees' pictures. Ima paste my head on one of those dueds and use it as an avatar. :D My gran's got some albums with pictures of our folks that look a bit like some of these viz the clothes, but by christ at least they had better taste in decor. The couches! OMG! The chandeliers! OMFG! The paintings! MY EYES! THEY BLEED!!!
• ooh I LOVE the green couch. seriously...its fantastic!!
• Awesome. I love this kind of shit. BTW, monkey plug: Big Happy Funhouse is jam-packed with this goodness, if you dig this stuff. Run by...Argh, if memory serves. Fucking wonderful photoblog.
• Yeah, BFH is argh's place. It's good, too.
• (BHF)
• Best FPP evar evar evar? /adores retro despite being too young to even really appreciate it
• /adores retro despite being too young to even really appreciate it How cute, you little whippersnapper.
• I think I just found new desktop wallpaper for the next few months! The photo of the family standing in front of the Stella Artois building is my absolute favorite. That hat, that suit . . . sigh!
• I can imagine exactly what that house with the gold curtains smells like. These pictures are amazingly evocative. And I would kill for that blue triangle-print dress the redhead is wearing on the ferry. Ooh, and the green one with the peter pan collar! Wow.
• I love the shot of the older guy standing on the lawn in front of (behind?) the house, the way he's kind of leaning slightly away from the house, as though trying to escape its pull.
• It's interesting how people dressed up to go out in public in the 1960s. Maybe as Fernando said: it's better to look good than to feel good.
• Stuff like this is great, but also kind of sad sometimes too. Usually the only way photos like this get sold is when the people who owned them died and either they had no next of kin to take them, or that person did not want them. A bit sad either way. At least the internet will remember them and wonder what kind of people they were.
• Good God, I had a hard time breathing while looking at these photos. I remember those times, constantly surrounded by smoke, everything tinged with nicotine, very little light coming thru heavy brocade drapery, colors that should never have gone together, not to mention the 'atrocious beyond belief' taste in artwork (if you can call it that) and fashion. Everyone drank, everyone smoked, everyone played cards......yep, takes me back, and I am ony 39. I have to agree with Medusa, though, that green couch kicks ass. I will never get the whole 'plastic covered furniture' thing, though.
• Because with all those toxins in their bodies, people in the 70s sweated pure brown crude oil into the orange velvet.
• How cute, you little whippersnapper. *whips, snaps, drinks, smokes, covers furniture with plastic*
• Those shots on the beach at Lake Tahoe. The old dudes are walking on the beach in dress slacks and shoes. Yeah, I remeber those days. And I'm really glad they're gone.
• Note the huge helmets of hair on these ladies.
• chy, i absolutely love you. this is spectacular. oh and Mfpb, your time will come. in 30 or 40 years you'll run across pics of what you're wearing right now, and how your house is decorated, and cringe. trust me on this one.
• I love the hideous migrating landscape painting with the four spindly trees: it's above the bed! No, wait! It's above the brown plastic covered couch! Now it's over the bar... (This family's collection of paintings is truly the worst I've ever seen. I feel like I need to bathe now)
• I've got some old family pics showing my grandparents, great aunts & uncles, etc., in their (my grandparents') tavern. The cigarette always held in one hand... a bottle Simon Pure Ale or Utica Club Beer in the other.
• Great find Chy. These people remind me so much of my grandparents. Why does no one take pictures at the dinner table anymore?
• These are gorgeous. I think the redhead is the daughter in law - I like the resigned look on her face in the boat shot. And the ladies' purses! I love the big white purses! When I was a kid my mother made sure we were dressed up to go anywhere - older parents, and it was the 70s by then, so we stood out, ready to be taunted, dressed as the leprous nerds we were. Oh god I'll never forget the black patent leather mary janes and the gloves and the horrible, horrible seersucker in the summer, wool kilt in the winter: just to go to the dentists' office, or to get on an airplane or anything. I wonder when that changed: when did it become acceptable to walk out of your house in casual clothes?
• Who says the internets are dead!? Thanks again, Chy, for a great post. I'm there with you grover96. I was really enjoying the retro-atmosphere, sniffing the yellowed-plastic on the polyester-covered davenport, the aroma of freshly sprayed Hair Net wafting in the air, Chuck Mangione biting his finger nails, and then, the CLOWNS! Satan is a cupcake, clowns are pure evil! I espied a clown jumping out of her beehive!
• *shudder*
• I wonder when that changed: when did it become acceptable to walk out of your house in casual clothes? I think there's an immigrant (or immigrant community) thing going on with respect to "dressing to go out". My family (Polish), in early generations, wanted to avoid the label of ignorance; rather, they wanted to paint a picture of refined aristocracy (to hide their blue-collar nature). Thus, I have pictures of my great-grandfather, an immigrant and tool maker in a foundry, digging in his back yard garden, wearing a white shirt, vest and tie (and the tie is not loosened), and usually a pipe hanging from his mouth (also believed to be an accessory of the refined people). A few generations after arriving, a family begins to grasp what being American is all about- and part of that is the manner of dress. I know people who belong to more recent immigrant groups (Indian, Filipino) that seem to be following the same pattern: A more formal style of dress for the immigrants and perhaps their children, and somewhere between the first and second generation (maybe the third even), there is a realization that their projected image is not aligned with the American mainstream and the result is switching to less formal clothing.
• (just wanted to make it clear... along with the white shirt, vest and tie, great-gramps also had pants on!)
• This is an excellent photo-study of the social conditions and activities of this family. Excellent post! Now wouldnt it be fantastic if surviving members of the family were able to comment here (and become honorary Monkeyfilter members too!)
• /adores retro despite being too young to even really appreciate it Gedorff my lawn, you funky little whippersnapper! *shakes retro stick at Muffpub D'hicky: Whew, I thought you were perhaps a cousing of petebest or something. Do you think pants-less is a genetic trait? Carried on the paternal (farting) side, of course.
• It's rather sad that anyone would get rid of family photos like these.
• It's possible that no one in the family is still alive. Anyone who frequents estate sales is well-aware of this; family photos, letters, postcard, etc. are usually bountiful in such sales. I always found it strange, having been to countless estate sales, contemplating the history and people behind such objects that were obviously priceless items to someone at one point in time...
• The really sad part is when you're emptying out an estate and they actually hand you the family photo album and say "Here, we don't need this". I often wonder what the hell happened in their lives that they don't want a visual record of who they were.
• we should all post our baby pics anonymously somewhere and try to figure out who's who. heh.
• or prom pics. that's PROM, not PRON.
• No that's pron. (I had a great prom)
• This guy is the coolest person in their family. But that outfit look's like it'd be really hot, with those palm trees behind him. This one is another favorite.
• oh and we made j-walk blog with this link!
• So what's with the shirtless guy in a van, interspersed with the rest of the photos?
• that's the son. You can tell he's experimenting with . . . life and stuff. The retro family album of pr0n shots is not something for an FPP. Heck we barely survived the Brown Bunny post. And GramMa, farting does not just come from the dad's side. Although I wouldn't go in there for awhile if I was you.
• Lovely. They're just SO PROUD to be in Antwerp.
• Bibliochick, I have been mulling over the wandering spindly-tree picture for a while now. I can only conclude that it is so hideous, that local zoning code prohibits its permanent display in one room of the house. On the other hand, it might be kind of fun and disorienting to switch all my pictures around. Could make a great party game.
• Good eye, bibliochick, I didn't notice the wandering painting before. Maybe they loved it so much, they bought 3 copies? Perhaps Woolworth's was having a sale.
• Fabulous. All the photos belong on Mik Wright cards.
• Watching those, for a moment, I began to see familiar faces, recall similar events and pictures from my family's... (no, we didn't own anything of those hideous clown paintings, luckily) The photos of the hippy cousin, the trip to this or that place, the family all dressed up, out to party... I wonder who, in 40 years, will look over my own pictures and videos. And what will they think about.
• /them
• Yean, I concur. I have old videos that we cant't even watch anymore. I think about the slides that my parents have from the 70's and 80's and I am truly saddened. I used to think my sister over-documented her life, but not anymore. Now, so much is lost.
• Because with all those toxins in their bodies, people in the 70s sweated pure brown crude oil into the orange velvet. Thanks Chyren, I laughed so hard that my 70's-passive-smoke-killed lungs ruptured... That explains why there was so much brown & orange furniture our family photos! Wow. not to mention the big orange paisley and white cigarette-stained curtains mum had in the living room. I still wake up screaming.
• I suppose we should be thankful for the seventies making all other decades to follow much prettier.
• This is nice, and reminds me of the Avocado Memories. hello natalie too, but photos look like they were found in better condition.
• The woman reminds me of Ruth Gordon. Also, this picture is especially sweet.
• Great old Nova Scotia faces. Check out the Corn Boil!
• Weel, now. tick, if that doesn't fetch the tourists in droves, I dunno what will. Come! Make haste! Be quick! Shake your shins! See Bluenoses feeding in their native habitat! See them lunching round the table, aye, watch them cavort, caper on the ice! Oops! Listen to their cries of anguish! Yea, visit them in hospital! ...And if these pleasures may thee move, visit Nova Scotia, but not for love -- ...bring credit cards! autograph cheques! Become a spent force in beautiful Nova Scotia