Look to the past to find the true meaning of the holiday season.
“Where’s my change?” That gruff voice made my skin crawl and the only reason he was included in my errands was because he was a member, one who wanted me banished from the yacht club. Coffee was 12 cents a cup back then and my disparager had given me 15. It was common practice to allow the errand boy to keep the pennies and some small change from coffee and food orders, but this man was one of the few exceptions. I dug into my pocket and pulled out a handful of change that would soon be returned to the men who ordered food and drink and a small portion of that would be the recompense for my efforts.
The value of pennies might be considered a trifle to today’s teenagers, but they were real money in the 1950’s. Look around in the lot of your nearest coffee shop or fast food restaurant and it shouldn’t be difficult to find a penny or two. Those 3 cents the skinflint demanded could have bought me a small brown paper bag of candy. As a reference there was always a bottle return reward of 2 cents from the larger city soda distributers and we seldom found any broken class on our streets or sidewalks.
We lived in what was called the Village. A collection of well-maintained, owner-occupied, multifamily homes, with the one I lived in, just a short jog over two blocks from the productive waters of the Taunton River. There were two pharmacies, two grocery stores, one large hardware store and one small, but popular sporting goods, hardware and feed store where I spent a great deal of time, sweeping the floor, wiping down the shotguns and knives and eavesdropping on stories and tall tales about fishing, hunting, dogs, farming and the occasional gossip about very friendly ladies of the night that often visited the local taverns on Friday (payday) evenings.
There were three taverns, two diners, two gas stations and two blacksmith shops. One, Lincourts, worked primarily on cars and truck frames, but Mr. Lapre on a dirt lane close to the docks actually shoed working horses and repaired eel spears, clam tongs and quahog rakes as he catered to the needs of the boat builders and watermen. I loved running errands for him and watching skid plates, boat skegs, railings and his tending to the needs of boat owners and builders come to life in his searing forge and huge anvil. On quiet mornings I could hear him shaping metal from the open side window of our living room.
There were two social clubs, both serving delicious ethnic food washed down with Old Tap and Dawson draft beer and cheap bar whiskey, a joint family effort that smoked Portuguese sausage and Mr. Alves bakery. I often wondered how he could afford a new Buick every few years on the flavorsome steaming hot bread I bought there for 13 cents a loaf.
And of course there was a confection store selling penny candy, tobacco, newspapers and ice cream, Drakes cupcakes and tall bottles of RC Cola and Orange Crush. Whenever I had at least a nickel in my pocket, the proprietor was reluctant to leave the comfort of his big rocking chair for a kid with just three cents, I would stand on the elevated wooden plank and point out my choices through the scarred window of the glass case. I’ll bet you never bought Squirrel Nuts, Mary Janes and three peach stones for a penny. My mother could not afford to patronize Mary’s Hair Salon so she and my two nearby aunts fashioned each other’s hair, and the aroma produced from some of those concoctions could make a sensitive lad choose the cold winters outdoors rather than the noxious odors of the warm living room.
Long before malls and big box stores, there were upscale storefronts that lined the uptown sections of most communities, mine was the extensive storefronts along the sidewalks of the prestigious retailers of Fall River. A bus ride from the stop closest to my home was a nickel but, I seldom ever put a coin in that collector unless it was pouring rain or Artic blizzard cold. I ran the 3 miles and saved the nickel for shopping.
Our downtown area was a very special place during the Christmas season, it was warm and welcoming, and the bells, Christmas Carols and decorations were spectacular, especially to a boy who had taken many long evening walks with his dad after he closed the shoe store where he worked, which was located in that downtown area. I continued those walks after my father passed, many a night with tears in my eyes because I couldn’t come to grips with accepting his loss.
Window shopping was a Major League sport back then. I recall pressing my nose against the frigid glass trying to make the critical choice between buying a jelly donut or combining that nickel with the other hard won coin in my pocket and going to Kresge’s Five and Ten to buy a bag of candy to share with my siblings. Before making that critical financial decision, I warmed up in the R. A. McWhirrs department stores huge Boy Scout display imagining what I might buy if I only had 5 dollars.
I had a burning desire to join the Boy Scouts, but I dared not burden my mother with the cost of the uniform and the other necessary items needed to become a member. From there I might visit my most favorite place of all. Cornell’s Emporium, a place filled with, leather merchandise and taxidermy with shotguns and rifles, bamboo fly and boat rods with Pflueger, Ocean City, Shakespeare and Penn fishing reels that made my head spin.
As a shoe salesman for the upscale Florsheim for many years, dad developed friendships with many successful members of the business community, and it was a thank you to him to do me a favor. Mr. Cornell bought Florsheim’s and granted me the privilege to remain in the store and handle merchandise and offer explanations about fillet knives, fishing tackle and firearms. Another of my father’s customers was John MacAvoy, manager of several of the larger movie theatres. A call from dad and I was admitted, never without a candy bar, to watch a movie until Dad locked up the store and picked me up at the theatre.
Where have all those kind and considerate people gone? It would be prohibited, and considered felonious for a 15-year-old boy to carry a shotgun onto a city bus, but as a boy I did this on days when I didn’t have to work at the bakery until late evening. A woman on the bus, who I recognized as an employee of the Terminal Bakery, also rode that bus to the end of the line. She was dressed in her white uniform with the white cap and hair net that was required of sales ladies who handled pastry. She left her seat and came to sit alongside me. “Are you going to the end of the line to Allens Orchard,” she asked. “My late husband enjoyed hunting there, even on the days his only catch were red cheeks and a warming smile; it’s pleasing to see a young man like you continue to pursue what he loved.” She then cut the string and opened the big while pastry box on her lap and taking a big cream donut and wrapping it in the wax paper covering, she insisted I take this to hold me over to supper.
On most occasions I never fired a shot, but on one day I discovered where Mother’s Brook, a natural trout stream with native brookies emptied into the Taunton River. That night I ran all the way to the turnaround for the bus stop, barely making it in time, which saved me a long, dark 5-mile walk home. The driver held his hand over the fare coin receptacle and said he was declining my fare in honor of my dad who had been a regular customer on his routes.
We never owned a car or a television set until my Aunt Vi and Uncle Ted bought my mom one after my freshman year of college. We got along just fine without a car or TV as mom would say, “You can’t miss what you never had.” Several years before that on one of my “one thin dime days,” I was pressing my nose against the cold showcase window glass of that same Terminal Bakery and ogling their famous array of cakes and donuts. My stomach was saying to buy the jelly donut and satisfy my hunger but the Christmas shopper in me said no. Perhaps I would find something I could buy to share with mom and my brother and sister?
I opted to peruse the huge glass candy counters of Newberry’s Department Store where the patient ladies, also in white uniforms and arched caps, picked our selections and put them in a creased white paper bag. I recall one particularly kind lady who would watch me walk round and round the glassed-in display, saying, “Take your time sonny, I’m here until five o’clock.”
It was the week before Christmas, and upon my arrival back home, the look on my siblings’ faces when they spotted the bag was well worth rejecting the donut. My dad took very little “spending money” from his pay envelope but almost every night he would walk to the Fanny Farmer chocolate shop at the bus stop and buy mom one of their famous candy bars, that was “just for her.” As my dad was in the bedroom changing out of his business suit mom broke off little pieces of that gift of love and shared it with her children.
At this stage of my life I realize that Mom’s adage that it was better to give than receive is actually very true. A few months ago, at a fishing show I was selling off collectible books and fishing tackle my sons had declined. On three occasions I noticed this enthusiastic boy, about age 10, with his single mom overseeing him, looking through my boxes and allowed him to open up and handle anything he liked. It was apparent he did not have any or much money for tackle.
There was a large tackle box containing very old and valuable lures, many given to me by Charlie Cinto who, when living in Florida, was an ardent freshwater fisherman. I kept that box behind me and only opened it upon request of people I knew to be collectors. Near the end of the show, that boy approached me and asked to look into that special box. His mother protested but I put the box on the table next to him and allowed him to inspect all the old lures. He picked up an old Jitterbug in excellent condition and a few others. He asked how much they were and in turn I asked him what two lures in that entire box would he buy if he had the money? He was like me at the candy counter, so many lures, so little money. He settled on two and placed them on the table. I smiled while his mother looked on nervously. I put those two lures in a bag, handed them to him and told him he had to pay this forward, which his mother explained to him. I disposed of a lot of tackle and books on that day but that was the most rewarding transaction I made.
Oh, and about my question as to the whereabouts of those people I grew up alongside. I believe there are still some out there and all we have to do is carefully scratch the surface for them to reveal themselves.
Illustration for one thin dime. With his nose pressed against the cold plate glass and just one thin dime to his name there was no way he could satisfy his hunger and gift his siblings, so he passed on the donuts and bought a bag of candy he shared with his brother and sister. The good feeling was well worth the sacrifice.
