#old newspapers

IG:the.sparkling.reader

One of the many things that my mum and my maternal grandma have passed on to me is the love for antiques.

I love to collect objects from past eras, objects that have already lived several lives in different eras than the one in which I live, objects that have their own history. I like to fantasize about the previous owners, who they were, what they did in their life. The objects I collect are not simply objects of value (in fact most are not) but objects that have had, and still have, sentimental value, such as letters, postcards, books with dedics.

My latest purchase was this newspaper clipping from the early 1900s on a ledger from the 1830s.

It consists in multiple pages, and most of them talk about the campaigns of excavations at Nippur.

What I imagine when I have these pages in my hand is a woman of the Edwardian era, in her forties, a lover of history and archaeological discoveries, who in her free time cuts out newspaper pieces on the things that interest her most to paste them on this old and abandoned ledger, and perhaps to tell her grandchildren some adventure stories when they come to visit her.️️

Some things never change. While we didn’t get to 100 exactly last week, it got pretty close.

Woah, so that’s a big correction.

Chris got probation in August:

Rock singer Chris Robinson, 24, was sentenced to six months’ probation when he pleaded no contest to a charge of disturbing the peace during a late-night beer run. The court dismissed an assault charge.

Robinson’s group, the Black Crowes, had played a May 29 concert in Denver, when he went to a 7-Eleven for beer and was turned down because it was after midnight. He allegedly spit on another customer, Elizabeth Juergens, who asked, “Who are the Black Crowes?”1

Whitney’s concert at the Hampton Coliseum was canceled on July 2nd due to “sluggish sales”:

The July 5 concert was killed Tuesday by promoter Dimensions Unlimited of Washington, D.C. Only 2,500 of 10,000 tickets had sold, said Alysia Taylor of Dimensions Unlimited. Even additional television advertising failed to sell the show.

Taylor said a mutual decision to cancel was reached by Houston’s New Jersey-based management company and promoters. It was the first cancellation of an East Coast appearance by the singer.

“It’s horrible,” Taylor said. “I think it hurt us really badly that people got to see Whitney for free a few months ago.”

Houston’s Easter Sunday concert at Norfolk Naval Air Station aired for free on the Home Box Office cable network. 2

What exactly is a dinette? There were stores devoted to them back then, but all I’m seeing is a dining room set. Webster’s says a dinette is a “small dining table and chairs” 3

The Bushes had Graves Disease, which is a thyroid disorder. Millie had lupus.

That motorist was Rodney King. 4

Tops reached their highest in 1991. They’ve never been that high again.

This is messed up. You know how years ago I would share the bottom 100 from Spy magazine? Well, in the 1991 edition, there was an entire section of ridiculous murders : 5

I’m sure that kid is wearing cutoffs that original said “Colonial” but now they just say “COLON”. Colon shorts.

Okay, so here is the thing, the newspaper’s microfilm copy that is on ProQuest is missing the Lifestyles section. I’ll try to fill in the pieces.

There was supposed to be an article about how the Virginia Living Museum built a dinosaur exhibit in the old Miller & Rhoads department store at the Newmarket Fair Mall. I found this article from a special insert from the day before.

My dad took me to this while mom shopped at Sears. I wish I remembered more from it, I just remember that it was at the mall, and I got a cardboard dinosaur pencil case afterward. I wish I had more memories of going places with my dad, he’s not close with me anymore.

WOAH WHAT ARE THE ODDS OF THIS ARTICLE AND THIS AD RUNNING TOGETHER.

I used the Eugene Register-Guard to fill in the comics page:

oh, this was a couple of months after Elly had April, the accident baby.

You know how the strip has been in reruns since 2008? They’re currently running strips from 1993. The original strip ended right when I transferred to another college in 2008 when I was 25. We’re getting old.

Don’t ya just want to slap Jeffy sometimes?

1. Staff. ‘ROCK SINGER GETS PROBATION’. Buffalo News. Accessed 30 May 2022. https://buffalonews.com/news/rock-singer-gets-probation/article_ee81dda5-27d2-5820-91df-5e9d00d0e0b2.html.
2. Daily Press. ‘WHITNEY’S CONCERT CANCELED’. Accessed 30 May 2022. https://www.dailypress.com/news/dp-xpm-19910703-1991-07-03-9107030079-story.html.https://archive.ph/dcx7Q
3. Merriam-Webster.com Dictionary, s.v. “dinette set,” accessed May 30, 2022, https://www.merriam-webster.com/dictionary/dinette%20set.
4. UPI. ‘Attn: Editors and Publishers Reporter Fined for Refusing to Identify Source in King Case’. Accessed 30 May 2022. https://www.upi.com/Archives/1991/05/30/Attn-editors-and-publishers-Reporter-fined-for-refusing-to-identify-source-in-King-case/3514675576000/.
5. Spy. ‘Ten Most Senseless Murders in New York City This Year (so Far)’, October 1991. https://books.google.com/books?id=66y_cHgHTYYC&printsec=frontcover&lr=&rview=1&hl=en#v=twopage&q&f=true.

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This was one of my favorite parts of the newspaper when I was growing up: the little blurbs about celebrities:

1. I didn’t know that Michael Crawford was in the Los Angeles production of The Phantom of the Opera.
2. The fangirls went nuts: Hours before Sunday’s matinee, unlucky-but-hopeful fans walked around with crude hand-drawn signs saying “Desperately Need 1 Ticket” and “Please, 2 tickets.” More than 100 people sat sullen-eyed in the cancellation line as the fashionably-dressed ticket-holders walked confidently into the theater. One group of fans set up a radio scanner and an antenna at a table outside the theater, saying they could pick up the performance inside.1
3. Robert Guillaume was a Phantom! Right after I graduated from high school in 2001, I would watch Sports Night on Comedy Central after the 10am Daily Show repeat. That show tanked after he left.
4. ThePhantom movie would not come out until 2004. Michael did not star in it.
5. Sammy Davis Jr. would die just a few days after this article. So would Jim Henson, more on that in a second. I was six and I learned about Sammy Davis Jr. because he died the same day as Jim, or in my mom’s words “Kermit’s daddy”.

Living off of tabasco and snow.

In retrospect, man did those Soviet Union jokes got old. So did those what do you call it? Goodwill missions? Like this basketball game, or that episode of Head of the Class where the kids went to Russia, or the gymnastics competitions.

These “Brain Builders” by the “world’s smartest woman” Marylin vos Savant seem so stuck up, you know what I mean? Like, number 45. 122 is the exception.

There was even a shirt from Starkist:

This is something I vividly remember growing up– but since I was a kid I thought, pre dolphin safe tuna, I may of accidentally ate a bit of dolphin when we had tuna sandwiches . I found a New York Times article from around this time about how the young people felt really strongly about this cause. Is … is this why people my age were so obsessed with dolphins when we were kids? I mean, just search for Lisa Frank dolphins.

I remember my mom saving this picture of Homer and Marge for me! This article is so bonkers considering just in a few months we would get a sloo of Simpsons merchandise.

This is a big oof to the gut, considering Jim died just 15 days later. Jim’s last TV appearance was on Arsenio Hall promoting this special on May 4th.

I love how Channel 33 , which was the Fox affiliate at the time, bought an ad to let us know that the movie Tank would be on that night!

Unfortunately, Oprah’s Brewster Place show would only last 9 episodes. It was filmed at Oprah’s Harpo studios in Chicago. Harpo studios was torn down in 2016 and is now the McDonald’s headquarters. So you can’t go see where Oprah’s talk show was filmed. That’s a part of tv history that is gone.

Guess what chickenbutts? All these theaters are gone.

Newmarket South: my mommy worked there in the late 70s.

New American - Mom would take me here for $1 films in the early 90s, now its a live theater.

Riverdale Theaters - Closed in the mid 90s, was a church I think in the late 90s, now torn down for the Kroger parking lot.

Wiliamsburg Theatre - Now known as the Kimball, now is a live theater.

Village- now is a live theater.

Coliseum 4 - Across the street from Coliseum Mall, which had recently lost their movie theater to a food court around this time. I saw Lion King and Cool Runnings at Coliseum 4, and I think it closed in 1997.

Newmarket Mall 4 - Closed in the early to mid 90s when everything else was closing at Newmarket Fair Mall. I wouldn’t be surprised if the Offices at Netcenter which took over the mall uses it for some sort of auditorium. y/n?

Patrick Henry 7 - Closed in 2000, became an Old Navy, and now is a Tilt Arcade.

Beechmont Twin - Closed in 1995, is a church now?

This is just a reminder on how behind I am on posting this entry.

I forgot Nancy looked like this!

I mean, I know Ann Landers is BIG, but why would people write in to her agreeing with Secretary Sullivan? I also want to go on a deep google dive to see if any of the tennis stars Ann mentions did in fact, smoke.

Was this in the Ken Burns Baseball documentary miniseries.

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1. Los Angeles Times. “‘Phantom’ Departs Amid Cheers, Tears : Theater: Michael Crawford Ends His 3 ½-Year Stint as Star of the Hit Musical. He Will Soon Go to London to Star in the Movie Version.,” April 30, 1990. https://www.latimes.com/archives/la-xpm-1990-04-30-me-82-story.html.

So when I made that 1986 Super Bowl commercials entry a few months back, I wanted to touch more on Herb, but needed the extra time to obsessively flip through old newspapers online. I did it.

When these cryptic ads began to pop up in papers in November of 1985, people named Herb who owned money to let’s say, mob bosses began to get weary.

Of course, the parodies and jokes began to roll out:

It is still too early to tell whether Herb is doing for Burger King what Shamu has done for Sea World. But one thing is sure – other chain restaurants are intent on stealing some of Herb’s thunder. Signs at Wendy’s and Ponderosa Steak House outlets in Central Florida proclaim that Herb is too busy eating in those places to appear at Burger King. Pizza Hut, in celebration of last week’s National Pizza Week and to promote its new delivery service in this market, distributed pizza boxes containing a flier that read: “Herb won’t be eating burgers this week either.” There has even been a sighting of a trailer sign in front of a local Presbyterian church with the message: “Man does not live by bread alone, Herb.” Perhaps to fend off the exploitation of its campaign by rivals, Burger King will finally unveil Herb this week. He will surface Tuesday morning on NBC’s Today show. 1

I had to re-read this article several times to understand it.

And of course, people stole the cardboard cutouts of Herb that were in every Burger King.

I wanted to find newspaper articles about people finding Herb in their town-after all, he visited every state and parts of Canada. That was harder than I thought it would be! Turns out, sometimes, the local paper din’t care or didn’t know that Herb had arrived, I guess. I mean, before Herb made his super bowl debut, articles began popping up wondering if people would even care once Herb showed his face.

Also, I wasn’t aware that Herb showed up on Today before the commercial. How dare he!

People in York, Pennsylvania seemed annoyed by the campaign:

Also, people who were named Herb (ok, maybe one or two people) were upset, which is really stupid:

Boy, you are 32 years old, you have bigger fish to fry than to be upset over a commercial. Also, don’t remind people about Herbert Hoover. He was a terrible president.

Then, there was a guy in Colorado who looked an awful lot like Herb:

Someone got mad that he wore glasses?

and of course, the boomer jokes.

Little kids did a program for old people where they parodied old commercials. A kid attempted to dress like Herb!

In Schuykill County, Pennsylvania, kids dressed like Herb for a contest! You’re right, Kelly, Herb is funny.

Herb even made a yearbook or two.

Alright, alright, so Herb hits the road!

(these aren’t in order)

Kansas - Levenworth

Maryland - Baltimore

Nevada - Reno

Arizona - Tempe

(also an interview with Herb! Jon Menick stays in character though the interview! Just a lil guy from Wisconsin!)

Mmm! Wisconsin couldn’t make their mind up whether they were proud or embarrassed by Herb:

(also,Wisconsin - Milwaukee)

Pennsylvania - unknown

Herb visited Gimbel’s department store in Pittsburgh.

He also showed up at an American Heart Association fundraiser while in Pennsylvania.??

Montana - Bozeman

Hawaii-Hilo

North Carolina - Charlotte

Utah - West Valley City

Mississippi - Biloxi

This Herb sighting kind of bummed me out. The winner would go to the same Burger King six or seven times a day for two months. That’s redic.

Florida - Lake Worth

Ohio - [Grove City?]

Illinois - Chicago

(the Gary from the commercial! )

I thought, `Hey! That looks like Herb!’ “ said the 24-year-old Franklin Park bachelor. Like the rest of us, Sirotzke has been inundated lately with teasers about Madison Avenue’s ultimate nebbish, billed as the only American never to have set lips on a Whopper. "So I went up and asked him, and all this happened.” 2

Rhode Island - [Providence?]

]

A giggly, glossy-faced fellow with thinning hair and horn-rimmed glasses, [Herb] hiked up his pant leg to proudly display his white socks, tweaked the winner’s cheeks, and invited him to reciprocate. When Ham obliged, Herb said, “I love you. Some of the people are …,” and he made a deadly face.
As he spoke, he took a black marker to sign a huge plastic banner. Meaning to write, “Herb was here,” he got confused and wrote, “Herb was Herb.” A Burger King employee pointed out the mistake. Herb giggled, then wrote, “You was you.”
The reporters paid more attention to Herb than the customers did. If nothing else, Herb knows his way around the press. He took one reporter aside and in conspiratorial tones, promised to tell the full story behind the story when the Herb shtick ends in March. 3

Wyoming - Laramie

(from Reddit user wyoming_1)

Idaho - Twin Falls

New Mexico - Albuquerque

Texas - El Paso

El Paso broke the mold by telling people herb would be in the area that day!

I’d love to find every single Herb appearance, but I’ve been at this for hours. I’m upset I couldn’t find Virginia! Oh, wait, I forgot one – Vermont (Brattleboro) . Vermont LOVED Herb the Nerd. They went behind the scenes with him in his Jon Menick clothes! He got a haircut! The article is too big so I linked to the jpg of the newspaper scan.

Another article that’s too big is this absolutely insane article from Florida where someone found Jon Menick’s parents and did a long interview with them, including baby pictures! (1,2)

I wanted to know if the $1 million was given away! Yes! It was in Louisville, Kentucky at the still open Oxmoor Center Mall where Herb had visited a few months prior. A young man who worked at Sears won the million dollars.

Herb looks upset in that photo. Probably because it would be his last public appearance.

Before this, he appeared at Werestlemania II as a timekeeper along with Joan Rivers. All I can find is this gif. (source)

The Herb campaign was on many “worst of” 1986 lists. Along with Joan Rivers!

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1. Reed, Julia. ‘Herb Again’. Orlando Sentinel , January 20, 1986.
2. “Herb the Nerd Surfaces Auditor IDs Him, Wins $5,000 Prize.” Chicago Sun - Times, Jan 31, 1986.
3. Johnson, Maria Miro. “Herb hands out $5,000, hams it up for press Cranston man claims reward for spotting actor.” Providence Journal, February 6. 1986.

The detail that these murdered people were found in a Volvo covered by teddy bears.

Funny how I’m compiling this as I’m watching the movie Spencer.

Oh, so this was right after President Bush’s dog, Millie had babies:

Millie, the first dog, gave birth Friday night, bearing at least two puppies at the White House beauty parlor, according to Anna Perez, a spokeswoman for First Lady Barbara Bush.

The springer spaniel produced her first puppy at 9:15 p.m. and another 15 minutes later, Perez said. She said there was a possibility that more would be born.

President Bush, knowing of his wife’s concern about Millie and the pups, had a bed moved into the beauty parlor for the First Lady, Perez said. He then went to bed by himself in another room, she said. 1

Thus, the last time puppies were born at the White House. Spot, George H.W. Bush’s dog was one of Millie’s babies.

I originally read this article wrong and thought the family was ON the tennis court and the plane crashed on them. The cause wasn’t found until 1992:

The National Transportation Safety Board has blamed pilot error and improper maintenance for a twin-engine plane crash here three years ago that killed all five members of a Canadian family heading home from a Disneyland holiday.

“The pilot failed to attain adequate airspeed before maneuvering back toward the airport, which resulted in a loss of aircraft control,” the safety board said in a report on the March 31, 1989, crash. A contributing factor, the agency said, was an improperly installed part that allowed contamination of fuel injectors and a loss of power in the right engine. 2

A job spending money just to meet me for an interview, put me in a fancy hotel for an interview, is something completely foreign to me. I do not have law school in late 1990s privilege. I was too dumb for that in school. I’m still dumb.

There was an article about swimsuit help, you know? Problem is, they showed no swimsuits! I went looking for some 1989 swimsuits, and the closest I could find was the Sears catalog from 1988–but there are still ruffles!

This is a strange article for the newspaper. Connie Chung was on David’s show a few times? ok.

Here is the “a day with Connie Chung” bit, and here is part two.

Working Girl was still in the theaters! Albeit, the dollar theater, but still! That movie came out in December. I guess Forum couldn’t say they had topless dancers, so they used the word Stopless instead?

Fraggle Rock on every night during the week? Man, I miss early cable.

Oh, here we go, Funky Winkerbean disappointing us again. That’s not a joke. That’s … nothing. Where is my person who writes Sun of Stuck Funky at, I need them to look at this.

I’ve mentioned dozens of times before that my mom would read me the comics when I was little. I had completely forgotten about Adam. Little me probably confused it with Rose is Rose or something. Adam has a totally different, nearly unrecognizable look now.

So this was when department stores like Montgomery Ward and Sears began selling more name brand items and less of their in-store brands and making their electronics departments bigger.

Highland closed their doors in March of 1993. We all know what happened to Montgomery Wards in 2000 and Sears is, as always, on death’s door. Last time I checked there are about 17 left.

Well, the comic book fans had nothing to worry about, right? I’ve never seen Batman 1989–and it was the first VHS tape my dad ever bought and I STILL have never seen Batman ‘89.

Oh, boy. Nick’s. This place was a D U M P. And their logo looks like a dead Willard Scott, sorry Willard.

1. ‘Puppy Love at White House: Millie Has 2’. Los Angeles Times. 18 March 1989. https://www.latimes.com/archives/la-xpm-1989-03-18-mn-140-story.html.
2. ‘Investigators Blame Pilot for ’89 Plane Crash That Killed 5 : Report: Safety Board Said Improper Installation of a Part on Twin-Engine Craft Contributed to Death of Canadian Family.’ Los Angeles Times. 4 July 1992. https://www.latimes.com/archives/la-xpm-1992-07-04-me-1087-story.html.

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This paper starts off with a big one, famous people came to town!

The democratic presidential candidates came to William & Mary for a debate shortly before the super Tuesday primaries. Jesse Jackson won Virginia.

and he picked up a little girl.

I always like finding nightmare material, and here is one. At 3am a truck full of stale bread caught fire inside the tunnel.

Copy Cat has a fax machine now! Attention! Attention!

Everything’s a $1.00! My mom practically lived in the one at Newmarket North Mall at the time. This was pre-Dollar Tree, from what I understand reading this archived article, what would eventually become Dollar Tree bought them out.

This article calling out how poorly the united States did at the recent Winter Olympics is uncalled for. Man, no wonder Debi Thomas went nuts, look at how the media treated her after she won a bronze medal.

I saw this photo before scrolling do the caption, and I thought that Mike had just had his wisdom teeth taken out.

Please get Pasquale away from the lit candle.

Early Aunt Gayle mention.

So taboo! Check out the raphic they used for this article:

That time Ken married Lucille Ball.

honk honk, we have a Sears messing up alert.

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Aftertwo monthsofcomplete flops, I finally have a good newspaper. So good, it might be two parts. Nah, I’m making you guys sit though all thirty something images.

Anybody else thought Jorel was a burnt up C3PO at first?

I looked up the memorial and while Judith’s name is fixed, you can clearly tell it’s been fixed.

I forget a lot about what all Montgomery Ward had. Mom and I never really went in there, and they closed when I was a senior in high school in 2001.

Like, they had paint? I want one of those paint cans, it has a kitty on it.

Getting big McDowell’s vibes from this. I tried to find an article about Mac Donald in Iran, and the closest thing I found was in 2015, there was a place called “Mash Donalds”.

HQ was a regional hardware store that started in nearby Virginia Beach. I had totally forgot about the animated H and Q mascots, and that one time I tried drawing them when I was a kid. HQ closed up shop in 1999.

Here’s another whimisical illustrated ad.

Oh, is this the beginning of E-Z Pass-like technology?

Hm, I don’t consider Baskin-Robbins a fast food chain. I mean, it’s just ice cream. Also, upper middle class people were getting their 31 flavors on back in 1986.

I wish this article was more about the California Raisins then people pooh poohin’ on raisins. I’ve never heard of the Fresno mini series. It had Dabney Coleman in it, I love him!

1. I’m surprised the NIE went with U.S. Acres (Jim Davis’ other comic strip, and the part of Garfield and Friends everybody fast forwards though) to promote the Newspaper in education Week.
2. I’m 38, so I guess I can’t color Orson and his friends.
3. Why isn’t Sheldon saying anything.

Why do I remember this Butcher Shoppe logo from 35 years ago?!

You got a dozen roses if you bought a car from Newmarket Hyundai. It would be funny to show this pic to a small child and tell them that this was one of the first Hyundai cars in America. I mean, you think of THIS when you see a Hyundai now:

Sooo, I died when I saw this, but I briefly came back to life to tell everybody about this. Mercury Mall was a small mall in Hampton, the oldest one in the area, opening in 1967. Only a few pictures survive online of the place, from the Daily Press’ website:

Obviously, when Coliseum Mall opened down the street a few years later, there were more shopping choices in the area. Montgomery Ward left, and moved to the Coliseum Mall in 1983, and that seems to be when the mall fell into disrepair. My whole life, I thought this place had shut down as a mall in the early 1980s, this sad lil guy held on until 1987! A Burlington Coat Factory put in the mall’s place. That Burlington always felt so ancient, that was another reason why I thought that the mall was gone by the early 80s.

The whole complex was torn down in the early to mid 2000s. Burlington moved to Coliseum Mall, killed the mall, and was brought back in nearly its same exact spot where it started back in 1987. Here’s more details.

Who wants to imagine that Oprah was on stage for about 30 minutes, but Lorraine, the Shisedio lady was on for like, an hour talking about the Replica Skin Diagnostic System after Oprah’s speech. And you couldn’t leave.

This whole time I thought Jason Bateman did lose his virginity in this episode.

I found one of these on eBay, going for the whopping price of …. thirteen dollars.

“Wish it, want it, do it” - Brian Griffin

Whooo, look at the “jungle mirage” sheet set from Kmart.

Also, piggy dippin on those dishtowels!

JCPenney still thought it was the late 70s.

These desks are never productive. You can’t fit anything on them!

Don’t buy you girl lingerie from Roses. What’s up with the dragonfly? underwear?

3M invented Post-It notes, who is Plymouth?

Remember these stinky lil things? People now have Bath & Body Works and Yankee Candle, but we had these.

That poor boy. That poor poor boy.

I remember Correctol looking like straight up candy.

These were shampoos made by L'Envie that were supposed to smell like popular perfumes at the time. ew?

I forgot about the brownie mix that came with the CAN of Hershey’s Syrup that always tasted better than the bottle.

Finally, I have two comics. This was around the time my mom began reading the comics to me. I didn’t know what my mom’s mom looked like until I was 12, because she lived so far away, the last time she had visited me was when I was a baby. So whenever I imagined her, I imagined her looking like Maw from Snuffy Smith?!

Also, when learning how to read, I totally thought the Biography comic strip was called “Broadway”. I was a pretty dumb kid.

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This magazine was for Teen girls. Teen.Girls.

Oh, these ugly boxes were everywhere back then.

The nearly $3,000 Sony ViewCam is the most expensive item in this list. The Sega Activator didn’t go over very well.

A shirt with Valley Girl phrases on it.

No child wanted this three hundred dollar globe in 1996.

Why is this tuxedo box of Godiva so expensive?

Yes, its a Pop Up Video book!

Um, this looks homemade. Why is it strapped on the seat arm like a pointe shoe?

Oh man, this is the worst one! Olympics Triplecast was a huge flop that I brought up years ago.

Don’t give your male bio teacher with a “wild side” BATH OIL. That’s not hot. That’ll send you to the principal or the guidance counselor.

Related: Siskel & Ebert’s gift ideas

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I was so disappointed by this month’s newspaper. It’s 500 and something pages of mostly very dark microfilm scans of salespapers. 

(source, L.A. Beast) 

Teddy Ruxpin was the big toy that year. Also, Herman’s screwed up. 

Does anybody know the episode of The Purple Stuff Podcast where Matt & Jay discuss a Teddy Ruxpin commercial where the boy has a very Staten Island accent? 

“He tawks…” 

Here are more details from the L.A. Times about the Foxes struggle living in the Elmwood neighborhood: 

A black couple, Marietta Bloxom, a 25-year-old department store supervisor, and Charles Williams, a 23-year-old worker at a fast-food hamburger chain, learned this the hard way when they moved to Elmwood from an apartment in a black neighborhood Oct. 31.

So, too, did Gerald and Carol Fox, a black man and a white woman who moved in 2 ½ weeks later and three blocks away. Bloxom said she was unprepared for the hostility that greeted them: windows shattered by BBs, bottles tossed at the house, a demonstration by 400 whites outside the house Nov. 20.At the Fox house, where 200 whites milled about and chanted the following night, vandals had by then already axed kitchen cabinets, destroyed a lamp, a clock radio and the water and oil heaters, and left behind a broken bottle stuffed with a rag soaked in gasoline. The night of the demonstration, reporters watched deli workers pass out free coffee to protesters. Bloxom and Williams’ home was later gutted by fire from an arsonist, even they were packing to leave Elmwood. The Foxes, however, say they are staying. 1

Someone get Malloy and Reed on the case! I love that silly show so much, Adam-12. I watch it every day after work on metv. 

OH, YOU DON’T SAY. 

I included that Canon ad because I love that building. I think this was around the area where I went to that ripoff for profit school after high school. 

Guess what, chicken butts. From here on out, its just gonna be salespapers. 

My parents have those marble top tables, and who knew they came from People’s Drug?!

Mmm, I don’t like the name of those lights. 

I had a tiny chuckle when I saw that Sherwin Williams the paint store at one time had a drugstore. Then, I got bored to death reading about the history of the store.

Remember when Rob from Theadbanger on YouTube had a robot? I think he’s the $50 one, modified: 

(Montgomery Ward)

I had NO clue that Furskins were THIS expensive. I feel like I had a little one from Shoneys? I want to say?  It was Wendys! 

I love the ripoff that is the Cabbage Patch Twins. You’re getting two of the same doll for $70. This had to be around the time that the Cabbage Patch craze was dying down, too. 

I was wondering why these were NINETY DOLLARS. Then I saw the little girl! Don’t you want that giant Garfield?! I know I do! 

The PEN-GUIN bathroom. 

DUCK bathroom. 

I said this a few years ago, but back then we flew too close to the sun with the microwave back then. 

I love that a fancy store like Thalhimers sold bag clips. I’m fascinated by the potato baker. Also, I didn’t know salad spinners existed back then!

Aaaaghg I want to see this in color so bad!  (Murphy’s Mart)

omg I want her, she’s so adorable! 

More crap that didn’t work for the microwave. 

We all know that this is just the “do not eat” packets that come with shoes. 

Things that wouldn’t fly in 2021. 

Thislooks ingenious, but I feel like with today’s packaging, you couldn’t use it. 

Years ago, I posted a similar ad on my Flickr, and I though the idea was gross, reusing your teabags. I got attacked so bad! I can’t be the only one who doesn’t reuse their tea bags, because they get weak, you know? 

(Herman’s)

I’ll be back … next month with another newspaper.

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1. “Racial Protest Splits Urban Neighborhood : Philadelphia Black Couple Forced to Move; Interracial Pair Plans to Stay Despite Threats.” Los Angeles Times, December 29, 1985. https://www.latimes.com/archives/la-xpm-1985-12-29-mn-25919-story.html. https://archive.md/giPIO 

Ok, so here’s the thing, for some reason ProQuest doesn’t have any issues of my local newspaper for the tail end of 1983. So I’ll have to go back and cover 1983 in January.  Maybe this was a good mistake – November 1, 1984 was a beast of a newspaper, full of ads, and the food section and the neighbors section! 

The Bowditch Ford logo always annoyed me from a design perspective. It looks like someone’s 12 year old kid drew the logo, and an adult drew the king. 

I can’t help but wonder if Zola retired so quickly after the 1984 Olympics because of the bumping incident with Mary Decker. I mentioned it before in one of my Favorite Commercial posts (of all places!). However, her retirement was short lived, she returned to the Olympics, competing for South Africa in 1992. 

aw, wedding hat! 

Maybe because I watch Adam-12 every day after work, but I’m getting big Adam-12 vibes from this troupe of “Angels” who watched over a neighborhood in Newport News on Halloween. 

The Dalkon Shield was a IUD like device that was discontinued due to harmful side effects from bacteria getting into the string. It looks like a scary ladybug attached to a string. 

A&N’s ads looked pretty much like this up until the time they shut down in 2008. 

I didn’t know we had Bradlees in Hampton back in 1984! Bradlees is just a store I don’t remember, because it left the Hampton Roads area back around 1989 when I was only six. It wasn’t a store my family frequented, like Sears of Kmart. I like that our local bus company, Pentran makes a special stop at Bradlees on Mondays through Saturdays. 

‘Yall know Company Man on Youtube? He needs to do a vid on the rise and fall of GNC. If you’ve been to a dead mall in the last 20 years, you know GNC because its the only store there along with Bath & Body Works. Walls and walls of protein powder and supplements that haven’t been touched in 5 years. The GNC of 1984 actually had real food like Tuna and raisins, yogurt and prunes. It’s kinda funny to think about going to the mall to buy tuna and peanut butter. 

I hope Jim Fuhs the lasagna making fireman is still with us today. 

I’m thinking that Farm Fresh used to be a lot larger back in the day, or they sold a lot less food. The Mr. T doll and Montgomery Moose! 

There has to be a catch on that $99 computer. 

Fae, the baby with the baboon heart died a couple of weeks after this article. 

This was back when we flew too close to the sun and thought we could cook anything including roast, cakes, and muffins in the microwave. 

 Here is the commercial for the E.T. Vitamins. Mr. Big reminds me of that episode of King of the Hill where Hank and the boys kidnap Dale’s new lawnmower.It wasn’t that episode, oops.  Yall know the scene. 

~Mr. Big~

well…i investigated where the Shoney’s once was in Hampton. It’s some dump for construction vehicles– I think the restaurant was long torn down, but look: 

they kept the sign! You can see the “S” a little. 

There was a York Steak House at Newmarket North Mall?! 

Ok, Beautyland. Good thing people didn’t care too much about copyright back in 1984. 

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October 1st’s paper started with something I covered way in the beginning, the Tylenol Murders. 

You don’t hear too many stories about women killing police officers, let alone someone stabbing a police officer. Also I can’t imagine the phrase “gone berserk” used in a newspaper today. I can’t find anything about Addie Hardy. 

omg, the rod that won employee of the month at the Springfield Nuclear Plant was on the loose. 

I wonder where the coffee shop was at JCPenney in the old Coliseum Mall. I saw that JCPenney still operates a (modern) coffee shop at one location in Hurst, Texas. 

Before we started using the term “ATM Machine”, ATM’s used to be called all sorts of cutsey names. Ours was called “Beacon”, and I still remember my dad going to the one on Woodland Road and I would wait in the car and watch him.

I didn’t know that Thalhimers sold electronics. That clock radio was originally $55! And we complain about the prices of things now!

Just posting because I love that little Western Store logo.

Yeah, newspaper, tell all the creeps what subdivision the little girl lives in.

Man,Golden Goat. There’s something I haven’t thought of since I was like, six. My family never used it, but I remember seeing them when I was really little.

This ad was amazing — until I saw they spelled JCPenney wrong. 

The Village Shops at Kingsmill in Williamsburg is apparently nearly all vacant and looking for new development. That place was a poop hole when I went to community college down the street from here like, 18 years ago. 

I can’t tell if the illustrations for this Lou Smith’s grocery store are charming or disturbing. Much like the “Kroger People” of today. 

Big fail over at Circuit City. 

wowow, look at all the movies. Yes, Giorgio was a movie that the How Did This Get Made? podcast covered, but I missed the episode and now it’s scrubbed off the internet. 

ooof, the King James was the ~scary motel~ by the time my memories start. Surprisingly, the Fox Den was still open as late as 1994!

…a gorilla gathering. 

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(August, 1980)

September wasn’t nearly as exciting as August, 1980 was. Then I remembered that it was a Tuesday after a holiday, and the kids were going back to school, so no wonder it was a slow news day. 

I love the “the surprising thing is that when you get these people off the ship, we’re still getting the same amount of work done” quote. I feeelthat so much. We’ve all worked with thatperson.

RIP. 

well, knock on wood, a plane has never crashed at Lynnhaven Mall in Virginia Beach. Here’s WAVY’s news archive of the grand opening, and the ribbon cutting. 

I forgot that Elizabeth Taylor was still married to Senator John Warner at this point. They had about a year left. 

okay, I love that Hoover Portable. Just throw that lil guy in the closet when you’re done. 

huck-a-poo

That filler paper seems expensive for the time. y/n. Its .99 at Target right now. 

The Muppet Lunchbox!! 

sooooo they noticed that drug dealers liked malt liqour, so they dressed an officer up like the bull from the Schlitz Malt Liquor commercials to make arrests. And their badges were made from malt liquor cans?? okay.

b u t t e r b e a n s 

(Dean & Dons over on Warwick is still going)

Me on social media. 

I keep forgetting that Nermal the Kitten is a boy cat. Because on Garfield and Friends Nermal had a female voice. Right?

I wanna know why the train stopped for the guy who flagged it down. 

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