Retro Reminiscing Video and Pictures – Do You Remember
online community focused on sharing and reminiscing about video, audio, and images that stir our memories of the past – old television, theme songs, commercials, print advertisements, the sights and sounds you remember
I’m pleased to welcome Ken Lynch to TheRetroSite.com! I’ve known Ken for over 40 years when we served together on an aircraft carrier while in the US Navy. Ken has a fun wit and has Andy Rooney-ish delivery in his observations of the world. Today’s observation is buying clothes during the pandemic.
If you were a hippy back in the 60’s you are now in your 70’s. Many could be in nursing homes now! Hard to believe! Well, here is a funny parody that aired on Saturday Night Live back in the 70’s.
Maureen McCormick recently shared this publicity photo on social media of a 1972 Easter publicity photo. The Brady Bunch never did an Easter themed show but they are decked out in their Easter best! I wonder if they are wearing Buster Brown shoes? I guess mom (Carol Brady) took the photo as she is not in the photo!
In 1957, spaghetti was not a common food in Britain. It was mainly available in cans pre-made, so at the time not alot of people knew how pasta was made. The BBC made a three minute report on their show Panorama about a Swiss family harvesting their spaghetti from trees.
It was viewed by over 7 million people and the next day the BBC received hundreds of calls asking for the authenticity of the report or how they could grow their own spaghetti trees.
I remember my mom telling this story as a child and was happy to see it years later. CNN said “the biggest hoax that any reputable news establishment ever pulled” I’d say maybe second best right behind War of Worlds radio broadcast.
Richard F. Outcault create the Buster Brown comic strip in 1902 which first appeared in the New York Herald. Buster was named after Buster Keaton who was at the time a child vaudeville actor. In 1904 Outcault went to the St. Louis World Fair, selling licenses for the character and the Brown Shoe Company purchased the and introduced to the Buster Brown Shoe Company to the world at the fair. In the 40’s and 50’s Buster Brown Shoes introduced a comic book as a give-a-way, prompting the stores to rubber stamp their business name and address on the comic book.
Many of you may remember the jingle
“I’m Buster Brown, and I live in a shoe. That’s my dog, Tige, and he lives there, too,” Tige was a pit-bull terrier and his sister’s name was Mary Jane.
In 2015, the company rebranded as Calares which in Latin means passion. You may know them today as Naturalizer, Dr. Scholl’s Shoes, LifeStride, Bzees, and Rykä.
Fizzies came in seven flavors- orange, cherry, grape, lemon-lime, strawberry, and root beer. Each package contained eight tablets for just eighteen cents. The tablets were made by the Emerson Drug Company, the same company that made Bromo-Seltzer in 1957. In 1962 Warner-Lambert bought the company and made Fizzies available internationally.
You simply dropped a tablet into water and watched the water come to life with bubbles as it turned the water to the color of the flavor. My memory was that it gave a diluted flavor to the water. Adding additional tablets did little more to add flavor. Was my memory the same as yours?
By 1968 Fizzies had double the sales of Kool-Aid. Fizzies were sweetened by either cyclamates or saccharin which were both banned by the Food and Drug Administration. They reissued the tablets with instructions to add sugar, but by then the attraction to Fizzies fizzled out.
Fizzies made a come back in the 1990’s sweetened with NutriSweet but it was short lived when the company went out of business. There was also another short-lived attempt to revive the product in the early 2000’s but only lasted until 2016. Probably the closest on the market today would be the orange flavored Airborne Immune Support Supplement.
Its easy to want to remember a person from the character they played on TV not realizing they actually grow up. This was the case back in 2010 when child actress Erica Rhodes, now known as Danielle Vega who played Kim on Barney and Friends. She tried to shake her little girl image when she appeared on American Idol. She wanted to show the world that “little girls do grow up”. She made it through the first round but was later cut.
She was born on February 4, 1986 and at the time of this writing (March 2021) is 35 years old. She is currently playing the role of Ceci on Hulu’s drama series East Los High.
In a new feature on the Retro Site we will explore the lives of the comedians of our most popular video Send in the Clowns, today we will explore the life of Jimmy Durante.
Most people today probably know Jimmy Durante as the narrator on the animated special Frosty The Snowman we see each December.
Jimmy Francis was born in 1893 in Manhattan, New York. He quit school in the seventh grade to become a full-time ragtime pianist. He teamed up with his cousin, also named Jimmy Durante but quickly out grew his cousin’s skill set and joined one of New York’s most recognizable bands the Original New Orleans Jazz Band. Durante was the only member from New York. Jimmy was then known as “Ragtime Jimmy”.
In the mid-20’s Durante became a vaudeville star and radio personality. In the 30’s Durante was bouncing back and forth between Hollywood and Broadway. It was the Broadway musical Jumbo when Durante where the expression “Elephant in the Room” came about!
His comedic style first started by interrupting a song for a joke. In 1934 he had a hit song “Inka Dinka Doo” which became his theme song for the rest of his life. In the 1993 movie Sleepless in Seattle which he sang Make Someone Happy in the opening and closing credits. His version of As Time Goes By was also featured in the soundtrack.
Jimmy hated his nose in his younger days but found it to be his biggest asset in movies and television. He made fun of it more than any critic could have.
Jimmy Durante was first married to Jeanne Olson on June 19, 1921 but she expectantly died on Valentine’s Day, 1943 of a heart ailment. Jimmy would sign off all of his shows with “Goodnight Mrs. Calabash, wherever you are”. Many thought he was referring to a waitress in Calabash, North Carolina. In a 1966 at a National Press Club Meeting Durante said he and his wife stopped at the diner and his wife liked the name Calabash which became her pet name and it was a tribute to his wife.
It wasn’t until 1960 until he met his second wife, Margie Little. He would kid around with the audience on his TV show and Margie was often the target of his clowning around with the audience. Margie was 41 and Jimmy was 67 when the married. They adopted a baby, Cecilia Alicia on Christmas Day 1961.
By now Durante was a beloved actor on TV. His gravelly lower east side New York accent made him one of the most familiar and beloved personalities. His gravely voice and butchering of the English language inspired the cartoon Augie Doggie/ Durante was Doggie Daddy in which he’d famously quipped “Dat’s my boy”! Jimmy also did a number of commercials for Kellog’s during the 1960’s. He also pitched for the 1973 Volkswagen about it being a big car enough for his schnozzola and his “companions”.
He often hosted ABC’s Hollywood Palace during the 1960. His last appearance was on the Jimmy Durante Presents the Lennon Sisters Hour which ran for just one year.
Durante retired from performing in 1972 after he became wheelchair bound. He died of pneumonia on January 29, 1980 just shy of his 87th birthday.
Tiger the dog and Fluffy the cat were the center of chaos at the wedding of Carol and Mike Brady’s marriage in the pilot episode. Fluffy was never seen again but Tiger was seen in a few episodes. In season two Tiger was hit by a vehicle and killed on the Paramount film set. Some say it was an automobile, others say it was a flower or pizza delivery truck.
The trainer never told the studio or the show’s creator Sherwood Schwartz. Not knowing what to do the trainer found a look-a-like from the pound that was untrained. They still had scenes to record for the episode. Of course with the dog being untrained the dog kept running off set. To complete the scene they had to nail to dog’s collar to the set to keep the dog in position. “Tiger” was never used again but you kept seeing his dog house even to the end of the series. The reason was that during production early on in the series a studio light fell on the Brady’s artificial turf backyard and burned a hole in it. The dog house was placed over it to hide the burn mark!
Here is an interview with Brady Bunch Creator Sherwood Schwartz on the incident:
March 30, 1999
Busch Gardens, Williamsburg, Virginia introduces to the public their new rollercoaster they named Apollo’s Chariot. What better way to promote it than to hire Fabio who has graced numerous romance novels and has been compared to Apollo. The press was invited, and the cameras rolled as Fabio donned in a red velvet cape was led to the rollercoaster with women dressed as goddesses, two on each side of him to the front car for the inaugural ride.
As the rollercoaster zoomed at 70mph down the first drop of the ride, a goose nesting nearby flew into the speeding ride hitting the front of the car and bouncing off and hitting Fabio in the face. In full view of the media, the cameras show the ride coming to an end with Fabio’s face all bloodied. No bones were broken but there was swelling. The goose however died from the impact. The press was then ushered from the event.
Busch Gardens released a statement saying: “Safety is our number one priority, and our ride engineers are examining ways to enhance the safety of an already safe ride.” Fabio went on Good Morning America and stated “”It was not a freak accident, and it’s going to happen again,” Fabio said. “A person — or even a child — can be killed.” It’s been over 20 years since the incident and not one person was ever struck by a bird. If you go on YouTube you sill see a couple of incidents but it is very rare. I’d love to know the odds of this happening.
