Wednesday, April 22, 2009

So I Guess I Am A Senior




Today I was thinking about my hometown. I loved it there. Cherokee was about five or six thousand people I guess. Most people knew me or my parents or my grandparents. My brother and sister and I kind of had to watch our p’s and q’s however, just because of that.
When I was thinking about the “old days” I kind of roamed the streets in my mind. I was telling you about the Soda Shoppe the other day. There were actually three stores that had soda fountains, the other two were drug stores, one was Mallory’s which had the best hard ice cream and sugar cones, and the other one was a drug store too. Someone help me I know it started with an M.
I can remember only one shoe store, Delaplane’s. There were clothing stores that sold shoes, but they were really expensive. Mother always bought us good shoes. She thought it was important that our feet were kept in good health like the rest of our body. Delaplane’s had something really cool. It was called a fluoroscope. The person that waited on us measured our feet and took an educated guess by the tool she or he used to measure our feet. Then we got to put on our new shoes, both feet. The fluoroscope stood against the wall just waiting for young customers to show us our bones. Inside our shoes! I still can feel that thrill I used to get just looking at the bones in my feet.
I looked up the fluoroscope today. It was invented in 1924 and discontinued in the 1970’s. The reason it was discontinued was really not because of the x-ray radiation, but because what the machine showed was bones, not soft tissue. The clerk still had to feel with his/her fingers to see if the shoes were a good fit. The fluoroscope was a fifties gimmick. As I read along, there was an article that said, “If you are a senior, you will remember the fluoroscope. Well that’s all I have to say about that. Comments are welcome on this post. I would really like to know what the drug store was called that was on the corner kitty corner from the Soda Shoppe.

2 comments:

  1. Wow! Cool. Can't help you with the name. :-) I guess if you had fat feet, the flouroscope wouldn't help a bit. :-)

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  2. The drug store that you can't remember was McWilliams Drug. I don't remember it having a fountain for drinks?? We always got drinks at Mallory's or the Soda Grill. Good to remember the "old" times!!!!

    Jo

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