Friday, September 13, 2019

Time Machine Preview

This Sunday here at The Pocomoke Public Eye..

1916.. It's said to be the biggest event of its kind in Pocomoke in 50 years, happening at the corner of Second and Walnut Streets. 

1988.. Six new teachers join the staff of Pocomoke Middle School.

1942.. (Ad) A Pocomoke insurance agency is encouraging citizens to acquire War Damage insurance.

1899..  An issue over which town gets a Civil War Monument leads to hard feelings between residents of Accomac and Parksley.

1994.. Baseball players strike and..


Thursday, September 12, 2019

Wallops Antares Launch Scheduled

(shoredailynews.com)


WALLOPS ISLAND, Va.- NASA has announced plans to launch a rocket from the Eastern Shore of Virginia to the International Space Station next month.
Northrop Grumman’s Cygnus spacecraft will take off from the Mid-Atlantic Regional Spaceport’s Pad-0A at NASA’s Wallops Flight Facility in Accomack County as early as 2:39 p.m. Oct. 21. NASA says the goal is to deliver science investigations, supplies and equipment.

Mark Your Calendar


Tuesday, September 10, 2019

The "green thing"

 A young cashier suggested to the much older lady that she should bring her own grocery bags because plastic bags are not good for the environment. 
The woman apologized to the young girl and explained, "We didn't have this 'green thing' back in my earlier days." 
The young clerk responded, "That's our problem today. Your generation did not care enough to save our environment for future generations."
 The older lady said that she was right -- our generation didn't have the "green thing" in its day. The older lady went on to explain: 
Back then, we returned milk bottles, soda bottles and beer bottles to the store. The store sent them back to the plant to be washed and sterilized and refilled, so it could use the same bottles over and over. So they really were recycled. 
Grocery stores bagged our groceries in brown paper bags that we reused for numerous things. Most memorable besides household garbage bags was the use of brown paper bags as book covers for our school books This was to ensure that public property (the books provided for our use by the school) was not defaced by our scribbles. Then we were able to personalize our books on the brown paper bags. 
We walked up stairs because we didn't have an escalator in every store and office building. We walked to the grocery store and didn't climb into a 300-horsepower machine every time we had to go two blocks.
Back then we washed the baby's diapers because we didn't have the throw-away kind. We dried clothes on a line, not in an energy-gobbling machine burning up 220 volts. Wind and solar power really did dry our clothes back in our early days. Kids got hand-me-down clothes from their brothers or sisters, not always brand-new clothing.
Back then we had one TV, or radio, in the house -- not a TV in every room. And the TV had a small screen the size of a handkerchief (remember them?), not a screen the size of the state of Montana In the kitchen. We blended and stirred by hand because we didn't have electric machines to do everything for us. When we packaged a fragile item to send in the mail, we used wadded up old newspapers to cushion it, not Styrofoam or plastic bubble wrap. 
 Back then, we didn't fire up an engine and burn gasoline just to cut the lawn. We used a push mower that ran on human power. We exercised by working so we didn't need to go to a health club to run on treadmills that operate on electricity.
We drank from a fountain when we were thirsty instead of using a cup or a plastic bottle every time we had a drink of water. We refilled writing pens with ink instead of buying a new pen, and we replaced the razor blade in a razor instead of throwing away the whole razor just because the blade got dull.
Back then, people took the streetcar or a bus and kids rode their bikes to school or walked instead of turning their moms into a 24-hour taxi service in the family's $45,000 SUV or van, which cost more than what a whole house did before the "green thing."
We had one electrical outlet in a room, not an entire bank of sockets to power a dozen appliances. And we didn't need a computerized gadget to receive a signal beamed from satellites 23,000 miles out in space in order to find the nearest burger joint. 
But isn't it sad the current generation laments how wasteful we old folks were just because we didn't have the "green thing" back then?

Sunday, September 8, 2019

TIME MACHINE: 1940, 1937, 1994, 1891.






April, 1940


  Worcester Democrat


August, 1937

The Denton Journal


March, 1994




The News Journal (Wilmington)


May, 1891

The Peninsula Enterprise




1969..  

1978..  Happy Days, Little House On The Prairie, and The Rockford Files are favorites on TV. 



The Time Machine is a weekly feature I've enjoyed researching and compiling on The Pocomoke Public Eye since 2011.  I have fond memories of growing up in Pocomoke City and welcome reader contributions we can share about things you've read, remember, or were told relating to our Pocomoke/Eastern shore area...a sentence, a paragraph, or more all fine. Just email it.