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Dave Mellor NJ

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Interesting that a "One Spot Flea Killer" was offered that far back. It hasn't been that long that products like "Frontline" have been available. Until then only things like flea powder, flea collars and flea dip were available. And the dip was only for the bad cases.

The sign behind that looks like part of the word Insects and maybe Play?

Found this on Flicker.

http://www.flickr.com/photos/worldslargestthings/3534110776/

Edited by Shop Rat (see edit history)
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Guest Jim_Edwards
We just updated our town's zoning regulations and finally eliminated all references to "trailer camps" and "trailer courts". Notice the very flat tire on the trailer in the foreground. Looks like it's been there for a while.

How many decades had it been since any business operated as either in your part of Pennsylvania?

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The combination of Meadow Gold and Amoco signage in the hot dog pic makes me think it was taken somewhere in the Southeast. I can't make out the complete name on the newspaper tube, but Salisbury NC newspaper was and is "The Salisbury Post".

There's probably not a one of us here (except maybe me!) who would go in a joint like that, but how much you wanna bet they made a good hot dog? Mmm- dirty south hot dog. Mustard, chilli, onion and slaw.

There's a little hole-in-the-wall in a town near here that makes a great hot dog, and a pretty good fish sandwich too. They make homemade beef stew every day they're open and sell all they can make. Not quite as rustic as the hot dog joint in the pic, but close.

But back then, places like the trailer camps and the hot dog joint were about all a automobile traveler had to choose from.

Thanks for great pics Dave and LowKat!

Edited by rocketraider (see edit history)
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How many decades had it been since any business operated as either in your part of Pennsylvania?

I'm a Councilman in a small town between Baltimore and Harrisburg. Sturdy PA Dutch folk mostly except for those "foreigners" emigrating from the Baltimore burbs. I swear our town motto is "Progress...We're against It". We also recently released our Mayor from his legal responsibility for the horse watering troughs.

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Guest Jim_Edwards
I'm a Councilman in a small town between Baltimore and Harrisburg. Sturdy PA Dutch folk mostly except for those "foreigners" emigrating from the Baltimore burbs. I swear our town motto is "Progress...We're against It". We also recently released our Mayor from his legal responsibility for the horse watering troughs.

Well there went the Amish vote....:D

There might be great benefit in that motto. More than one small town has been totally screwed up by ill conceived ideas of "progress." People move to small towns from the big cities to get away from them and just can't seem to resist making them exactly what they sought to escape in the first place....Go Figure!

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Guest Jim_Edwards
I like West's Ogden Nash quote- "Progress might have been all right once, but it has gone on too long."

However I am glad we have progressed past trailer camps and rickety hotdog joints! though I still love to see pictures of them!

But have we really progressed past "Trailer Camps" or have we simply chosen to rename them? How does one separate a KOA Campground from being a trailer camp? And how far removed from the five cent hot dog stand is the fast food joint?

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Just proves that life was good in the "old days". Maybe not perfect by today's standards, but good for the times. I remember staying in "Guest Cottage's"

on the PA Turnpike in November 1950, at age 5. Not a good memory, but at least we were not homeless in our trip fom Minneapolis to Princeton.

These pictures are much more real than TV documentaries or movies of the times, at least for us 99%'ers.

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On Looking at the birds they look to me like Geese or ganders their bills are the wrong type for flamingos. Ah yes 5 cent hotdogs and 5 cent cokes as well, lunch for 20 cents. Is that the Rent-a-Car center up against the garage wall? Check out the eating area. One can sit and watch the traffic go by from the bleachers while eating their hotdog and drinking their coke. If I had a nickle for every gallon of Meadow Gold milk,ice cream,etc that I ate as a kid I'd be a whole lot further down road on my restoration project than I am now. Them were the days though, these photos brought some happy memories. Thanks Dave. Mark

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Perhaps the flea killer company bought advertising space on the trailers? Even free samples in each trailer, for the travelers' pets? Perhaps . . . there was a real need for that product???

Has anybody priced one of the "replica" screen doors at Lowes lately??? All of the "yard critters" would have been upscale back then--dress up the grounds with novelty items.

Perhaps the man talking to the Plymouth's driver is advising him NOT to rent the trailer with the flat tire?

"Trailer camp" now = "RV Park".

It was kind of funny at one of the high school reunions I went to. Some of the very people who couldn't wait to get out of town and start their lives returned here in their later years, to live.

Thanks for the pictures!

NTX5467

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Don't think I ever had a 5-cent hotdog but I do remember when Cokes went from 5 to 6-cents, when a Meadow Gold Ice Cream bar was a nickel, a pint of ice cream was 15-cents, hotdogs were 2 for a quarter. There was a lady in town who I think came from Greece that ran a small restaurant before the chains got popular. I think she charged a quarter for a hamburger. You could order a burger, tell her what you wanted on it, sit at the counter and watch her pick up a lump of ground beef, squeeze off a portion, hand shape it into a patty and watch it cook just the way you wanted it. No chain has ever sold a burger as good as hers were.

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The combination of Meadow Gold and Amoco signage in the hot dog pic makes me think it was taken somewhere in the Southeast. I can't make out the complete name on the newspaper tube, but Salisbury NC newspaper was and is "The Salisbury Post".

Both Meadow Gold and Amoco brands were also found throughout Pennsylvania.

===========================

After posting that I found another, much clearer photo of the same area (with people in it this time). According to Life magazine Jimmie's Trailer Camp was on U.S. 1 outside Washington DC. The newspaper cans are for The Washington Post. ( http://www.life.com/gallery/60951/image/ugc1229001/coca-cola-refreshing-memories#index/7 )

Edited by Dave@Moon
added second 1/2 (see edit history)
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Whatever it was, if it worked I can guarantee it's been outlawed!:P

We have a sizable Greek community here and several of them run restaurants. One just recently closed up, and then only due to the death of the owner. Some yuppified couple bought it and made big whoop about turning it into an upscale eatery. They didn't stop to consider that 1) it was in the old cotton mill district and 2) it was not on the "powers-that-be" plans for locating new restaurants in the city. Being out of the way and a little expensive, it never caught on. It didn't last a year.

But Mr. Kirios sure did make a good hot dog when he ran it. Made good homemade vegetable soup on Wednesdays too, but you had to get there early to get any of it.

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