dpullum Loc: Tampa Florida

Started to post in the recent photo size limitations UHH discussion but thought best of it.

My self censored comment: I use photo size reduction when sending e-mails especially to Jerry where the internet is the old DSL squawking system via telephone lines. Jerry lives in the Catskills Mountains of New York. I commented that Jerry still has a hand crank system for phoning thru the local operator who is sitting on the stool like Lilly Tomlin in Laugh-in. Jerry still uses the phrase "ringie-dingie." I recall that our ring in the post-war 1940s on the 4-party line was two longs and a short. The number was cedar [CE-45567].

Do any of you recall the old hand crank magneto phone systems... Removed from independent Davidson Michigan phone system believe it or not, in 1951 they were of the few systems not with Ma-Bell. We neighborhood kids use the magneto to make a cranking shock system... faster and faster until someone would break the hand holding ring of kids. Hum, low-cost shock treatment.

For lack of any less dangerous things to do Jimmy, Randell, and I invented and would do open-handed magnito slap boxing. One of the three cranking and not holding an electrode. Oops, Randell and I were boxing and I open-handed slapped Randell on the side of the head and knocked him out!! He woke quickly but confused and dazed. No, we never thought of doing a lobotomy with hatpins...! We were teens and our brains were as with most teens were naturally lobotomized.

How many of you love "Laugh-In" the great fast moving weekly comedy program? Google it and laugh.

RoswellAlien

Model T spark coils are exciting, too. 😳

bobmcculloch Loc: NYC, NY

IMHO, The Catskills are better than Florida!

Rab-Eye Loc: Indiana

😂😂😂

Picture Taker Loc: Michigan Thumb

I learned to drive in Connecticut with the family car a 2936 Chevy and rememberer Kate Smith sing God Bless America at noon every day to start her show.

pendennis

I can remember the hand-crank/operator system in rural Kentucky in 1952. However, it was on the way out, and being replaced by the Bell System. I remember that my grandparents' neighbors had both in their home for a time. My grandparents never had a phone until they moved to Louisville in late 1952. Their home phone (CLay 3098) was a two-party system; their ring was a long and a short.

Most memorable was the change from the six-digit, to the seven-digit numbering system in the mid-50's. Their number went to JUniper 3-3098, and a private line at the same time. What was odd, though, was they were in a different "exchange" and lived two houses from us, on the same block.

Our own number was JUniper 5459, then to JUniper 4-5459.

dpullum Loc: Tampa Florida

I agree... but not if one only samples FL coming down in the winter... Ouch, bought property and moved in the summer and it was hot-hot... don't hike here... it is all sand.

Virginia was great, when I worked in Richmond, once a month I went to the mountains of the Appalachian Trail.. Hiking and camping was great there...wonderful

dpullum Loc: Tampa Florida

Yep, 1936 chev, straight 6, ... and at baseball games, she was the only singer... and as was said.. Ain't over till the fat lady sings.

OH! My education continues, "The opera ain`t over till the fat lady sings.'' And the ''fat lady'' was not Kate Smith."
https://www.chicagotribune.com/news/ct-xpm-1987-11-22-8703280340-story.html

dpullum Loc: Tampa Florida

I still have one.. that will lay a spark when supplied with an electric train 12 V AC transformer. I had hold of the high voltage line and the vibrator stuck. I reached over and tapped it and the next thing I knew was I was laying back on the bed. Perhaps 13 y old.

I had an uncle who spread his finger and shorts out 4 cylinders on an old ford and stall it out. Wow! Is it a real memory or his brag?

Jacobs ladder can make the ford coil alive... to me the ladder had nothing to do with the Bible, it was a gadget to bring Frankenstein's monster to life. I still love the old B&W second Frankenstein move. "a 1931 American pre-Code science fiction horror film directed by James Whale." The one I recall and loved was Boris Karloff as the monster.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=AkSbwiKP3mo

Edison movie 1910
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=w-fM9meqfQ4

If there is a heaven Mary Shelly will be amazed at what she gave birth to!!

Picture Taker Loc: Michigan Thumb

Last year I sold my model A for several thousand. Got my 1st Model a for $5.00 and when I sold I did great got $10.00.
Only older is a 34 Fire Truck from the Ford Highland Park Plant.

dpullum Loc: Tampa Florida

I had a 29 A model 5 window... a great car... sold it for a few hundred for college expenses... my dad and I overhauled the engine in the basement. Finished late, I just had to get it running so dad towed me... the engine turned over with towing but not the starter because the bearings were tight.

I choked it and he towed... after a mile I discovered I had not turned on the key... you talk about an explosion... the wooden floorboards flew up; the car may have been airborne briefly ... it split that big muffler wide open, luckily the seam was on the bottom or all the force would have gone up. The whole neighborhood was flashed for 1/10 seconds with bright light.

When I regained my hearing the engine was purring. Dad had a good laugh.

Ford, ... I went thru the River Rouge steel plant [near Detroit]... wow that was a monster place ... spectacular ... you could feel the heat as if it were a bright sun.

gsmith051 Loc: Fairfield Glade, TN

Unfortunately I remember the old hand crank phone system. 😀

Picture Taker Loc: Michigan Thumb

"dpullum" The Rouge plant is large, been there hundreds of times, I ran the test track in Dearborn and had my A to the Amish country in Ohio several times as well as Niagara Falls 3 or 4 times. At one point was the president of the A club at Greenfield Village and had national meets there. PS I had an original Slant Windshield A (un restored with original upholstery)

jaymatt Loc: Alexandria, Indiana

Here, hold this mag wire while I crank the tractor. Oops! Sorry!

jerryc41 Loc: Catskill Mts of NY

When we moved here in 1966, we had a party line. That didn't work out at all.