When Your Memories Become Collectibles

Originally published January 5, 2000



As we travel about the country, and even at home, we like to stop at yard sales to browse.  I look for books.  Some I read a long time ago and some I never read but always wanted to own. I look for authors such as Roark Bradford and Edgar Greene [Editor's note: more commonly known as "Doc Greene," he was a popular columnist for the "Detroit News," and one of Jim's favorite authors. They shared a sporadic correspondence over the years and when Doc died in 1970, Jim attended his funeral. I think Doc was Jim's mentor and the role model for his own columns.]  When I find one, I add the book to my collection. Many times I find items for sale that have no meaning to me, except that they were commonplace when I was young. In the few short years since my youth, they have become collector's items and antiques.

Among these yard sale lots are articles from the dairy industry where I spent my early working years, and among the most common collectibles are old milk bottles. They came in many shapes and sizes. Some had inscriptions of various colors and styles. Early bottles were round with a large mouth for pouring. Before homogenization became common, many bottles were shaped like a woman wearing a hoop skirt and sporting a bulging bust line. The bust line was a place for the cream to gather at the top, making it easier to pour off for use as a coffee creamer and in cooking. Or, to feed the cat.

Some milk bottles were scripted in beautiful gothic or Germanic lettering. In Detroit, one creamery used an Olde English style of lettering, such as you still see on the "D" sewn onto Detroit Tigers baseball caps.

Of course, I'm talking about the glass bottles that were used to package all milk products. These days, rarely is glass used to transport liquid products of any kind. Paper and plastic have replaced glass. The old type of round milk bottle I worked with years ago now sells for up to $5.00 at yard sales and much more at some auctions.

Other milk products seen in yard sales these days include milk cans. These cans came in three, five, and ten gallon sizes. They were made of aluminum or stainless steel.  A full 10 gallon can contains 80 pounds of milk. Add the weight of the can, and it's close to 90 pounds. No wonder wrestling those things about used to tire me out. After I had moved a half dozen or so, the three gallon size seemed to leap off the floor when I moved them.

In the 70s and 80s, people painted designs on those outdated cans and used them as porch decorations. They usually had floral or plant arrangements sprouting out of the top. The large, decorated milk cans sold for $10 to $15.  Now, they're passed down through families as heirlooms and keepsakes.

In the days before refrigeration and tank trucks, the can was the way milk was moved from farms to processing plants. It was labor intensive and a new way to transport milk was developed in the 50s. Rural electricity enabled dairy farmers to reinvent the whole operation. Except for the cow. And even in her case, some serious innovations were made.

Milk crate and bottles from the 50s

Another item I occasionally see at yard sales and, more often, in the garages of private homes, is the milk crate or case. In my day, these cases were all made of wood. And no light weight wood, either. These things were heavy. After a few trips through the cleaning process, wooden crates became water-soaked and even heavier.

Milk cases became so strong that many were stolen by shady mechanics and used as "jacks" to hold up a car while the mechanic worked underneath. They were also used in shops and plants as seats for workers. They were built so well they lasted for years.

When the square milk carton came along, the old milk case became obsolete and a new one had to be developed. This led to a lighter weight, but less strong, case made of plastic saving trees for other uses like newsprint. The new paper milk container made the milk case less complicated, allowing for the removal of the wire sections that had been necessary to corral the glass bottles. These modifications may have resulted in injuries, or even killed some red-necked mechanics fixing cars before they found out the case was too weak for their needs.

Another item I see from time to time at yard sales is the plug cap that sealed freshly filled milk bottles. This wafer-thin gasket-like sealer was absolutely air and moisture proof as long as it was dry. If it got wet, it didn't seal out anything. As a dairy worker, my favorite use of the plug cap was an aggravation weapon. I soon learned to fit them between my thumb and forefinger, like a marble shooter fits his shooting taw.  From 25 feet, I could raise a welt on the back of a co-worker's neck with a well-aimed shot. My modus operandi was to fire and quickly pretend to be working when the wounded target turned around in anger to confront his attacker.

Setting up the shot with his taw

Like me, a lot of the things from my youth are out of date. "Collectibles," they're called. They served their purpose and made it possible for us to reach the point where we are now.

I Have A Daughter

[Editor's note: For years a clipping of this article hung on the wall of my office at Bozell Worldwide, an advertising agency in New York. I wish I had noted the publication date.]

original date published: unknown

The "daughter" of the article, age 3,
displaying an early love of shoes 

I have a daughter living in New York City who is a lot like her father. Contentious, contrary, argumentative, and prone to the last word. But she will never bore you, be dull company or cause you to wonder where she stands on an issue.

On the phone the other day she complained, "Dad, you write about my Mother, my Grandfather, you even write about a dog, but you don't mention me."

It is hard to write about the people one is close to and the closer the relationship, the harder it is to write. If I tried to describe her good points as well as her not so endearing traits, anything I would say would be tinged with prejudice. I can say she was never a problem growing up but that she was troublesome in that after the sixth grade, she felt the bathroom in our house was her private territory and no one else should use it without her permission. With that thought in mind, she stocked the bathroom with dozens of bottles of hair shampoo, hair tints, and hair curling solutions. She had concoctions for light hair, dark hair and hair that was thicker than normal. Taking the place that my shaving gear had occupied in the early year of my marriage was a dozen or more bottles of fingernail polish. Four or five tints of red alone. 

She could be followed through the house by the trail of shoes she left in her wake. She loved shoes and owned many pairs but seldom had them on her feet. When she arrived home from school, she kicked off the shoes she was wearing in the living room and continued on to her bedroom where she would try on three pairs, kick two pairs off on the floor of the room, then wear the third pair to the bathroom where she would add them to the collection of her things adorning the floor there.

When she was thirteen, she ran away from home but didn't stay long. Within two or three hours hunger and forgetting what she was mad about drove her back to our door. She was a good student, hard working and dependable, earning mostly Bs. After high school, she completed a five year course in Library Science in just four years. Hard work and dedication made that possible. She had no natural talent in that direction. Immediately after college, she set off for New York to make her mark in show business. But in the world of show biz, for every successful one there are literally millions who fall by the wayside. She has had to come to grips with the real world. And she has adapted pretty well. She claims the title of account executive with an advertising company. I fret about her all alone in that big town, but she seems to be doing well and I am proud. 

I'm glad to have our bathroom back unencumbered with shoes and bottles. But on the days I'm searching through the house for shampoo, I feel a tinge of longing for the good old days.