Do You Remember?

March 1960

• Singer Elvis Presley became a civilian after picking up his final Army paycheck of $109. He left the base in a chauffeur-driven limo to resume his rock and roll career.
• The nation's Pioneer V 95-pound aluminum satellite rocketed 552,000 miles into space on its five-month trip to orbit around the sun.
• Meanwhile, on earth, 18 coal miners in West Virginia were trapped underground, and rescue operations were encountering one problem after another.
• The Chicago football Cardinals – the oldest club in the NFL – were sold to St. Louis. John Griesedieck, president of Falstaff Brewing Corporation, and a minority owner of the city's new team, said 25,000 season tickets were already planned for the six in-town games. You know the rest of the story.
• 2,350 persons were buried in a mass grave after an earthquake in Morocco. In a study by the Associated Press, there had been 60 earthquakes between 1900 and 1960 with “heavy death tolls.” The China earthquake of 1920 was the worst, killing 180,000 persons.
• The Castro government began seizing more than $100 million in American corporate holdings in Cuba.
• Who Was That Lady was advertised (in a costly full-page ad) as “The most uproariously funny movie you'll see in 1960.” The movie's stars were Tony Curtis, Dean Martin, and Janet Leigh.
  

March 1985

• Consumer's Digest magazine listed these as some of the top products of the past 25 years: birth control pills, disposable diapers, video recorders, credit cards, and the personal computer.
• Missouri University raised its annual tuition seven percent (!) to $1,379 for undergraduate state residents.
• The median price for a new home was $84,500...meaning half of the homes sold for more, and half sold for less than that figure.
• Marlin Perkins, zoologist, explorer, adventurer, and director emeritus of the St. Louis Zoo celebrated his 80th birthday. He was host of one of the longest running shows in TV history.
• Movie dancer Gene Kelly was awarded a Lifetime Achievement Award from the American Film Institute. However, he told the audience “All I wanted to do was play shortstop for the Pittsburgh Pirates.” He also noted that he went “Kicking and screaming all the way” to dance lessons when his mother insisted.
• The U.S. Trade deficit was $10.3 billion, which is obviously considered peanuts to the current legislators in Washington.
• Even before Southwest Airlines began flying out of Lambert airport, it was advertising sensational introductory fares...like $17 one-way to Chicago. At the same time, Pan American employees were on strike. Guess which airline survived.

February 1960

• Montaldo's, at 14 Maryland Plaza, was having a winter fur sale. Mink coats were on sale for $2,150, while a white fox cape was just $125. Maryland Plaza went down hill, but it is now revived with smart shops and condos in all those beautiful homes across the street.
• Jack Parr, the NBC talk show host, walked off the set of his program when he discovered one of his jokes had been censored. The network apologized, but Parr decided to quit the show.
• The Winter Olympics opened in Squaw Valley, California. Sweden won the first gold medal in the 30-kilometer cross-country race.
• Three local cities...Alton, East St. Louis, and DeSoto...were named “All American Cities” by the National Municipal League and Look magazine. They were among 11 towns chosen from the 100 that entered the national contest.
• Two employees of the Johnson-Stephens & Shinkle Shoe Company were arrested for stealing 13,000 pairs of shoes valued at $30,000. One of the guys was a security guard, so that's how they were able to pull off the thefts over time. They then sold the shoes for $5 per pair.
• An airplane blew up killing 34 passengers. Upon examination of the wreckage, it was determined that a dynamite explosion was set off by a battery...and it was located near a man who had $1 million in accident and life insurance coverage. Hummmm.
• In North Carolina, a tornado picked up a house, twirled it around, and set it back down 30 feet away...and the three people in the house were unhurt.
• The 400th anniversary of Presbyterianism and the Reformed Church was celebrated here in St. Louis and around the world.
  

February 1985

• First class postage went up to 22 cents.
• Ozark Air Lines opened the new Concourse D at Lambert Field. The structure had 16 new passenger gates. Nowadays the concourse is closed...used only as a filming location last year for the movie “Up In The Air.”
• It's February, have you bought you Girl Scout cookies yet? Back in 1985, the top salesgirl was 13-year-old Markita Andrews in New York City. While the average scout sells about 60 boxes, in 1984 Markita sold 8,000 boxes of cookies (at $2 each – the price back then). Maybe it helped that she lived in an eight-building, middle class apartment complex with 10,000 residents who called her “The Cookie Kid.”
• The St. Louis Symphony Orchestra won its first two Grammy Awards for best classical recording of 1984 and the best engineered classical recording. Maestro Leonard Slatkin lead the SLSO in an RCA recording of Prokofiev's Symphony No. 5.
• The first cable TV service in the city was hooked up and running in St. Louis. STL Cablevision Partners had five months to get two-thirds of the rest of the city cable ready.
• Actor Marvin Miller died in California at the age of 71. A St. Louis boy who graduated from Cleveland High and Washington University, he started his career in radio at KMOX. But he was best remembered for his weekly roll on the TV program “The Millionaire” which ran from 1955 to 1960. He played the personal secretary who handed out million-dollar checks from John Beresford Tipton.

January 1960

• Roy Quinlan Studios was offering 10 dance lessons for $5. The ad said “Anyone Can Learn to Dance” the Fox Trot, Swing, Waltz, Tango, Cha Cha, etc.
• Senator John F. Kennedy told the Democratic Party he “...would not accept the vice presidential nomination under any circumstances.”
• International Shoe Co. ranked number one in the industry with $283 million in annual sales. Fast on it heals was Brown Shoe with $276 million in sales. Our city was the leader in the shoe business.
• An auto executive refused to take his annual $100,000 bonus. You would not see that happen these days. But George Romney of American Motors did just that, even after his company's Rambler had a record sales year.
• Everybody was On Strike in St. Louis. The Meat Cutters (butchers) struck A&P, Kroger, and National food stores. Custodians at 139 St. Louis elementary schools went on strike, sending 80,000 pupils home to wait out the labor negotiations. There had been a national steel strike in the summer, and in Hollywood, writers for TV production companies stopped writing.
• Speaking of writers, Earl Stanley Gardner put out his 100th Perry Mason book titled “The Case of the Waylaid Wolf.” The main characters Perry, Della Street, and Paul Mason worked together to solve the mystery.
• Stan “The Man” Musial signed his 19th contract (and likely his last) to play for the baseball Cardinals' 1960 season. How much? $80,000 for the year...making him one of the highest paid baseball players. NOTE: his first Cardinals contract in 1938 paid him $227 for a season.
  

January 1985

• Imagine that you bought gold for $302/oz. in 1985, and you could now sell it for more than $1,000/oz. Oh boy!
• The steel framework for the downtown Adam's Mark hotel was topped out.
• Crown Victoria and Mercury Grand Marquis autos were discontinued at the Hazelwood assembly plant. The facility would be changed over to produce the Aerostar minivan. As many as 100 robots were designed into the new assembly line. “We will be practically rebuilding the whole inside,” said Ford spokesman Robert Pollock.
• General Motors announced that it would start a new car company called Saturn to design, manufacture, and sell the line. Just 25 short years later, the company said that it would discontinue the company. Ugh!
• Full service cable TV in St. Louis was going for $9.95/mo. from Storer cable television.
• The American Red Cross in St. Louis said it would begin screening all blood donations for the presence of AIDS. It was expected that only one percent...or about 2,400 blood donations annually...would be rejected because of a finding of AIDS.
• The $40 million winner of the Illinois Lottery said, “I'm bored.” Mike Wittkowski said, “I'm not really into traveling.” Because he enjoyed bowling, he was thinking of buying a bowling alley with some of his winnings.
• At the end of the month, the Dow Jones hit a “record high” of 1,292.

December 1959

• The U.S. Census Bureau estimated the country's population at 179 million. Just 50 years later it is now over 300 million.
• The average wage for production/manufacturing workers in the St. Louis area was $96 per week.
• Christmas turkeys were selling for 59 cents per pound at Bettendorf Rapp food stores, 47 cents/lb. at Kroger's, and 43 cents/lb. at A&P. Christmas trees were selling for $6 and up.
• Sam, the monkey, was shot 55 miles into space...then crashed down into the Atlantic Ocean. He was recovered and pronounced fine. Sam was the test subject for the Project Mercury capsule, which would be, soon sends a human into space orbit.
• This year Santa Claus was more likely to arrive by helicopter than by reindeer-drawn sleigh. More than 50 such fly-ins was planned for shopping centers and other locations around town.
• The “Fone Follies of 1959” was performed by 100 employees of Southwestern Bell Telephone Company. The show consisted of 23 dances, vocal solos, and skits. Did you attend?
• Professor Barry Commoner of Washington University started collecting teeth from the little children of St. Louis. Called  the St. Louis Baby Tooth Survey, eventually 300,000 teeth were tested for radiation levels. The result? The study showed that increased levels of strontium-90, decreased birth weights, and increased rates of child cancer were evident during years of atmospheric nuclear tests. Eventually, in 1963, President Kennedy signed and international ban on nuclear tests in the atmosphere...and that's why tests are now done underground.
• Gina Lollobrigida, as the Queen of Sheba, opened on Christmas day at the Esquire Theater in the movie spectacle Solomon and Sheba. Yul Brynner was Solomon...he loved playing those “king” parts.

December 1984

• The U.S. Navy launched its first nuclear-powered submarine designed to carry sea-launched cruise missiles. This added to America's sea power.
• Illinois passed a law requiring auto drivers and front seat passengers to wear a seat belt.
• A Christmas tree farm in Beardstown, Ill. was partly ruined when a plague of grasshoppers gobbled up 5,000 Scotch and white pines. Still, the owner would be fine for future holidays, since the remaining 45,000 trees on his farm would gradually mature for cutting. But those must have been some really hungry creatures.
• Do you remember the TV commercial where the guy said “I liked the product so much I bought the company?” That was Victor Kiam, head of the Remington electric shaver company. He stopped the production line to tell his workers that the shaver they made was voted number one by Consumer Reports magazine. Everyone cheered and went back to work during their busy time of the year.
• Fred Kummer, president of HBE Corp. in Creve Coeur, told new graduates of the University of Missouri at Rolla his three tips for success. Manage your time...manage your jobs...and manage your ego...to achieve your goals.
• According to the St. Louis Post-Dispatch, William Olsten, a flower shop operator in Florissant, was caught with more than $5 million in counterfeit bills...one of the largest seizures in American criminal history.

November 1959

• Three hundred cowboys were competing for prize money during the Fireman's Championship Rodeo at the St. Louis Arena. Part of the fun included TV star Steve McQueen giving a pistol fast-draw demonstration.
• Speaking of giving...Jack Carney, an announcer on radio station “Wonderful WIL 1430,” was giving away 10 trips to Hawaii every day for a week during early November.
• After only two years and just 100,000 models sold, Ford shut down the production of its Edsel passenger car.
• Artist Thomas Hart Benton began work on a huge mural he was to pant in the Truman presidential library in Independence, Missouri. The scene would depict events from 1815 to 1850 when that city was the starting point of the Oregon and Santa Fe trails. Mr. Benton said it would take about two years to paint.
• Comedian Jack Benny and his Stradivarius violin made an appearance with the St. Louis Symphony during a benefit performance at Keil Auditorium. 3,500 people attended, and $41,000 was raised. Bravo!
• We just recently confirmed that there was frozen water on the planet Mars. But 50 years ago, Dr. William Sinton of the Lowell Observatory in Arizona declared that dark regions of the planet may posses “great patches of vegetation” similar to algae which grow on earth.
• In Houston, Texas, the 116-year-old last surviving veteran of the Civil War was reported to be in failing health. But he was determined to outlive his grandfather who lived to the age of 119.

November 1984

• Banks are being closed now...fallouts of the 2008 financial collapse. But 25 years ago, a government study found that 169 banks could go belly up if they continued losing money at their current rates. So far in 1984, 70 banks had closed their doors.
• History's first space recovery occurred when two astronauts wrestled a satellite into the cargo bay of the space shuttle Discovery. It took a six-hour “walk in space” for two guys to get the thing shoved into place and the cargo doors locked.
• Back on earth, the first Sam's Wholesale Club opened in St. Louis. Newspaper ads had to explain who could join, and what types of bargains were in store, inside the Earth City mega-store.
• Autumn in St. Louis during 1984 was the second soggiest since record keeping began in 1870.
• Meanwhile, the U.S. corn crop harvest was the fourth largest in history...up 81 percent from the year before. Wow!
• Ronald Reagan won the election for his second term as U.S. president. Newspapers called it a “landslide” win over Walter Mondale. John Ashcroft won as Missouri Governor, and Harriett Woods of University City won the Lieutenant Governor spot.
• Inflation's cost of food came home to roost. The U.S. Agriculture Department calculated that the typical cost of a Thanksgiving dinner would be a whopping 7.5 percent higher than in 1983.
• The bestselling books of this month were The Talisman by Stephen King and Iacocca: An Autobiography by businessman Lee Iacocca.

October 1959

• Applications were being taken for tenants of the new Plaza apartments across from Union Station. There were 1,090 units in the six, 13-story buildings. Efficiency apartments rented for $95 per month, $125 for a one bedroom, or $132.50 for a two-bedroom unit.
• Famous-Barr was celebrating its 110th anniversary with a big sale in all of its department stores. I miss Famous, but I don't miss licking those darn green stamps and pasting them into the little booklets.
• Miss Laura Rand Orthwein was crowned the 1959 Veiled Prophet Queen of Love and Beauty. Her mother, the former Laura Hale Rand, was also the VP Queen back in 1938.
• Mr. Moke, the world's only known “talking” chimpanzee, came to live at the St. Louis Zoo. His two-word vocabulary consisted of “mama” and “no.” He could also roller skate, ride a bike, and jump rope. Do you remember seeing him in the zoo's chimp show?
• Also, three eight-month-old snow leopard cubs arrived at the zoo and were to be trained for the next summer's lion show.
• Dr. Flack, editor of Family Physician, a publication of the British Medical Association, wrote a story about the 11-year-old National Health Services in England. Here's his evaluation; “Socialized medicine is a success from the patient's standpoint but has brought about a loss of incentive and income for physicians.” In a speech to the Mississippi Valley Medical Society, he said, “Britons are getting better medical care now than they did before.” About 97 percent of the people take advantage of the program, but only 75 percent of the doctors accept the program.
• Motorola used a full-page newspaper ad to announce their new TV remote control...with no wires. What we would today call a “wireless” remote was a big technological breakthrough. It also ushered in the era of the couch potato. 
• The Guggenheim art museum, designed by architect Frank Lloyd Wright, opened in New York City. Unfortunately, Wright died six months before the controversial building was completed.
  

October 1984

• A yearlong $20 million expansion transformed Crestwood Plaza into “The Ultra Mall” with an additional 50 new retailers and restaurants. Today the mall is struggling to stay alive.
• After 18 months of trying to make a profit, St. Louis based Air One, Inc. was grounded.
• Diana, Princess of Wales, celebrated her son's one-month birthday. He, Prince Henry, was beginning to be known as Harry...a most un-royal, common name.
• The fifth annual Columbus Day parade was held on The Hill. Actually, since 1867, Italians in St. Louis had been celebrating the explorer who sailed to “the new world” on ships underwritten by the Spanish crown.
• The United States government was shut down for several days. More than 500,000 federal workers were furloughed because congress had not passed the necessary funding legislation for the new fiscal year. Here in St. Louis, the Arch was also closed because the National Park Service supervises it.
• Sotheby's auction house in New York City was handling the sale of more than 1,000 antique cookbooks...including one thought to be the first printed cookbook. Known as the “Platina,” it was printed in Venice in 1475, and its sale was expected to fetch bids between $5,000 and $7,000. Another cookbook, printed in Milan, was expected to sell for between $20,000 to $30,000. Dr. and Mrs. Marcus Crahan spent 40 years amassing their collection.