People thought nothing of lighting up wherever they were. Here is Jerry at maybe under a year old with his dad and Grandpa Morrison, both smokers, 1938.
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| 1938 Jerry as a tot, held by his dad and his Grandpa Morrison alongside. Notice both men have cigarettes |
Mom and her husband both smoked and I hated it when I was a child and would ask her to please not leave her dirty ashtrays all around. She paid no attention to me. I put a sign on my bedroom door, "No Smoking" I might have been an early anti smoker, ahead of my time. I tried smoking briefly in my 20's to be sociable, many friends smoked, many people smoked at work, at their desks, so I tried it too. But I was never converted, and soon quit because I hated the smell, and honest to goodness, I NEVER inhaled. I know our former president made that statement famous, but I can believe that because I did likewise. I would get a mouthful of smoke, not even think of inhaling but blow the smoke away from me while furiously waving it away.
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| 1971 Christmas Day Me with Jerry and his cigarette |
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| 1986 Jerry to the left, Uncle Carl to the right outside Uncle's home in PA; you can almost see Jerry's cigarette |
I banished Jerry to the outside of the house if he was going to light up following our 1986 trip to Pennsylvania when my late Uncle Carl took Jerry outside if he was going to smoke. I never knew Uncle Carl to smoke but he admitted he had all through his US Army days in WWII but quit in the 1950's. I decided that would add another trick to my bag of getting husband to stop smoking, once home I announced I was adopting the Uncle Carl method. Up until that time he had only been allowed to smoke in the den anyway, so outside was not all that surprising to him. It was awkward to have smokers around our home but I would simply state, "only outside for smoking. I am allergic." I suppose that might have been true and perhaps why I never climbed on the smokers wagon.
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| 1986 Jerry to the right with his late cousin Kip Cook The Cooks visited us in Newcastle, and Jerry went outside for his smoke |
Funny how 1986 fits a Sepia theme this week. As does our 2010 trip in North Carolina where amongst other sites we toured the a Durham Museum dedicated to the preservation of the history of tobacco in this country and its importance to revenues in the South. I cannot find my photos or perhaps that day I took none, only this of an old poster.
It was fascinating to see cigarette dispensing machines, now artifacts of a time when the country touted smoking and tobacco was revered. Today there is an organization, Artomat, that refurbishes the old cigarette vending machines to dispense various kinds of artwork or crafty items. I think that is clever. Here is their website, and we have seen these in Louisiana. http://laughingsquid.com/art-o-mat-retired-cigarette-vending-machines-converted-to-sell-art/
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| Refurbished cigarette vending machine |
I now dismount my anti puffing soapbox and invite you all to peruse the various contributions on this week's Sepia site hosted by Alan. Some have been faithful posters all along and others like me are dabblers. Time has a way of slipping by us as it has here, travels and tasks take their share of the 24 hour days. Click here to get to the Sepia site to see what others have done with or without the theme.
