... AND GOT FAT IN THE PROCESS!
A recent e-mail conversation with the Slockbower brothers, Dave and Frank, made us revisit a few businesses in Newton where, when we were little kids into our teenage years, we could go for food (not healthful food, mind you, but food, and mostly ice cream and sweets). These places were mentioned or thought about:
Tee Pee -- Mr. Slockbower's place, next to the Newton movie theater (when it showed just one movie).
Ding Dong Dairy -- My father's place, on Lower Spring Street, with soda fountain.
Klingener's -- On Spring Street, next to where Sears-Roebuck used to be: I recall the 10-cent vanilla Cokes, but I think this closed up long before we were in, like, second grade.
Julie's/Pete's (the Towne Shop?) -- On Clinton Street; a good place for an ice cream soda or an egg cream after baseball games at Memory Park.
Britt's -- The buffet.
Woolworth's -- Bill Rosselli and I broke many a balloon there, trying for the 1-cent banana split.
The Green Room -- It's been mentioned in other pre-reunion communication. I remember cracking a joke at a romantic lunch with Kitty Gray -- well, as romantic as me and Kitty could be -- and sending Coke running through her nose!
Ding's/Main Street Grocery -- Big racks of candy and cupcakes.
Campus Shop -- People swore by their hamburgers.
Newton Diner -- Ed Hickok, onetime Newton mayor, made trays of hamburgers ahead of time for the Halstead Street School lunch crowd. You'd order, "A hamburger, please." He'd reply, "Almost ready."
Any others?
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ReplyDeleteSo, I remember Klinenger's - so it couldn't have been that far back, could it?
ReplyDeleteAnd every Saturday when I got my allowance, while Maggie (then Jane) was donating her $ to the nuns to help pagan babies, I was satisfying my sweet-tooth at Ding's. One time I fit 2 1/2 "Big Daddy" bubble gum sticks (you know, those ruler-type things) in my mouth at once, in a contest, of course. Ask my cousin, Carol.
But my fondest memories were of working at Hayeks my last two years of high school. It was like being in a big extended family. I went to visit Mitchell and his wife when I was home last. They are sure good people.
What was the name of place by Memory Park? My older brother and sister worked at the A&P on Clinton Street and they used to take me there for french fries.
ReplyDeleteOn Clinton St. was Pete's or Julie's or the Town Shop. Last owned by Pete. Remember that they sold toys there and they were covered with a golden coating of grease and tobacco?! My Mom's very first job was at Slockbower's.
ReplyDeleteMy early karma for the pagan babes worked out since I became one at 40!
Come on Mike you left out Dominics Pizza! Pizza by the slice, guys that could only speak Italian. My mouth is watering now. Hayeks had the greatest cold cuts in town and the prettiest girl behind the register.
ReplyDeleteGee Tom, I wonder who that pretty girl behind the counter was????? Dominics is still there, but recently moved across the street. And Wendy, I know the store you are referring to, but I don't remember the name of it either. It was just down past where the inspection station is now and on the same side of the road. I remember stopping in there for candy after going to the Newton Pool or hanging out at the park.
ReplyDeleteWell, if Ellen can't remember the name of the fast food joint near Memory Park, nobody can. I remember going there with my great Aunt Peg, my grandmother Yetter's sister (and yes, for whom I was named). She turned me on to coffee ice cream there at a very tender age - is there any caffeine in that?
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ReplyDeleteThe first Dominic's Pizza in Newton is where my father's Newton Sheet Metal Shop was, on Lower Spring Street -- in fact, right next to what is now O'Reilley's Pub, where we're supposed to meet up on Friday night, July 24.
ReplyDeleteMy father was the landlord for Dominic and for Tom the Barber, with the sheet metal shop in the far back. Then came the fire that burned the place down (thanks a lot, whoever forgot to turn off the Dominic's pizza ovens that night), and that's when my father left the sheet metal business for the jug milk trade, and he built the Ding Dong Dairy.
I remember Dominic's as the best pizza ever ... still go there when I come home to visit. There is nothing like it in California. No one mentioned the Newton Drive-in - now a Lowe's. Some of us hung out at Paulinskill Lake, water skiing and spending some crazy nights on what we endearingly called, "the boozer-cruiser."
ReplyDeleteStewart's Root-Beer Stand in Springdale on South 206. My family would get in the car on any given night that my mother didn't want to cook, and off we'd go. They had "curbside service" and brought your meal(s) out to you on a tray that attached to your window (much like the speakers at the drive-in theater). Wow, we were on the cutting edge of the "drive-through" revolution!
ReplyDeleteOK Peggy and Wendy-The name of the place by Memory Park was called......"Blondies"! I wish I could say that I remembered it on my own, but that's not the case. It's actually kind of strange how I came to find it. I received an e-mail from my sister Janet who is over in Iraq at the present time. She is on the massive e-mail list from Mike and saw the question about the former bands. Through the answers that our classmate Pat Wright gave, Janet was then put in touch w/Pat's sister Colleen and brother Kevin. (Our families were very close growing up in good old Newton!) Anyway, Kevin has a website that tells all about Newton, NJ from way back. As I was reading on his website he happened to mention the little place down by the inspection station and memory park that he and his siblings/friends used to go to all the time called.....Blondies! He also mentioned Woolworths which also had a counter to sit at and eat lunch! I don't think anyone had mentioned that previously, but I do remember going in there to eat and also to buy records!
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ReplyDeleteGee thanks Ed, I guess I was sooo excited about finding the answer to "Blondies" that I neglected to scroll back up to see all of the other places that were mentioned.
ReplyDeleteAnd yes, Kevin is doing an amazing job on preserving the history of our town. I thoroughly enjoyed reading his work and it was pretty awesome how many of my own memories were triggered after reading his!
Whenever I came home from the Marines I'd inevitably go out with friends to the popular local bars. There was a restaurant on Spring Street that we used to go to at 3am or so and the place would be full of people who'd had one drink too many! Some interesting times in that place - lots of hell being raised by alcohol fueled testosterone!
ReplyDeleteI cannot remember it's name, but I still think of it whenever I am in or near a fast food place and that nauseating "grease" smell hits me!
I think I tried to jump all over Ellen once, when I was around 12. ;-) Or maybe it was Rita Fitzpatrick? Something to do with Tom Driscoll in the Annunziata yard on top of Ashford Street, where we were playing an outdoor kind of Twister, or leap-frog, which turned into wrestling, etc. Janet may have been involved, too.
ReplyDeleteAnd yes, Woolworth's was where they had balloons with little slips of paper inside. You broke a balloon, hoping for the 1-cent banana split. Most of the pieces of paper said 99 cents. As Bill Rosselli reminded me an e-mail yesterday, he was the best at finding the 1-cent balloons, and also the fastest at slurping down those Woolworth's banana splits!
As for buying records, I think there was a store next to or near Woolworth's called Graybow's or Gray's (run by Max Graybow). I bought my first 45 record there as a kid ... I think it was Mary Wells singing "My Guy" ... and promptly got into the front seat of my father's truck and accidentally shut the door, right on the record, smashing it. Max, of course, wouldn't give me my money back or replace it. I think that was 99 cents, too -- twice.
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ReplyDeleteBlondies went back to being the Town Shop early 80's owned by my sister and her husband for a short while. They made just enough to leave town and move to Florida where they raised their family the last 23 yrs. It was the one place in town Cheir & I would buy our yearly bathing cap. An absolute must to swim @ Newton pool! And what lovely styles coud be had. Flowers and all pasted on them! The shop is now a very nice resturant.
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