Do You Remember. . .?

. . .the Whip-It ride that used to come around the neighborhood for what seemed like almost every day? For 50 cents, you’d get a three minute ride on a mini-whip. Very convenient . . . the amusement park came to you instead of the other way around. I had an “in” with the ride operator, and he’d let me ride for as low as a nickel a pop.

. . . .the Charles Chips man? The guy would stop over everybody’s house once a week and drop off one can each of potato chips and pretzels to the masses. . .I’m wondering if the Charles Chips guy morphed into the UPS guy over time. Heck, they both had the same color uniform and same type delivery truck.

. . . .the Fuller Brush man? One of my neighbors on Forest Street was a salesman for Fuller Brush. There was one teacher from my old grammar school who used to place orders with him through me since I lived so close to the guy. Dang! If only I was smart enough to negotiate a piece of the action with him!

. . .slot car racing? It all started for me around 1967 when I was around 8 years old. There was this store in West Long Branch where Scarpetta's Restaurant is today that had three slot car tracks and also sold slot car accessories. I got my first slot car there and raced endlessly after school until it closed around 1970. Afterwards, what seemed like every Saturday when I was a kid, my mother’s parents (“Little Grandma” & “Little Grandpa”) would take me out to the Collingwood Auction where -- to this day -- they have one of the only remaining slot car tracks in the county.

. . . .Long Branch Fireman’s Fair? Every year in late June, Long Branch held its annual fireman’s fair on the grounds where the Quick Chek in West End sits today. That’s where I met a lot of my friends from Long Branch growing up. The fair ended around 1978 and the building housing Quick Chek, King Chef, Izu Sushi, et al went up soon after.

. . . .White Sands Beach Club? After we left Cramer’s Beach Club, my family went to White Sands. By the time we arrived, the name had been changed to “North Long Branch Bathing Pavilion”. From 1974 until it burned down in 1977. . .probably the best summers of my teen years were spent there. I made even more friends from Long Branch at White Sands. They had a huge clubhouse that housed a snack bar and sauna. My heart sank when I found out it had burned down. It sank even lower when the city sold it to the county. Now it’s part of Seven President’s Park.

. . . .driving to Florida for vacation? When I was a kid, we couldn’t afford to fly on an airplane, so every Easter vacation, my mom and dad would drive us all down to Florida. Back then, it took two full days to get down there, two full days to drive back. So with a nine-day break for Easter, we only spent five actual days in Florida. I think that time period was when my dad came up with the saying “As soon as we’re in the car, vacation starts”.

. . . .selling Christmas cards door-to-door? Every year around October, I used to get this box filled with Christmas cards, wrapping paper, and other holiday dooh-dads for me to sell to make money for my grammar school. Besides hitting up the relatives when they came over for a visit, my main business was from the neighbors. I used to go around door-to-door and see if any of them needed some Christmas items before the retail stores started stocking their shelves with the same things. Now, a lot of specialty businesses work with schools tell the kids to NOT sell door-to-door.

My, what a different world we live in now as opposed to way back when. . .

(You can also follow Kevin Cieri’s blog on his Facebook page, “Jersey Shore Retro” as well as on Twitter at @jsretro).