It’s interesting — and frustrating — how memory works. I forget why I walked into the kitchen to get something and once I get there I have no idea what my mission was about. Inevitably I have to walk out of the room and walk back into it to dislodge the thought from some closed part of my brain.
And yet a whole flood of memories about events from years ago bubble up to the surface.
The sound of the local ice cream truck recently brought back a bunch of remembrances of summers past.
When we lived at 104 Navajo Rd. in Springfield in the late ‘50s and early ‘60s, There was a parade of snack serving trucks that went through the Sixteen Acres neighborhood. Sure, there was the soft-serve ice cream van, the Ding Dong Cart, variations of such still roam neighborhoods today but there was also a Popsicle truck, a truck that sold freshly popped popcorn and the royalty of all of them, the Good Humor truck.
My mom once expressed disdain for the latter as it was the most expensive, charging 25 cents for its ice cream confections. I had to do a little more whining than usual for that one.
The other aspect of the trucks that I clearly remember is the panic hearing the far-off sound of its horn or bell or recorded song. Did I have enough time to ask Mom, get the money and make it out to the curb before the truck passed by? Would I be willing to chase it down the street?
Summers when I was very young meant going to the drive-in theater. Now so few exist they are seen as almost museum pieces, but this area was full of them. There was Memorial Drive-in in West Springfield, Red Rock in Southampton, E.M. Lowe’s in West Springfield and the Parkway in Wilbraham, among others.
The first movie I saw was at a drive-in, specifically the Airline Drive-in in Chicopee, located where BJ’s and The Big Y are now. Mom had given us our bath, dressed us in our pajamas, and put pillows and blankets in the car, probably our 1955 Buick which was bigger than a studio apartment.
The movie we saw was George Pal’s “Tom Thumb,” a suitable enough family film. I don’t remember anything about the movie — I was 4 or 5 at the time — but I do recall as I was about to fall asleep hearing my dad say to my mom, “Now can we go home?”
Another drive-in experience resulted in me spilling hot chocolate all over my mom. It was years before they allowed me even close to that beverage.
Although I was a movie-crazy teen, working on the family farm meant that the late nights at the drive-in were a near impossibility. My younger brother did manage to have me take him and a friend to see the second feature film based on the “Dark Shadows” TV show, though. As I recall it wasn’t very good.
I was fascinated, though, by the movies that played there, many of which were low-budget productions I knew nothing about. “What is this thing?” I wondered. I would cut out the movie ads from both the Holyoke Transcript and the Morning Union and save them in a scrap book, which I still have.
I was not allowed to take my high school and college girlfriend to the drive-in by her father who suspected the worst of me. The theaters had earned the nickname “The Passion Pits,” for legitimate reasons. If you saw a car with steamed up windows, you had a good idea of what was going on there.
For the uninitiated, the drive-in experience often depended upon several factors, including just how comfortable was your car. The concession stand was like a bad diner serving up the exotic fare — for the time — of pizza, as well as burgers, hot dogs, popcorn and sweet stuff. Between features there would be a countdown clock projected on the screen to tell you how much time you had to race to the stand before the next film started.
The sound depended on just how good the tiny speakers that hung onto your car window or door were. I’ve got one in my office that my buddy Steve Bissette bought me from a dealer at a Brimfield show.
If there were mosquitos you were urged to buy Pic at the concession stand. Pic looked like a curled incense but it was actually some sort of pesticide. You lit it and supposedly the smoke took care of the bugs. I often wondered what effect it had on people.
As I grew older, summers changed their definition. As a child they were for of opportunity for play. As a teen it meant a time to work, foreshadowing the responsibilities of adulthood. Since my family had a small farm, summer meant a garden and the work associated with its care. I spent one summer plucking chickens and helping my mom prepare them for the freezer. There were cows, and later goats, to be milked daily, pigs to fed and barns to clean.
I also worked a summer job full-time at the first Basketball Hall of Fame on the Springfield College campus. It was a job I carried through the year on weekend. Summer was a time to make some money and prepare food for winter.
I appreciate all of the lessons these activities taught me.
Today, summer is welcomed as long as it doesn’t get too hot, which it certainly has this year. I have a very modest vegetable garden, which I will be expanding next year. I make pickles from the cucumbers I grow. I sit outside read, smoke a cigar, and have an adult beverage.
And I return to my own version of the drive-in theater. I sit in our three-season room, with the windows all open and watch a movie on a big screen TV. The snacks are better, the sound is better and occasionally if I have the door open, critters will walk by and check things out.
I hope your summer is going well.
G. Michael Dobbs has worked for Reminder Publishing for 23 years of his nearly 50-year-career in the Western Mass. media scene, and previously served as the executive editor. He has spent his time with the publisher covering local politics, interesting people and events. The opinions expressed within the article are that of the author’s and do not represent the opinions and beliefs of the paper.
