1960 Boy Scout Handbook ADVERTISEMENTS: Part 6

Give a Boy Scout a fishing pole and he can feed himself for life.

Give him a Harley and you can kiss that Eagle Scout goodbye.

Click on image to see it larger.

Now just imagine you could go 100 miles on a gallon of gas on one of these little beauties. Let's say gas cost 15 to 20 cents a gallon when this ad was run. Do you want to even imagine how far you could go on what you currently pay to fill your tank each week?

As to this Cushman scooter ad..."road-ability" is a word? What dictionary were they using?

Click on image to see it larger.

And I'm not quite sure they've explained how a scout would make extra money if they bought one of these, but from what I read at Wikipedia I'm guessing parking meter attendant or ice cream sales might be possible.

The Cushman company started in 1903 in Lincoln, Nebraska, by Everett and Clinton Cushman. The company incorporated as Cushman Motor Works in 1913.[1] Until 1936 it produced engines for farm equipment, pumps, lawn mowers and boats. From 1936 until 1965 Cushman produced motor scooters, widely used by the US military in World War II and as alternative to automobiles before and after the war. One famous Cushman was the model 53, a military model from the WWII era. Designed to be dropped by parachute with Army Airborne troops, it became known as the Cushman Airborne. Other models were used on military bases for messenger service. The most successful model of Cushman scooter, the Eagle, was in production approximately 16 years. It resembled a motorcycle with its exposed engine and top tank. Other Cushman models used a step-through design common for scooters. The step-through design and ease of operation made it popular with men and women alike. Some late 50s Cushmans, designated Road King and Pacemaker, had jet-age body styling. Sears sold a version of these models under the Allstate brand. Cushman scooters featured an automatic centrifugal clutch, which allowed the rider to twist the right grip to accelerate. Oddly, the throttle twisted forward during acceleration, opposite the usual pattern in most other motorcycles and scooters. Cushman claimed 75 miles per gallon, and advertised penny-a-mile operating cost. Cushman scooters usually weighed about 250 to 335 pounds and had as much as 9 horsepower (6.7 kW). Scooter production ended in 1965, but some remaining Eagles were sold as 1966 models. After scooter production ceased, Cushman manufactured golf carts, industrial vehicles and turf maintenance equipment.

Cushman Trucksters were produced from 1958 to 2002. Small and light duty, they have been used for ice cream sales, mall and stadium maintenance, and by police for parking patrol. (SOURCE: Wikipedia)

Click on the "Boy Scout" label below to see previous scouting posts.

IT'S ONLY ROCK 'N' ROLL...

but I like it.

I will leave you to figure out who these famous faces are from a 1973 post card.

LET'S GO FIRST CLASS across America: Part 10...THE END

Well folks, this is it for the first class travel. We've now crossed to new territory, which this was sitting on when this card was made. Hawaii was a territory of the United States, a serious offense if there ever was one fueled by greed.

Click on either image to see them larger.

The Royal Hawaiian Hotel opened to guests on February 1, 1927. The hotel was built by Captain William Matson of Matson Liner fame. It was built specifically to house and entertain those who sailed to Hawaii for vacations on his ships.

With the success of the early efforts by Matson Navigation Company to provide steamer travel to America's wealthiest families en route to Hawaii, Captain William Matson proposed the development of a hotel in Honolulu for his passengers. This was in hope of profiting from what Matson believed could be the most lucrative endeavor his company could enter into. Matson purchased the Moana mansion, fronting the Ainahau royal estate. Christening it the Moana Hotel, it opened in 1901 as the first hotel in Waikiki. With its overwhelming success, Matson planned and built the Royal Hawaiian Hotel which opened in 1927.

During World War II, the Royal was closed to tourists and instead served as a place of rest and relaxation for U.S. submariners. While the Royal Hawaiian's lush tropical garden was (and still is) tranquil and poetic, on the beaches fronting the Pink Palace (sometimes referred to as the Pink Lady) one saw reminders of the war with rolls and rolls of barbed wire planted in the sand. The hotel was sold, along with the rest of Matson's hotels in Hawaii, to the Sheraton Corporation in 1959.

During the 1960's, the Pink Palace was home to "Concert by the Sea" which broadcast daily through Armed Forces Radio Network (AFN). Soldiers would listen to sounds of home all across Vietnam, and then on R&R would come to Waikiki to visit the Pink Palace in person. (SOURCE: Wikipedia)

This card was sent by my mother to her folks when we stopped over on Oahu on our way to live on Midway Island for a year in 1953. Somewhere I have a slide of my wee self standing on a step at the Royal Hawaiian.

If you've read my blogs for a few years you'll know that I met my best friend on a Matson Liner, the Matsonia, when our families were both transferred from the East Coast to Hawaii in 1959. Click here to read an old post about the Matson Liners.

For the first few months after arriving on Oahu in '59 we lived just a few blocks from the Royal in a hotel called the Islander until we got military housing. The Islander was a dump, but the military paid for it so you kept your mouth shut.

We used to walk to the International Marketplace in the evening for the shows and then walk along Kalākaua Avenue looking in shops and maybe stopping in to the Jolly Rogers for a piece of coconut cream pie and a root beer float.

The gardens at the Royal abutted the avenue and were beautiful, tropical, magical. There was a man who used to walk along the avenue with a parrot on his shoulder which impressed the heck out of me. If you were really lucky Duke Kahanamoku would walk by. A stunning man. If you don't know who Duke was I recommend you do a little side reading about him here.

When we moved to Oahu the Royal was one of the largest buildings in Waikiki. It was stunning and special. Then the jets started flying into the islands and things began to change. Developers moved in and by 1966 it looked like this in Waikiki. I've added a slight blush so you can find the Royal.

Photo: from Here's Hawaii by Tongg Publishing Company, Ltd.

Today...

Photo: Gerald Farinas

I hope you've enjoyed this odd little journey, first class and not so first class, around the United States of yore. There will be more travel adventures to come.

MAY IRWIN in MRS. BLACK IS BACK

I've had this card in my collection for several years having bought it at an estate sale. Until today I never bothered to really look at it. What I've found is rather interesting.

Click on either image to see it larger.

The card was sent on June 18, 1907 to Miss Belle Gordy in Santa Rosa, California from her friend Edith. That's not the interesting part.

Nor is the publisher, Carter & Gut, all that interesting.

Note the caption on the front:

May Irwin and Company

MRS. BLACK IS BACK

So who is May Irwin and why should we be worried that Mrs. Black is back?

May Irwin (June 27, 1862 – October 22, 1938), was a Canadian actress, singer and star of vaudeville.

Born at Whitby, Ontario 1862 as Georgina May Campbell, her father Robert E. Campbell of Whitby, Ontario died when she was 13 years old and her stage-minded mother, Jane Draper in need of money, encouraged May and her younger sister Flora to perform. Creating a singing act, billed as the `Irwin Sisters` debuted at the Adelphi Theatre, in nearby Buffalo, New York in December 1874. By the fall of 1877, their career had progressed, and they were booked to appear at New York's Metropolitan Theater then at the Tony Pastor Theatre, a popular New York City music hall.

The Irwin sisters proved popular enough to earn regular spots for the ensuing six years after which a 21-year-old May Irwin set out on her own. She joined Augustin Daly's stock company from 1883 to 1887, where she made her first appearance on the theatrical stage. This comedienne was known for her improvisation skills. An immediate success she went on to make her London stage debut at Toole's Theatre in August 1884. In 1886 her husband of eight years, Frederick W. Keller, died unexpectedly. Her sister Flora married Senator Grady.

By the early 1890s, May Irwin had married a second time and developed her career into that of a leading vaudeville performer with an act known at the time as "Coon Shouting" in which she performed African American influenced songs. In the 1895 Broadway show The Widow Jones, she introduced "The Bully Song" which became her signature number. The performance also featured a lingering kiss which was seen by Thomas Edison who hired Irwin and her co-star John C. Rice to repeat the scene on film. In 1896, Edison's Kinetoscope production, The Kiss, became the first screen kiss in cinematic history.

Among her own pieces have been : " The Widow Jones," " The Swell Miss Fitzswell," "Courted into Court," "Kate Kip-Buyer," "Sister Mary," etc.

In addition to her performing and singing, May Irwin also wrote the lyrics to several songs, including "Hot Tamale Alley," with music written by George M. Cohan. In 1907 she married her manager, Kurt Eisfeldt, the same year she began making records for Berliner/Victor. Several of these recordings survive and give a notion of the actress's appeal.

May Irwin's buxom figure was much in vogue at the time and combined with her charming personality, for more than thirty years she was one of America's most beloved performers. In 1914, she made her second silent film appearance, this time in the feature-length adaptation of George V. Hobart's play, Mrs. Black is Back, produced by Adolph Zukor's Famous Players Film Company and filmed for the most part at her own sprawling home in New York. Still pictures, showing May, survive from this movie.

A highly paid performer, Irwin was a shrewd investor and became a very wealthy woman. She spent a great deal of time at a summer home on secluded Club Island a small island off of Grindstone Island of the Thousand Islands and at her winter home on Merritt Island, Florida before retiring to a farm near Clayton, New York, where a street would eventually be named in her honor.

Personal life

May Irwin was married twice. First Frederick W. Keller, of St. Louis from 1878 until his death in 1886. From 1907 to the end of her life she was married to Kurt Eisenfeldt. The couple lived at West 44th Street, New York.

May Irwin had two sons by her first marriage, Walter Keller (born ca. 1879) and Harry Keller (b. 1882).

Death

May Irwin died in New York City on October 22, 1938, aged 76. (SOURCE: Wikipedia)

So what was Mrs. Black is Back about?

Based on a play by George V. Hobart, the story concerns a peppery middle-aged widow who claims to be only 29 years old. Despite the fact that she is obviously well along in years, Mrs. Black (Irwin) is able to convince a marriageable professor (Charles Lane) that she is indeed as young as she claims. But what is the prof to make of the fact that Mrs. Black has a grown son named Jack (Elmer Booth), who is himself well past the age of consent? Featured in the cast as Mrs. Mason was (Clara Blandick), best known for her work as Auntie Em in 1939's The Wizard of Oz. —Hal Erickson, Rovi (SOURCE: NY Times)

Hankering to hear May sing? Just click below to here her sing "Don't Argify". Want to hear the other songs? Click on the source below the list. WARNING: Some of the songs are offensive.

(SOURCE: Archive.org)

How about the famous May Irwin kiss?

All these years this card has been stuck in an album and I never once paid any attention to what it was. Only because I have a headache and grew weary of the work I need to do did I decide to see where this old piece of ephemera would take me.

I might still have the headache, but at least I'm not feeling so weary. In fact after listening to those tunes I'm absolutely serene.