September 08, 2003
Chewy Chewy
Bubble gum related sites - Topps has put a sampling of
Joe Bazooka comics on their site. Never liked ol' Joe that much. They always had the corny, squeaky clean humor of a Bowery Boys movie. Sometimes I think Topps just recycled the same comics from the '40s. The gum was probably that old, too! (via
Metafilter)
On the other hand, Wacky Packages were an entirely different thing. Transgressive. Brilliant. Who cares if the gum was like cardboard. Tom's Wacky Packages is the ultimate resource on the subject. (via Sugar 'n Spicy)
Posted by mhinrichs at September 8, 2003 12:01 AM
Just the other day I was reminiscing about two of my favorite things from childhood: Wacky Packs and the Marvel Super Heroes stickes.
When I was seven or eight, I would ride my bike one mile from my house to the nearest store: a country store run by a grouchy old man named Charlie. He hated kids, or seemed to.
I'd buy a pack of stickers and a bottle of Dr. Pepper and then ride back home.
This was in 1976 or 77, and we lived in the country, but still I'm amazed that my parents let me do this. I'm glad, though! :)
If you use Mac OS X, I created an icon set a while back using these wacky packages scans check them out here.
I used to chew Bazooka like it was going out of style, and I had a drawer *full* of Bazooka wrappers/comics, in hopes that one day I would send away for the free crap you could get with x number of comics. I never did, though.
J.D., we had a little store, too, in rural Ohio: Kenny's Grocery, though to call it a grocery was an overstatement of the century, and I never found out who 'Kenny' was. The woman who ran it would had signed photos of Michael Damien ('Danny Romalotti' from the soap Y&R) and senior pictures of kids from the 70's who would come in and buy cigarettes there before school. (As far as I know, Kennys' is still operating, and those photos still hang.) I would use my allowance to buy gum & swedish fish and eat/chew it all in about 10 minutes' time.
Mmm, swedish fish.
I never heard of autographed photos hung in a convenience store. How exotic!
My cousins living with my Grandmother plastered her refrigerator with Wacky Package stickers. And magnetic fruit.
Love your bl*g. Found it by way of the Male Librarian Centerfold.
From work, look out your northern window and wave. I might be able to see you. (How come my Sunday paper didn't have any coupons. Ha,ha!)
The Kenny's near me shut down years ago, or at least the name did. I didn't know they had Kenny's in Ohio. Now, it just takes the boring old name of the city like every other business in the towns borders.
I have to say though, I much enjoy Bazooka gum, and especially the comics, and appreciate the "squeaky cleaness"- its one of the few simple things left not perverted by the day's culture.
