“These are the good old days.”
— Long-time Mount Pleasant friend and old soul, Oscar Elliott (1947-2016)
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Rain was starting to fall. Mom ran around the house in a flurry of activity. “Put the windows down,” she called out to my sisters and me. “Quick.”
Summers in the late 1950s were hot. Closing all the windows in the house when it rained typically elevated already high East Texas humidity levels up into the Amazon Jungle range.
Once windows were closed, Mom charged out to the clothesline grabbing at still-damp laundry hanging on the line. And dad was already in the driveway rolling up car windows. “Leon,” he called out. “Come put your bicycle in the garage. It’s going to get wet.”
Air conditioning debuted at our house in 1959 in the form of one small window unit. Largely inspired, I think, by a night we spent at that small Arkansas motel with the neon sign teasing, “Refrigerated air.” During one of our trips to the Crater of Diamonds tourist attraction where middle class dreamers could spend a sweltering day in the hot sun digging for diamonds.
Before that, we had no air conditioning at home. Schools were not air conditioned. Nor were many churches. Dad worked for the five-and-dime chain, Perry Brothers. Their stores, like the schools, churches, and other businesses of the day, were “cooled” by open doors and ceiling fans.
Nature’s air conditioning at its best.
It was hot.
At home on Redbud Street in Mount Pleasant, the doors and windows were always open. Even at night when screens were the only thing that let cooler air in and kept bugs out. Most of them, anyway.
Our first AC was a tiny window unit no bigger than a breadbox.
A what, some will ask? Breadboxes were decorative boxy containers for keeping bread fresh. Big enough for a loaf of Sunbeam bread in a white paper wrapper plus a box of saltines. Usually placed on a countertop although ours, for some reason, once resided on top of the refrigerator. Clearly labeled “BREAD.” Just in case anyone wondered.
Breadboxes were popularized by the 1950s game Twenty Questions quote that spilled over into the television game show “What’s My Line?” Where humorist Steve Allen asked, “Is it bigger than a bread box?”
The small unit Dad purchased at the local Western Auto Store on time payments of $5 per month was mounted in the living room window where it became not unlike a shrine where everyone gathered for praise and comfort. And it was fine … for the living room. But no more. Living room doors between the hallway and the kitchen were closed during the day, making it the haven for cool hangouts.
It was turned off at night to conserve electricity in favor of evaporative coolers, or as they were called “swamp coolers,” to work the night shift.
Evaporative coolers earned that name for a reason. One, they provided a cool breeze at night, albeit damp, so long as the humidity wasn’t too high. Two, they mildewed every leather shoe and belt in the closet, regardless of the reported humidity level.
It was hot.
But hot was the norm. At home or anywhere. Even traveling. Air-conditioned cars were rare and expensive then. That trip to Arkansas to spend the night in a “refrigerated air” motel room in the family’s un-air-conditioned Ford station wagon was hot. Sitting in the back seat, summer air coming through a car window at 55 to 60 miles per hour offered little relief. And if you drew the short straw and had to sit behind Dad, there was that smoking thing. Dodging airborne cigarette ashes as he thumb-tapped the burnt remains out the driver’s window. The only thing worse than solar-heated air was solar-heated air laden with cigarette ashes.
“Dubs on Mom’s side,” my sisters and I clamored when ordered to load up in the car.
“You got it last time,” we accused each other. “No, I didn’t, you did.”
“Stop that,” Mom chided. “Just get in the car and be quiet.”
It was hot.
And it was also hot last week the day I walked in my back door after work. The indoor/outdoor thermometer glared “89 degrees” at me just before the heat knocked me down. That was the inside temperature. Outside, it was 85, in the shade. With a heat index of about 185 in the sun.
My aged air conditioning system had given up the ghost. Fried the freon. My efforts at patching it every summer while speaking nicely, promising, “Just hang in there one more summer,” had expired.
Problems created by recent rains, flooding, and power outages in East Texas had repair people booked into the next millennium. However, my preferred repair service came to my aid. After we concluded memorial services and a proper sendoff for the deceased compressor, the damage assessment was made.
I had an appointment for replacement—three days and several thousand dollars hence.
Three days turned into four, then five, thanks to this country’s current supply chain circus and delivery dilimas.
However, a week in a house sans air conditioning, circa summer 2024, gave me cause to reflect on the “good old days.” How we once coped with hot weather because coping was the only option. Because hot was the norm. But we didn’t complain because, in the “good old days,” we had nothing different to compare it to other than one night in an Arkansas motel room.
It caused me to question. Have we, as a society, simply become too soft? Unable or unwilling to deal with a once common way of life? Growing up living a wonderful life in conditions we would consider today as “hardships.”
While drafting this missive last Sunday afternoon, I arrived at a conclusion or two. While basking once again in the comfort of cooled air flowing throughout my house … “Thank you, Jesus.” Courtesy of a 2024 air climate control system much bigger than a 1959 breadbox.
One, it is still hot.
And two, Oscar’s sage advice was spot on — then and today.
“These are the good old days.”
—Leon Aldridge
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Aldridge columns are featured in these publications: The Center Light and Champion, the Mount Pleasant Tribune, the Rosenberg Fort Bend Herald, the Taylor Press, the Alpine Avalanche, the Fort Stockton Pioneer, the Elgin Courier, The Monitor in Naples, and Motor Sports Magazine.
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