Nothing like a little academic research for a modern American culture class I’m putting together to come across some of the more truly amazin’ stuff out there on the web. Via the always entertaining Learning To Share blog, I found this wonderful collection of scanned catalogs from Sears, JC Penny and Montgomery Ward ranging from the late 1940s to the early 1980s, and GOOD GOD did people actually WEAR this shit???
I must confess that I remember far too many of the outfits featured in the mid-70s Christmas catalogs… especially for the kids, since that’s what my little school mates of the day were parading in. The wide wide world of belts on red bell bottoms and bright orange and brown shirts!!! It was clearly the best decade in the history of the world to be color blind.
Click on the thumbnail if you want to see what was all the rage on the 1976 Bar Mitzvah party circuit… oooh, the memories… ooh the pain… crank up the Wild Cherry and Leo Sayer and you’ve got everything you need to par-tee down!!!
Hey baby, I’m wearin’ one-hundred percent polyester…. that’s right, nothin’ but the best for me! Double knit for double your pleasure, if you know what I mean? Let’s boogie!
For a solid antidote to the clothes, however, the toy ads are a soothing trip down memory lane. I want my Hot Wheels set back!!!
And here, courtesy the 1955 Spiegel catalog (Chicago 60609! Back to you Monty!) is a page filled with the kind of crap I dream about finding at yardsales… I want the “Uranium Rush” game AND the “Dragnet” game, Santa!!!
Jim Berkin 