JC Whitney Basic Car Air Conditioner Discovered

JC Whitney was and is a mail order car parts company I believe based out of Chicago. Their catalog ordering kept many an old car going or improved. Ordered VW parts from them many yrs ago. At a Garage Sale near Baldwin NY I discovered for sale at $.50 a really unusual and  odd Whitney product from the late 50's , early 60's. It was a car ice cube air conditioner. The ladies who were selling noticed my attention to the item. One came over and asked me what the heck it was. It had come from her Fathers garage  who had passed away this past February. I explained what it was , how it worked. I explained that I actually knew a {red neck] who had one . She offered to give it to me.....I declined. This is how this most basic of air conditioners worked. Once mounted somewhere on dash board of your car and the direct current wire attached to a hotwire  under the dash one would fill the tray container with ice cubes. Flick the switch and on would come the fan. The air would blow over the ice cooling it down  and put cooler air into the car.  It actually did work to some degree. Anyway , it came out as a novelty product when car air conditioning began to come into the market. In the 50's when air conditioning began to take over from fans or a shady porch it was an expensive item. But with increased traffic flow and more "traffic jams" it rapidly became a prized option. As we know today it is practically standard equipment on most cars. So , a short  trip back to  mail order automotive  artifact time. Car stuff always fascinates me even this stuff.

Three Young Guys in a Bar

 I have just finished the book Fire and Rain. It was a look back at the year 1970 and what was happening in music and culture. Many things were beginning to change that year after the 1960's had marched through. I have been fascinated by this time period as well....have written some about that period. So many things were quickly passing , so much building. Unless you were there or sort of there it is hard to explain what currents were weaving through society at that moment. So I present this story as a micro look at that time , about midway through that year. One cannot be sure but I think it has the sort of  personal history that may reflect the developing mood across a nation which was quite weary at that moment.  It begins ....there are three young guys in a bar. They are at best nominal of  any faith. But as many jokes go a Catholic a Jew and a Protestant. the bar is Garafalo's Bar in Castleton N.Y. 12033. Long now closed. It is mid July. They sit in a booth nursing their Budweiser beers. The door to the bar is open as it is humid. Something not allowed anymore because of health laws.  A 1966 Ford Falcon with a loud exhaust  passes by and then burns rubber at the stop light. These guys have known each other since early elementary school.. They are unusually quiet. The afterglow of High School Graduation has passed , all the graduation parties done  , gifts received and congratulations given. Summer jobs are here. One remarks that after waiting for so long to graduate the feeling goes so quickly. We will not be going back....which we all agreed was a very good thing. I remarked that the past year was the only year  I actually enjoyed for yrs. As a matter of fact I had returned home from another school and to be honest come back from a sort of private edge , my past year with a little help from  my friends turned out to keep me focused and I was indeed changing toward a more adult outlook. Though I would not admit it at the time. College beckoned us all. We planned some adventures but we were indeed going to new places. Then one of us said........I am sick of the sixties.....the arguing .......the war.......protests .....riots........Jesus  will things ever quiet down. We were quiet for a moment ,  Then we all agreed. We seemed to feel fatigue , a situational fatigue. We did not know it of course but people like Morrison would be dead within a couple of years. Hendrix had only a couple of more months on this earth. Our high school era was really ending.. The Beatles had split in the spring. What had anchored us was leaving. We didn't say that of course more of a gut feeling. Society was turning , Kent State shootings were a watershed for many of us. We did not realize it but we were responding to our young national cultural mood. So were it seems many young people. College campus's were becoming rapidly more quiet , The Nixon Administration was in charge ,  Woodstock seemed a long ago event that night though it was less than a year before. It is not that we suddenly lost our wise ass adolescent  edge but we were somehow looking at a bottom line. We were going to be something else. That night we began to talk about some of what we wanted to accomplish. College and careers. One of us was within two years of meeting his future wife which would have shook  us to the core if we knew something like that. I bought a round ,  and we talked some more. A discussion of  the future , the kind of discussion America was having it appears. By the next New Years  we looked alot different from say the recent ball busting American year of 1968. I think our quiet thoughtful talk that night was happening all over.....reevaluation ........all most in a semi conscious way. America of that present  a few short months after a new decade was rung in was moving as perhaps America does best quickly. We don't have as a people alot of patience. Not then and not now. This conversation stayed with me all these years. At Garaflo's that night we  may have put a foot into our next life. As our society was as well. It was nice to do it with my friends.

Jim Morrison : You've Been Dead A Long Time

 On a recent trip to my home town , I stopped by  one of our local cemeteries. I promised my cousin I would stop by and "pay my respects" to a family friend who had recently passed away. By the way , I hate cemeteries  and funerals as well. But a promise is a promise. After a short search , found it stood there for a couple of minutes. Thought about their life for a moment. As I was walking out I passed the grave of an old classmate which caused me a moments delay. I kept walking and then stopped. An odd artifact of sorts on the ground in front of me. Reached down , picked it up. An old Doors LP or as we called them a record. It was weather worn but the label could still be read. It was their first album I believe....the one that featured Light my Fire. Came out around 1967 I believe. The shorter version of light my fire became the big hit of that long ago summer. My first real kiss occurred that summer.....while that song played on the radio. East Hampton Connecticut in July of 1967 while on a  visit to my aunt & uncle's home summer home. Amazing how a memory can be jogged out of ones mind. What this record was doing there , who knows. People do leave all sorts of things on graves for the dead. But of course it is a way to comfort ones self.  Morrison would of course die in July of 1971....purported drug overdose. He is buried in a much different place than a small local cemetery in Schodack , NY. He was buried in the Pere Lachaise Cemetery in Paris. My daughter while on a semesters study in Italy stopped by his grave while on a visit to the city of light. Believe it or not it is one of the top 10 most visited sites in Paris. Not forgotten after all these yrs. A best selling post card you can buy is Morrison's grave. Imagine that....Jim Morrison's grave up there with National attractions like the Eiffel Tower.  A sustained memory , part talent , part illusion , part lost memory , like along ago lost kiss. I never saw The Doors play live except on the Sullivan Show. Owned their music.  Part of a young life at the time. But the yrs have gone by , you have been dead a long time. I placed the album down on the ground where I found it and continued on my way out.

Schodack Valley Spring / Schodack N.Y. 12033

 I spent the last few days doing some research and  collecting near and around The Moordenkill stream in and around the Castleton / Schodack township area. An interesting area which I have been itching to explore in more detail for quite a while. I received a good room deal at the Franklin Square Inn  in Troy , NY so I had a good set of digs from which to set off from. Spent a long day in the Moordenkill Gorge  , photos , some interesting rock finds which I may discuss at another time. On one of my passes along Schodack Valley road I passed  a small abandoned dwelling. A few minutes later my memory was jogged. I went back took out the Vietnam Style Tomahawk I have in my bag  and chopped away some trees of paradise. There it was , a once famous spring in this area. Old field notes would provide more history. This spring has been active for well over a century. Generally it has been referred to as the Schodack Valley Spring.  Old interviews in the sixties and early seventies revealed that this was a well traveled road 70 plus yrs ago. When horses were still used for farming or teams of oxen it was stated to me that no animal would pass by this roadside spring without drinking their full. Many people would travel to it for drinking water as it was considered widely as a very sweet spring. It was even considered in a strange way to be a health drink. If one had a sick animal that wasn't eating well a pale of this water could be restorative. As the yrs passed it was used for many people as a good drinking water and was used in apple cider making. I  have even talked with WWII vets who told me it was a sobbering up place when that generation finished up their night on the town so to speak. A couple of slurps of water , throw some on you face you felt more sobber already. Hence my last previous visit to this watering hole. Circa July or August in the yr 1970. I and a couple of friends stopped by for a late night drink and a cold splash on the face.That is an old memory. But remember young drinking was not as frowned upon as it is now by  various parts of society. Anyway it appears that this spring going into an old barrel is not  as nearly used at it once was. I can't vouch for it's purity but I did take a short drink and threw some water on my face and sunburned red neck. So far no ill effects. These sort of springs are neglected in many areas but were once where communities might form around with a reliable source of good healthy water. If I was going to start a business today I might buy that property and start a spring water company.....God knows how many spring waters are on the market but this might have been worth the risk capitol.