VINTAGE RECORD ALBUMS EXPLAIN SEX TO KIDS

There was once a time when Americans could pick up an LP from their local record store that either gave youngsters sex advice or their parents tips. (Just the tips, please.) They were given pointers on how to discuss the subject with their little ones. I know –you’re embarrassed thinking about it. Me too. The well-meaning (sexist?) discs included here like a priest (Father Filas) advising parents on what to tell their children about sex (like he’d be the best person to ask?) the host of Kids Say the Darndest Things, Art Linkletter, narrating the story of “Where do I come from?”, and a Dr. Morris Fishbein giving advice to growing girls. Thank the baby Jesus that these are just the visuals and we don’t have to HEAR the advice. You can be sure that it was all just boy on girl stuff and making babies. It’s gotten SO much more complicated these days. I say, let Mr. Google fill them in, 

“Cindy, just type in, ‘Where do babies come from?’…”

VINTAGE MACY'S THANKSGIVING DAY PARADE PICS

I love these old pictures of the Macy’s Thanksgiving Day Parade. Turn on any TV this morning and you can see the 2017 version. Here’s a bit of parade history from Wikipedia:

The tradition started in 1924, tying it for the second-oldest Thanksgiving parade in the United States, along with America’s Thanksgiving Parade in Detroit.

In 1924, the annual Thanksgiving parade started by Louis Bamberger in Newark, New Jersey at the Bamberger’s store was transferred to New York by Macy’s. In New York, the employees marched to Macy’s flagship store on 34th Street dressed in vibrant costumes. There were floats, professional bands and live animals borrowed from the Central Park Zoo. At the end of that first parade, as has been the case with every parade since, Santa Claus was welcomed into Herald Square. At this first parade, however, the Jolly Old Elf was enthroned on the Macy’s balcony at the 34th Street store entrance, where he was then “crowned” “King of the Kiddies.” With an audience of over a quarter of a million people, the parade was such a success that Macy’s declared it would become an annual event.

Anthony “Tony” Frederick Sarg loved to work with marionettes from an early age. After moving to London to start his own marionette business, Sarg moved to New York City to perform with his puppets on the street. Macy’s heard about Sarg’s talents and asked him to design a window display of a parade for the store. Sarg’s large animal-shaped balloons, produced by the Goodyear Tire and Rubber Company in Akron, Ohio, replaced the live animals in 1927 when the Felix the Cat balloon made its debut. Felix was filled with air, but by the next year, helium was used to fill the expanding cast of balloons.

At the finale of the 1928 parade, the balloons were released into the sky where they unexpectedly burst. The following year they were redesigned with safety valves to allow them to float for a few days. Address labels were sewn into them, so that whoever found and mailed back the discarded balloon received a gift from Macy’s.

Through the 1930s, the Parade continued to grow, with crowds of over 1 million lining the parade route in 1933. The first Mickey Mouse balloon entered the parade in 1934. The annual festivities were broadcast on local New York radio from 1932 through 1941, and resumed in 1945 through 1951. The three-hour Macy’s event is held in New York City starting at 9AM EST, on Thanksgiving Day, and has been televised nationally on NBC since 1952.