Texas State Historical Association - My Texas

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Saturday's Entertainment

Saturdays were always exciting for my sister Gwen and me. We took a bath in a number-two washtub filled with water drawn from our well and heated on our coal-oil cook stove. After washing our hair in a basin of warm water, we dressed to go to Commerce for our supplies. Dad would borrow Grandpa Coney's car and away we would go. The car had running boards. Gwen would stand on Dad's side of the car so he could put his arm around her waist to hold her and keep her from falling, and I would stand on Mom's side of the car. We loved feeling the wind blow through our hair. Of course we only rode on the running boards while we were on the county roads. When we got to the highway between Cooper and Commerce, Dad stopped the car so we could get inside. I loved to sing and would try to drown out the sound of the motor with my voice. Gwen would join in from her side of the car. One spring night I was giving it my all, with my mouth wide open, when a big bug flew into my throat with such force that I thought my voice box was broken! Not only did he fly into my throat, I gulped real big, and he continued on into my stomach. Try as I might, I couldn't vomit him up. I was about eleven at the time. After that I sang with my back toward the front of the car. Mom took me to the doctor on Monday because she was concerned about a bug crawling around my insides. He snorted and said, "I'd rather be her than the bug!"

In Commerce we shopped at the five-and-ten-cent store, where Mom bought material to make our dresses. There were all sorts of wonders to be found there: toys, dolls, thread, buttons, big-little books, and even socks to match our dresses. We would take our purchases to the car, then go to the movies where it was cool. We had our choice of movies. The Lyric showed Westerns and cost a dime. It had such stars as Roy Rogers, Tom Mix, Gene Autry, or Hopalong Cassidy, then a cartoon, and always some kind of a serial like a space adventure with Buck Rogers, or maybe Tarzan of the Apes. These left you with a "cliff-hanger" at the end to keep you coming back the next week to see what happened. The show lasted three or four hours.

The Palace across the street cost a quarter. It showed more sophisticated black-and-white movies with stars like Humphrey Bogart and James Cagney. It also had a cartoon, a newsreel, and previews of coming attractions. (That's the place I saw Gone With the Wind--the first colored movie I ever saw.)

Dad didn't care much for Westerns, so he chose to go to the "domino hall" and play dominoes. One Saturday afternoon Mom wanted him to go with her to see a movie at the Palace. She told him that he was playing dominoes too much because he played all day Sundays at Grandpa Coney's, and the four hours on Saturdays was entirely too much. He agreed to go to the movies that day. One of the scenes in the movie showed a building on fire, with the fire department raising their ladder to the top of the building to let the people on top of it climb down. They started driving off just as another man came to the edge of the roof and began to step onto the ladder. He was waving and yelling, but the firemen didn't see him and kept driving off. Dad was so engrossed in the action that he stood up from his seat, pointed to the man on the building, and yelled, "You left one!" Well, everybody in the audience roared with laughter. When Dad realized what he had done, he was so embarrassed. After the movie was over and we were walking out, people were pointing at him and laughing. He told Mom, "Maybe I have been playing dominoes too much." He never went to the domino parlor again.

When the movie was over, we shopped at the A&P grocery store. Mom selected our meat from the butcher's counter, and he cut it to the size she wanted. She would get three pounds of coffee beans, then run them through the grinder which also roasted them. That coffee smelled so good being ground.

We loved visiting friends and neighbors who parked on the "square." Whole families chatted and laughed until late (maybe even 9:00). Sometimes we went to the ice cream parlor for a special treat. At about nine o'clock we left for home, a trip that took about an hour.

At the grocery store, where Eagle brand milk was three cans for one dollar, Dad would buy it. When we got home he would open all three cans, give one to Gwen and one to me, and keep the last one for him. Mom couldn't stand that stuff. She would gag just watching us. She usually went on to bed. We laughed and talked with Dad. It made us feel very grown-up to stay up with Dad after Mom was in bed. We would drink every drop of that wonderful stuff, go to bed, and sleep peacefully. How, I can't even begin to tell you. It should have given us nightmares! Eagle brand milk is still one of my "comfort" foods. Drinking it brings back sweet memories.

Lowell McCormack
Gainesville, Texas
Published: November 14, 2005