Another thing I spent a lot of money on was Comic books . And there were lots of comics to choose from . The Super heroes , GI Joe Comics , Daffy Duck and friends , Mickey Mouse ..I really can't begin to remember them all .
I was not good at keeping comic books pristine . That's like saying the
ocean is salty , or my Brother really hated it when I discovered his current
comic book hiding place. As a result in a few short months my comics would be
torn apart , dripped on , stepped on , used to hit flies ,washed with my jeans ,
left at school accidentally or confiscated at school. One thing I can be
assured of , I don't need to search my past to find a stack of mint comic books
ready to be sold on Ebay.
Just about everyone I hung out with had comic books , and part of the fun
of visiting our friends at home was reading their comics and trading them . I
found Ii could get more mileage out of my trades by trading my Brothers .
Most of our comic books we purchased were purchased at a local Grocery
Store chain called Fred Meyer's . For most of the week the little Grocery store
on the corner worked quite well . but every two weeks after dad got paid we
would make the 15 drive to the Burlingame Fred Meyer Store .
Finding any information about the History of this store seems very
difficult here is what I do know about Fred Meyer Courtesy if Wiki
: Fred Meyer, Inc., is a chain of hypermarkets founded in 1922
in Portland , by Fred G. Meyer. The company
was one of the pioneers of one-stop shopping, eventually combining a complete
grocery supermarket with a drugstore, clothing store, shoe store, fine
jewellers, home decor store, home improvement centre, garden centre, electronics
store, toy store, sporting goods store, and more under one roof.
All that was totally lost on Bob and I . If asked we would thought every
town in every state of every nation would have a Fred Meyer . As it is with so
much we were blessed and didn't know it.
We looked forward to the bi Monthly visits to Fred Meyer . And so did our
parents . Freddy's had hit on a clever Idea that was humane and Family
friendly. In the short run they probably lost money for this decision , but in
the long run it garnered them generations of Faithful Customers .
Fred Meyer had a Comic book section that was as vast as the prairies were
vast , and though I had never really seen a prairie , I knew vast when I saw it
. The comic book section was directly in front of the Check out counters .
Scores of spindle displays reached half way to the stars ...and gathered around
these colourful monuments to children's literature , Bob and I would be left off
with scores of other children . So while our parents shopped ( Protesting and
whining child free ) we would sit under the shadow of the comic book forest and
read comics . Yes we were actually allowed to sample the comic books before we
bought them . To be sure many kids wee slow readers so it was imperative that
the comic was purchased at the end of the shopping cycle, but both bob and I
were also very good readers so we could easily toss off about 5 comic books ,
before we settled on one or two to take home . IN fact we rarely read the
comic books we took home instead reading ones that we enjoyed but not enough to
purchase . It was a good thing . One of my favourite family memories .
When mom and dad were done shopping they would collect us , we would pay
for our comics and the they would be placed in the cart . The carts had a
numbering system and each cart had two matching numbers . The clerk would give
my parents one number and leave the other on the cart . Then we would go to
where the car was parked and drive it up to the store. Mom would hang the number
over her window , and we would pull up in front of the Fred Meyer . Carts
filled with Groceries were lined up , and a young man would match our number on
the window with the cart with the same number and proceed to load the groceries
in the car .
Again a pretty neat system, the paring lot was filled with cars not carts
, by working efficiently Freddy's was able to spend less on Carts , and you had
the impression you were really being served .
On the way home , bob and I would good naturally fight , usually because
bob would suddenly be reminded that he couldn't find the new Casper the Ghost
Comic He had bought two weeks ago and would accuse me of stealing it .. I would
defend myself defiantly drawing a fine line between stealing his comic book
and the truth which was I used it in a sweet trade with Rex for his GI Joe
commando Comic and a Road Runner ( Beep Beep) for a strawberry stained Casper
the Ghost .
Family time ...was good time .
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