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Neighborhood markets and other food pictures on Shorpy dot com

Alex

By Alex
in Food Traditions & Culture

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Alex

Alex

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A recent eG forum about "Consumer Reports Best Supermarkets" got me thinking about how when I was growing up in NYC, we had a mix of regular supermarkets (though not as "super" as many of those today) and smaller, neighborhood-oriented grocery stores. Coincidentally, a picture posted today on Shorpy.com was of one of those stores.

 

For those who aren't acquainted with Shorpy, allow me an introduction. The site describes itself, accurately, as "a vintage photo blog featuring thousands of high-definition images from the 1850s to 1950s." What that quote doesn't tell you is how addictive the site is -- especially for anyone with even a remote interest in history. I've weaned myself to checking for new photos (and, sometimes, comments) only a couple of times a day. They're also associated with Vintagraph, purveyor of vintage poster reproductions -- including some that are food-related.

 

This is the 1947 grocery store picture I was looking at today. (Click on the picture for a larger image.) It's somehow reassuring to see familiar labels, like Heinz, B & M, and Hellman's. Here's another one, from 1948, this time with Planters, Sunshine, and Chef Boy-ar-dee. And a grocery store cheese display, also from 1948. (Breakstone's! Ry-Krisp! air-wick! And check out the bagels.)

 

I told you it was addictive.

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"There is no sincerer love than the love of food."  -George Bernard Shaw, Man and Superman, Act 1

 

"Imagine all the food you have eaten in your life and consider that you are simply some of that food, rearranged."  -Max Tegmark, physicist

 

Gene Weingarten, writing in the Washington Post about online news stories and the accompanying readers' comments: "I basically like 'comments,' though they can seem a little jarring: spit-flecked rants that are appended to a product that at least tries for a measure of objectivity and dignity. It's as though when you order a sirloin steak, it comes with a side of maggots."

 

"A sense of humor is a measurement of the extent to which you realize that you are trapped in a world almost entirely devoid of reason. Laughter is how you release the anxiety you feel at this knowledge." -Dave Barry, humorist

 

Read to children. Vote. And never buy anything from a man who's selling fear. -Mary Doria Russell, science-fiction writer

 

When small men begin to cast big shadows, it means that the sun is about to set. -Lin Yutang, writer and translator

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