Auctions tables are full of remnants from our past, and one special item can evoke memories that have long lain dormant. That’s what happened recently when two items from my blog posts propelled readers back to some pleasant times in their childhoods.
For one reader, a hand-crank ice cream maker evoked tears of joy and sadness. For another, the Bannister doll called up a special memory that made her proud.
Peach ice cream at family gatherings
Reader’s comment:
Yes I remember these. We made ice cream 2 or 3 times a month in the hot summer months. My first memories of them I was too small to crank the freezer. Whoever happened to be cranking the freezer had me sit on it to steady it as the handle became harder to turn as the ice cream froze. By the time the ice cream was ready you could hardly turn the handle.
We had peach trees and always had fresh peaches to make peach ice cream, which seemed to be the favorite around our place. We always had big family get-togethers on July 4th and Labor Day, and usually had 2 freezers of ice cream. Each freezer made 1 gallon of ice cream. I am almost 80 years old now and remembering brings tears to my eyes as almost all my relatives who joined us for the ice cream parties are now deceased.
I had 2 uncles who were WW2 vets and a third who was drafted and sent to Germany with the occupation forces a couple of years after the war. We had a big ice cream supper going-away party when he left. I was about 10 years old then and teased him unmercifully about being a dogface. He told me not to worry, my time was coming and it did 10 years later.
Background:
A couple years ago, I wrote about finding an old hand-crank ice cream maker at auction, romanticizing about how nifty it must have been to make your own ice cream. It was a White Mountain freezer, first made in 1853. I also learned that the first ice cream maker – “crude, but easy-to-use” – was made by a woman named Nancy Johnson around the 1840s, and she patented it as an artificial freezer. Earlier, I had found that she did not patent her invention. There were several discrepancies about the patent.
A holiday ‘Show and Tell’ with a Constance Bannister doll
Sherry, my sister and I each received a Baby Bannister doll for Christmas (1956) when I was in first grade. She came in a pink cardboard carrying case wearing the little white bath robe with hood and a pair of white panties. The bath robe was trimmed in pink, and she also came with a pink dress with blue and pink flowers on the upper half. She came with a bubble pipe and a baby bottle.
She had a small hole in her mouth for the bubble pipe and baby bottle. She also had a tiny hole in her lower back so she wet when you fed her. I still have mine in the original dress. Don’t have anything else that came with her. I think my sister still has her doll, too.
I took my doll and her case with the accessories to school after Christmas for “Show and Tell.” A lot of the children in my class had brought something to show. I always remember Mrs. Grosweiler, my teacher, held my doll and case up and walked them around the room to show the other children. She told me how cute it was. She didn’t take the time to walk any of the other children’s toys around like she did mine.
I remember it made me feel extra special. I loved my doll and played with it for years. It’s really great to read about her and her history. Thanks so much.
Background:
The Bannister Baby doll seems to have been pretty popular because I’ve gotten several emails from women who remembered her fondly. None, however, realized that the doll was based on the work of photographer Constance Bannister. She was a well-known photographer in the 1940s and 1950s whose specialty was babies, sometimes featuring them in whimsical poses and endeavors.
