We were in Santa Fe, New Mexico in early August, 2022, meeting up with one of our sons and his wife, primarily to attend a couple of performances at the open air opera.
Santa Fe is a typical tourist town with over priced everything, but a very pleasant place to visit, although it was warmer than the pre-trip weather forecast indicated. The old town atmosphere is charming, with lots of shops, street vendors and activity. I usually had the task of waiting with our labradoodle, while my wife shopped. Some stores allow dogs inside, some do not.
This portion of our trip was not conducive to photography activity, so I have only a few iPhone photographs to share. The image above was made prior to the first opera performance we attended. The mustache on the stage might give away the performance: “The Barber of Seville”.
The sun sets behind the stage and it was spectacular at the beginning of this first event. The second night’s sunset, during the early portion of “Carmen”, was not so great. Even though this facility is covered, it is open. We were expecting cooler temperatures at night, but it was still quite warm in the audience area.
One afternoon we went to the Meow Wolf art display, which is a rather wacky place.
On a road trip to Santa Fe, NM and Colorado, our first night stop over in route was in Lubbock, TX. Lubbock is not along the shortest route to our final destinations, but I decided a new route was desirable, having often repeated the same route in that direction.
After checking into our motel, we had a little time to kill before dinner. Looking around for something to do, my wife found a number of her favorite type places to visit, antique malls. So we picked one that was only a few miles away and was still open, but closing soon.
I found a number of old cameras to inspect and photograph with my iPhone.
It is amazing how many different makes, models and designs there were in the earlier days of photography.
In my high school days and on into college years, I worked in an old style drug store in a small town. The store had only two cash registers, both manual types, similar to, but more basic than those in the images in this post, one small one and one larger one.
This particular antique store had old style drugstore furnishings, including many glass display counters and behind the counter shelves with sliding glass doors, similar to those in the store in which I worked. I only recently learned that the reason for such furnishings were that people were not trusted to have access to the products and open style shelving is a relatively recent development, first introduced in Piggly Wiggly grocery stores in the early 1900.
These bottles still contain liquid, although they are no longer full. I’m guessing the wine is no longer good, even though it is well aged.
Many other beverage types and brands are always found in these old stuff stores. Coffee seems to be one of the favorites.
Those stripes look black to me. Maybe it is navy blue?
Tobacco related items are also popular. I did not recall Diana Lynn, which prompted me to do a brief internet research. I’m thankful that the internet allows for such easy research on almost any topic from almost anywhere. No library browsing required. If not for this old advertising poster, I might never have known anything about Diana Lynn.
My wife recently purchased an old Singer sewing machine. It is the same model as her mom used, so the purchase was based upon nostalgia. The machine works, but I replaced one of the electric cords, since the original one looked hazardous. I had to refinish an old cabinet for the machine, too. But not the original cabinet that the machine came in, since that one was not acceptable to my wife. Now we have an extra sewing machine in our garage that was in the refinished cabinet. Contact me if you are in the market for a sewing machine, no reasonable offer will be refused. Heck, I’ll even give it away to anyone that will take it away.
Some items in this store were subject to censorship.
This is enough to drive one to drink.
But here is an ice box to keep our beer cold:
I hope to have regained my sanity before the next post.
One of my wife’s favorite pastimes is browsing in antique stores and malls. I frequently accompany her on these visits, occupying my time shooting photos, usually with an iPhone, of items or displays that I find interesting and/or nostalgic.
I recall seeing the Memorex magnetic recording tape commercials many years ago, but I do not recall Memorex brand radios, which seems strange, since Memorex came into existence in 1961, while I was in high school. I had a Westinghouse clock radio in my bedroom then, not Memorex.
Having photography as a hobby, I’m always drawn to displays of old cameras.
The vendor of the booth in which this odd electronic device is displayed has an elaborate description of its ability to transport one in space and time. I see no Flux Capacitor, but there are numerous potentiometers in its Circulator panel.
Cameras, comic books and yams. What can be better?
Remember when cameras were manufactured in the U.S.?
Six-20 Camera, as opposed to Brownie Scouts or Fudge Brownies.
Not sure what makes these “Lucky”, but it was a popular brand for years.
Sieves used for sorting some materiel by diameter, probably have/had numerous application in industries. Maybe these even were even used for particle size distribution analysis of data that I used in my job, prior to retirement.
Colorful lamp shades hark back to the early days of popular home electric lighting.
Rows of colorful glassware always catch my eye,
as do rows and shelves filled with old cameras. Such displays remind me of how fast technology advances. This image (and all others in this post) were made with a device that is obsolete, even though it is only a few years old.
Not Dak Prescot, but seen in Dallas.
From Wikipedia: “An anastigmat or anastigmatic lens is a photographic lens completely corrected for the three main optical aberrations: spherical aberration, coma, and astigmatism. Early lenses often included the word Anastigmat in their name to advertise this new feature”.
Small, rural towns across the U.S have experienced dramatic economic downturns as the agrarian industry evolved from one that required much manpower to one that relied more upon mechanization (machine labor).
I see much evidence of this in my road trips, occasionally taking time to photograph the abandoned businesses and homes, either in small rural towns or those scattered across rural farm and ranch lands.
The title for this photo is taken from the street number that is hanging upside down on the post to the left of the door.
In spite of the obvious economic hardship indicated by numerous abandoned homes and businesses in one small community, this old school seem to be well cared for.
Old farm machinery rusting away in this farm field, may have been some of the initial machines that started the economic downturn in this small community.
This lone tree in a vast, post harvest farm field, beneath the wide open sky caused me to pull over for a photo.
Until the next adventure and/or desperate need to photograph something overcomes me,