Summary

Mrs. Anne McKinnon who is seventy-four years old, lives in Oxford NC. Mrs. McKinnon was born in Queens County New York on September 11, 1929. She remembers her first car and says “I think we only paid about twenty dollars for it.” Also her big treat when she was younger, was to go to White Castle. “Where they had hamburgers that came in like a little house, like, a castle. Each hamburger would be in one of these little that looked like a little castle. And they were under five cents each, I think at the time that he was buying them; they were probably about three cents each.”

Questions

Speaking of cars, how have automobiles changed your life?
Well when I was a young girl growing up, we didn’t have a car, we didn’t have a telephone. Of course there was no such thing as television. – Uh- the first car that I recall that my dad got was probably when he was working at The World’s Fair, it was a Ford station wagon, with wooden sides. And our big treat was on Sunday; sometimes he would take us to White Castle, where they had hamburgers that came in like a little house, like, a castle. Each hamburger would be in one of these little that looked like a little castle. And they were under five cents each, I think at the time that he was buying them; they were probably about three cents each.
Man, you cant get anything for three cents now.
But then, you know, soon after that, when the Second World War started, you couldn’t buy tires, because there was a rubber shortage, and gasoline was rationed. Every thing was rationed. Butter was rationed. Shoes were rationed. –Uh- sugar was rationed. Coffee was rationed. So for each family, like, we were ten people my Mom, and my Dad, and there were eight children, and each adult, and child got a ration book. So if you thought about it that meant that we were entitled to ten pair of shoes, well first of all, we didn’t get shoes like kids get shoes today. You got one pair of shoes when school started, and they lasted, like, you know, forever. So we always had plenty of ration stamps for our needs, because we had so many ration books. But not every body did that. If you were just two people, you know, you might run out of butter or sugar, and if you didn’t have a ration coupon, you couldn’t just go to the store and pick up five pounds of sugar, and take it home, you had to have the coupon to but it.
How have automobiles changed over time?
You’re asking me, who still drives a stick shift? –Um- they didn’t have air conditioning, like everything else; there have been phenomenal changes in automobiles. They didn’t have SUVs, or –um- they didn’t have those –uh- what am I trying to think of?
Hybrids?
The vacation vehicles
RVs?
The RVs –uh- there was no such thing like that, they just didn’t exist.
Simplicity in other words, everything was simple back then?
Very simple, very simple
So they kept it as simple as possible?
Right, they didn’t have seat belts, you know, they didn’t have air bags
Did they go fast?
I don’t remember, because I wasn’t driving, I don’t remember how fast, but believe it or not, when I first started driving, I don’t even remember where we got, probably from the junk yard. I think we only paid about twenty dollars for it. It was a 1932 something or other, with the stick shift on the floor, you know, the kind of boxy looking, and that was when I was maybe twenty-one or twenty-two. So –uh- It was old then, it was an old car then, you know, so –uh-
Now it’s just real old.
Yes, yes, yeah, I mean –uh- you just, and every family didn’t have a car. I mean it was a luxury to have a car; families didn’t have cars like they do today. I mean today you look in people’s driveways, there’s two, three, and four cars. We wont talk about your drive way. – Uh - but people used public transportation, especially when you lived in a place like New York. We had trolley cars when I was a young girl. And then the trolley cars disappeared, and we had buses. We had buses, and trains that we took everywhere. People used public transportation, or we walked. We walked a lot, I would say that I probably had to walk a mile and a half or more to school every day.
Up hill both ways in the snow?
In the snow, and the rain, and all the other in climate weather.