Classic Products You Wish You Didn’t Remember

[francist]

Okay, there was a thread recently where someone dredged up the memories of “Dippity-Do” setting gel from the 1970’s. I’m sure it was some derivative of Agent Orange and I hesitate to think how many girls (my five sisters included) smeared that goo over their hair to make themselves look ever so more bee-ew-tee-full.

But I had to chuckle when I recalled it and the fond memories of younger days. What other good ones are out there in your collective memory banks?

I have one that I’ve been trying to remember the name of for a couple years now. It was a liquid plastic product that came in small pint cans (no, it’s not Plasti Dip). The colours were vivid green, fuschia, red, orange, etc and it dried to a transparent film like cellophane. The idea was you took some floral wire, bent it into a closed form (a leaf shape, for example) and dipped it into the liquid plastic. When you withdrew the shape the liquid plastic stuff would bridge over the form and dry very quickly so you ended up with a transparent leaf of this shiny green plastic stuff.

The smell was very powerful, probably acetone or maybe lacquer thinner, and I’m sure it was toxic as all get-out. The liquid tended to dry out in the can pretty quickly for obvious reasons so it was one of those short-lived wonders. The finished products were also huge dust magnets, and after the initial shininess and brilliance of the first few weeks they quickly became a dull, dust covered thing that was way too fragile to clean.

Anybody remember what it was called? From about 1970, my one sister brought it back from the big city with her at Christmas one year. Too late to ask her, but for some reason I can’t get it out of my head.

-frank

Edit: found it! “Dippity Glass” aka Fun Film, FormaFilm.

 

[brino]

One to go along with your sisters hair products: Brylcreem.
I guess my mother thought it made us boys look more kempt for school.

Funny, I never knew the spelling until today.

According to wikipedia:

The cream is an emulsion of water and mineral oil stabilised with beeswax

I now wonder if it could have been used as a cutting fluid/coolant.........hmmm

-brino

 

[Ulma Doctor]

i don't know what the cellophane like substance was, but i do remember plasti-dip!

on thing that still haunts me is the old commercial for the Ginsu Knives

 

[francist]

“Weed Bar” is another one burned indelibly into my senses. Consisted of a waxy bar about 2’ long with a cord attached at each end. The idea was you tow the bar behind the push mower on nice hot summer days. The key components of the bar, other than wax, were such lovely things as 24D, dicamba, mecoprop, etc which were now deposited via the sun-warmed wax onto any offending dandelions. This was about 1968.

After a season of dragging this around your lawn the wax bar would wear down to the cardboard core and you’d theoretically be forced to buy a new one. A frugal father, however, would break off the remaining wax into chunks so that he could rub it directly onto any remaining dandelions. Safety was not spared of course, so he might wear leather gloves which would quickly soak up the warm, waxy chemical. Good lord, he lived to be almost 90 but I can still remember the smell of that bar and the gloves!

 

[C-Bag]

Sorry Frank, I don’t remember the weed bar. I do remember my mom messing with that plastic dip stuff but I don’t remember the name. She was always trying crafty stuff. Sometimes I think some products were a local thing. I do remember Brylcreem, a little dab will do ya! We didn’t use that, we used Butch Wax when everybody was into flat tops and it made your top stand up. Nasty stuff.

 

[mikey]

i don't know what the cellophane like substance was, but i do remember plasti-dip!

on thing that still haunts me is the old commercial for the Ginsu Knives

This must have been the origin of "... but wait, there's more!"

 

[mikey]

As a kid growing up on Maui, HI, only the big boys and the rich kids could afford Brylcreem. We used the sap of the red Torch Ginger instead. Take a crown of that stuff and bang it on your head. Worked just like Brylcreem or Pomade but it smelled really nice. Only problem was the ants that liked to live in the ginger; they could sting you so you'd be scratching your head all day!

 

[FOMOGO]

Remember the slip and slide? hook up a hose to it, get a running start, and off you go. And of course the infamous lawn darts, and then there's the Popeel pocket fisherman. Mike

 

[francist]

And “clackers” — two plastic balls on a string that you were supposed to get knocking together really fast. If you didn’t knock yourself senseless first!

 

[matthewsx]

Three words:

Space Food Sticks

John