This block is on Olive, across from the former Tasope building. The taller building on the left is the old Toft & Co. The part with the wall, now apparently part of the Olive St. Grill, is where the old E.B. Todd work clothes factory was....which burned in the early 1960s. One thing I recall being in the reddish-brown building was the Smith Barber Shop, run by Gene Smith (father of classmate Jon Smith)---where I got my hair cut as a child. For real young kids, he would put a aboard sort of thing across the arms of the barber chair to make you tall enough to work with. Across the room, on the west wall next to the front window, was the shoe shine stand. It had either two or three chairs on a stairstep riser with those metal things to rest your feet on. Sonny Haddock was a shoe shine man supreme.....he could make those old brogans really gleam. He had all the lotions and potions and wax to do the job. Sonny died at a young age as I recall.....a really nice guy. Not sure what else was in those 3 or 4 more storefronts back then. Upstairs was where, at one time in the early to mid 1950s, ballroom dance lessons were given. Which takes us back to the picture posted not too long ago by my sister......of Pat (Fogle) Leong and I in our best attire to attend one of the formal dances that allowed students to show off what they had learned. The waltz went: One........two, three. One........two,three. The main thing I remember from that class.
Posted on: Wed, 05 Mar 2014 04:21:32 +0000
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