JUICE STORE

JUICE STORE

In Kingman we had a department store. I suppose it was a typical store for a small town. It was quite large as I remember it but I suppose that in reality it wasn’t. It was a typical old store front building with wooden floors. There was an overhang that covered the sidewalk all along the front of the building. Steps funneled customers into the front door. There was a long glass case and counter at the door as you entered. They had everything that a person could want. There were clothes. All kinds of clothes that a rural farmer might want and occasionally some fancy clothes. They always had these large open tables with short sides. They would pile clothing on these tables and everyone would look through it. People were very considerate in those days. If you unfolded a shirt and looked at it, when you finished you would fold it back. You didn’t just throw it down in a heap. You had consideration for the people who worked in the store, for the store owner, and for the merchandise. You just don’t find that consideration today. And maybe that consideration is not earned by many of today’s store owners. And really, there are very few store owners anymore. Stores are owned by the corporation and the corporation has more important things to attend to than getting consideration. But getting back to my story...They had all of the clothes, you looked at them and when you finished, you folded them like they were.

There were also some food items. I remember the candy. They had those all day suckers...Holloway I think. They were delicious although they would never last all day. I guess that was my first exposure to marketing. I could never understand why they were known as all day suckers. You could get one for a nickel...and it was big but it didn’t last all day.

Another thing that I didn’t understand was why they called that store the Juice store. It had no juice. One day I asked my Mom why they called it the juice store. She said juice owned the store. Now I was really confused. Juice owned the store? What could that mean? I ask her what that meant...juice. She said “Not juice. Jews. J-E-W-S” I asked her what Jews were. She explained that they were people just like you and me. They had a different religion than we did and many of them had a lot of money and they owned stores.

I don’t know that I ever saw the owners of that store. I don’t even remember the name of the people that owned the store and in fact I think that the Jews that owned it in the beginning no longer owned it when we moved there. But because it had been owned by Jews at one time and had been called the Jew Store, it continued to be known by that name.

They had those little paraffin bottles shaped like cola bottles that were filled with some kind of liquid that you could drink. They came in a little 6 pack. They were usually a penny each so the six pack was 6 cents. Can you imagine? A penny. And those all day suckers were a nickel. I always liked to get those little bottles filled with the liquid and drink the liquid and then chew on the paraffin. That paraffin had a great taste when you first chewed it. But after a short while, it was quite a chore to continue chewing. I always prided myself in the fact that I could chew my paraffin bottles longer than anyone else. I would chew them until my jaws hurt.