It can definitely be said that “necessity is the mother of invention,” and once the fledgling soft drink companies realised they needed a way to sell bottles of their drinks cold, the rush was on to see who could come up with the answer.

It has been well documented that the first “cooler” was a wooden barrel sawn in half and filled with ice. From there, some ice chests were made with legs, some with lids and other with elaborate “selecting mechanisms.”

In the mid-30’s, starting in the USA, things began to change. Style, as well as functionality became important. The 40’s saw some very beautiful machines being produced and by the mid-50’s “soft drink styling” was at its pinnacle.

Whether you’re a serious collector or just someone who thinks old soft drink machines are cool, you can easily appreciate the workmanship and styling any which way you look at it.

The internet has begun to have a large influence on the collectible market. Many items get mis-represented on e-Bay and other places.

Be careful and make sure you know as much, if not more, than the person you’re thinking of buying from!

Show any antique to five different people and chances are you’ll get five different appraisals. Everybody has differing opinions on the worth of an item, so it is worthwhile to be careful out there when looking.

We all love original condition items. But no matter how great they look, when put next to a fully (properly) restored piece, they always look used.

I personally only collect original soft drink machines, and I have some very nice ones, but compared to all of my friends restored machines, these look “old.”

Nevertheless, I prefer the old and original items. The nicks, dents and scrapes tell a story. That soft drink machine delivered to the corner store by the Coke delivery man way back in the Summer of 1939 has been through some interesting times without a doubt. I love that and I like to see it as it really was!

Whatever it might be that you collect, may it bring you complete joy and happiness for many,many years to come.

Phil Adair

Some crazy dudes he hung with over at Malibu on his days off were taking regular sabbaticals to Hawaii, surfing the huge winter swells that pounded Oahu’s North Shore. Jack, who wasn’t shy when it came to steering his board in to waves of the solid variety, had heard mention of a little coastal town in southern Mexico called Puerto Escondido, which also offered some pumping beach break wave action and the added chance to experience a different culture.

He spun his truck into Ellen’s Soul Food and Barbeque Restaurant, just near the corner of Hollywood and Vine, his tyres scrunching on the gravel road as he pulled into the car park beneath the overhanging verandah. Making his way inside he ambled over to the nearest soda machine, dropped his dime into the slot and pulled gently on the familiar neck of an ice-cold bottle of Coke. He heard his coin clattering somewhere deep inside the mechanism – faintly audible over the sound of an old Robert Johnson blues tune drifting in from the dining area. As Jack walked towards a booth, “Miss Ellen” gave him a warm smile as he slid his tall angular frame in behind one of the tables. Shortly he was making his way through a hearty meal that consisted of crispy fried chicken, fried okra, black-eyed peas, turnip greens, sweet yams, and finally the divine tasting crumbly cornbread that he used to soak up the sweet gravy. Before too long, Jack’s hunger had become a distant memory.

Now all that he needed to do was to head down Sunset and back out to his house at Malibu, grab his two favourite boards, both Greg Noll shaped – one a 9-foot round tail, then second a 10’ 6 Charger. Sliding them under the tarpaulin on the back of his truck, He drove by Jed’s place and leant on the horn. Jed appeared bleary eyed at his front door, his girl Sue at his side. ”You coming Jed, or what” laughed Jack. ”I’m there buddy – got into the Tequila last night, that’s all. Bit of a sore head.”

Seems like I’ll be driving the first stretch, thought Jack to himself. Jed remained fairly quiet on the first leg of the trip, until the boys made a slight detour to “Challenger Point” to check the swell. The afternoon sun had disappeared. It looked like a storm was coming in from the ocean and grey skies loomed overhead. But right now it was as calm as you could imagine. Not a breath of wind. Except, that it was a solid 6-8 feet of oil slick glass pumping right hand point break surf, and lining up all the way through to the shore from out the back. As usual, at the remotely located Challenger Point, there was no one out. This was their very own secret spot that they’d surfed together for years, and no one ever came. Ever. No one really knew where it was either. It was theirs, and that’s just the way they liked it.

Jack watched the inside section reeling through. Jed who was previously unable to speak, was now hollering and hooting so loudly with excitement, that is was clearly obvious he was back from the Tequila hangover that had claimed the earlier part of his day. Urging Jack to pull over under a nearby tree required no convincing, the boys grabbed their boards and paddled out through the waves as swiftly as they could.

They exchanged waves for the next three hours until it they were completely spent, the fading light making it virtually impossible to see the sets rolling in. Finally Jack sat alone in the line up. A dark line pushed forward from the horizon, arriving on to the reef as a flawless, A- frame peak that pitched skyward with a wave face of at least 14 feet. Jed threw himself into a free-falling drop, hooked his right hand into the face of the wave to allow his surfboard to connect on the bottom turn and then pulled up into a heaving tube large enough to be a carwash. More than a few breath-taking seconds passed and before Jack was blown out of the tube with the spray, in disbelief.

They both surfed remarkably well, Jack’s tube riding exemplary, and Jed’s down the line aggressive bottom turns and snaps of the top of each wave he rode were a marvel to see – that’s if anybody else was there to observe.

Jed and Jack had grown up together, and had been introduced to surfing when Jack’s Dad, Fred had returned from being based at Pearl Harbour during WW2 with many a story, though more importantly to Jed and Jack – a 12 foot balsa board that had been ridden in the Hawaiian Islands by Fred on his days off work. It was no secret that Fred had been surfing on that fateful December morning in 1941 when the Japanese planes had flown over. They sure didn’t look like B 52s on a training mission he thought as he surfed with a couple of friends at Makaha.

Jack and Jed laughed all the way to the Mexican border and beyond. They decided to share the driving making the decision to carry on driving all night until they hit Mazatlan where they finally rested.

Good waves were had in Mazatlan the next day, the boys striking up a conversation in the surf with a young local dude who tipped them off about a hard to get to wave that was also a bit off the beaten track, though a gem of a break.

Hitting the road again, Jack turned the dial on the a.m. radio, and came up with nothing. The pick-up roared along the poor dirt roads bouncing along on the corrugations and leaving a trail of dust in its wake. Both men were aware that they were on an adventure. This was their time – And they took it for all it was worth.

Puerto Vallarta eventually came in to view though this “place on a postcard” tourist town held little interest for them both. A fair way south of the bustle though, they carefully wound their way around the precarious cliff road that headed further south. Finally, they were descending into the tiny village of Boca where they parked the truck, grabbed their boards and gear and walked down the rock stairs and onto the sand of the stunning little horse-shoe-shaped bay. A handful of Mexican locals lay around in hammocks. Dozens of long wooden boats were tethered to anchors close to shore and although the bay was deep you could see the pull of the Pacific Ocean’s might, with heavy waves bursting majestically on both headlands leading into the bay of Boca.

Finding a boat would be easy. Convincing one of the locals to brave the swells might prove a bit harder thought Jack. Jed was pretty adept at convincing people to see his point of view, so Jack backed off and let him weave his magic and before too, the two of them, plus a rather apprehensive young skipper in a faded baseball cap steered the boat out through the throat of the bay and into the open ocean. Spray hit them all hard and the underneath of the boat slapped down heavily each time a swell rose up to meet it. The driver new his boat though and managed to navigate his way through the rolling and sometimes menacing waves, straddling the heaving ocean and gunning the outboard when he needed to outrace the larger swells.

They both laid eyes on it at the same time. It needed a solid swell to break and would have hardly ever been ridden due to its remoteness and access only by boat. Before their young Mexican driver could protest, Jack and Jed were over the side and paddling towards the break from behind. That surf would stay with both of them for a long time. They rode those waves until darkness came, and then finally, with much relief on the face of their new friend, returned to the boat and hoisted themselves back on board – exhausted and content.

Their driver was reluctant to head back north to Boca due to the increasing swell, so as an alternative the group headed further south and into the safe confines of Yelapa, a stunningly idyllic deep water bay only accessible by boat. Miguel, their new friend had been a great skipper, so knowing they were there for the night in the small village, they more than compensated him for his troubles by the means of cold cerveza’s, tequila, good food and more cash than he’d probably seen all year. All in all, it was a blast. They’d ridden some of the best waves of their lives. They were in Mexico. Beer and food were both cheap and plentiful. The locals were friendly and the sun seemed to shine on their backs all day long…

Wind whipped along the darkened streets of a cold November night in Chicago. Autumn leaves flurried upward briefly before being regathered, dancing wistfully in the urgent breeze. Retro Jack zipped his jacket up as far as it would go and thrust his hands deeper inside his jeans front pockets. In the sky above a wafer thin full moon made for a ghostly presence as white cloud wisps drifted briefly over its surface like strands of white cotton.

Jack had walked from his hotel, along Diversey, making a left on Halstead. Passing a bar called “The Corner Pocket” he continued on walking briskly in the cool Chicago night air. Suddenly, there it was – right in front of him: 2433 North Lincoln Avenue…The Biograph Theatre…The infamous, though now dilapidated cinema, still with its façade proudly intact, closer inspection though now revealing a closed and seemingly derelict building.

The macabre fascination of the event that happened here over 70 years ago sent an involuntary shiver up Jack’s spine as he paused to reflect upon that brutal hot July night a lifetime ago…

Life and Times…

John Dillinger was a prolific bank robber during the 1930’s who gained international acclaim for his daring exploits. Banks were having miserable public relations problems during the Depression. Many of them failed, sweeping away the life savings of millions of hard working people. So bank robbers were not particularly viewed as criminals by the average American.

The daring daytime robberies and skilful getaways were glamorous and exciting, especially if the robbers were handsome, polite and photogenic. While America was in the grip of the Great Depression, here was a man striking back at poverty by taking from those who could afford to lose their money the most. And so John Dillinger, Harry Pierpont, Baby Face Nelson and the rest of the Dillinger Gang’s exploits were followed very closely by a Depression-weary public – enthralled by their every adventure as if it were a running radio show.

In the process of all this violence, Dillinger managed to somehow become an American folk hero. In 1934, driving a stolen car across state lines was a federal offence. The FBI suddenly had jurisdiction to go afer Dillinger, and director J Edgar Hoover immediately made apprehending him the agency’s top priority, deciding to hunt him down like a dog.

In Chicago Dillinger tried to keep a low profile. He hung out with his girlfriend, Polly Hamilton, and they stayed out of public places. But hiding out gets boring real quick, and in late July they decided it would be worth the risk to go see a movie.

The FBI had been tipped off by a phone call, said to be made by Anna Sage, who became immortalised as the “Lady In Red.” She would accompany Dillinger along with his girlfriend Polly Hamilton. She informed the FBI that Dillinger would be taking in a movie around 8pm at one of two theatres, the Marbro or the Biograph. So the FBI staked out both places.

The Last Picture Show…

Around 10:20pm on a hot Sunday night on July 22, 1934 a well dressed man wearing a straw hat and a pin-striped suit stepped out of the Biograph Theatre, where he, Hamilton and Sage had watched Manhattan Melodrama starring Clark Gable. No sooner had they reached the sidewalk when a man appeared and identified himself as Melvin Purvis of the FBI. Dillinger broke into a run and went for his gun. Purvis ordered him to surrender. Several shots rang out. Dillinger was dead before he hit the ground. Three of the FBI men who lay in wait had gunned him down. Two bullets hit him in the chest, a third shot shredding his left eye.

It was on or around the 3rd of July 1947. I was headed for the city of Las Vegas and travelling fast to make a trade show that I was, as is in my nature, running late for. I had been in Memphis working my way through a rack of ribs down on Beale, sipping back on a Rolling Rock and taking in some Blues tunes – though really just enjoying a well earned rest, or so I thought, when I received a wire from head office reminding me to head west. West, as in Las Vegas, Nevada. That’s Sin City for you uninitiated folk out there. Quite a bit of time behind the wheel, let me tell you.

There was a severe thunderstorm brewing ahead. I was driving around 75 miles north of Roswell, New Mexico, right on dark, when I witnessed the most bizarre sight. Nearly running off the road, I hit the brakes hard skidding to a stop on the loose bitumen. A quiet dollop of rain landed on the hood and a stray dog’s howl echoed far away in the distance.

Now, those of you out there who know me well will say that I’m not a man prone to exaggeration, but this truly was a remarkable occurrence.

It was fast approaching evening as I said, but in my mind it’s still as clear as day. It was a very bright saucer shaped object with glowing lights moving across the sky at 400-500 miles per hour. It was around 20-25 feet across. This “flying object” appeared from the Southeast and disappeared to the Northwest.

Something was very, very wrong. I got back in the car and drove through the night, and fast – stopping only once for gas and food before I arrived tired and weary in Vegas…

Pawn shops, panhandlers, riff-raff, winos, small-time hoods, dice-girls, slot cheats, pickpockets, con-artists and drunken yodellers. There was just about enough distraction here for any man.

Laying in my bungalow alongside the pool at El Rancho staring upwardly at the slow turning overhead fan, I needed answers, and soon. Damn it was hot! This was no time for “Samoan Fog Cutters” though, or other strangely named cocktails at the Tiki Bar.

Things weren’t making sense at all. My brain was spinning with questions and coming up with nothing. Was the government behind all this? Was it the Russians? Flying saucers for Christ’s sake! I’m the kind of man who needs convincing most of the time, but I’d seen this with my very own eyes. Things weren’t adding up. I drifted in and out of a restless sleep trying to piece it all together.

To be continued…

Coming Soon:

Retro Jack gets deeper inside the Roswell Incident…

Retro Jack goes undercover and discovers the mysterious “Area 51.”

Retro Jack goes Surfing in Hawaii…