They Feed the Hunger for Yesteryears

On one of his last albums, acid-rock survivor Country Joe McDonald wistfully bemoaned the passing of the tune in, turn on, drop out generation in the song, “Bring Back the ‘60s, Man.”

At the same time, he called for a return to the flower-power values, beliefs and life styles he and his band, the Fish, had so fervently sung about at Woodstock.

McDonald--the fire of the rebellious 1960s still flaring in his eyes--is not the only one who has been doing a fair amount of looking back in recent years.

In the midst of the Impersonal 1980s, the air of nostalgia is thicker than ever. Fading flower children like McDonald, tired of stifling the carefree attitudes of their younger years, are inhaling it in deep, drawn-out breaths. They’re letting their hair grow long again, dusting off their old Jimi Hendrix albums and scouting the want ads for Mustang convertibles.

Graying James Deans, knee-deep in six-figure mortgages and college tuitions, are likewise enraptured by the scent of nostalgia, which carries along with it memories of Saturday nights at the drive-in, of chaperoned sock hops and poodle skirts, of flattops, black leather jackets and “Rock Around the Clock.”

And still older types--World War II veterans, survivors of the Great Depression--are equally eager to recapture the golden days of Swing, cinema and fashion.

Enterprising businessmen around the world have taken note of all this. Miniskirts from the 1960s, pleated pants from the ‘50s, and blazers with padded shoulders from the ‘40s have all made fashion comebacks. The blow-dry look has been replaced with crew cuts and ducktails. New wave bands freely admit that the basis for their sound comes from the simple, innocent rock ‘n’ roll of the 1950s and ‘60s.

But to some people, that’s not enough. They want the real thing, not imitations: the real fashions, the real music, the real artifacts, signs and symbols of their past.

Here are just some of the places around San Diego where that past can not only be relived, but where it has never left.

Miniskirts, Go-Go Boots

Grandma’s closet never yielded as many goodies as you’ll find at Wear It Again, Sam, one of several vintage clothing stores around San Diego.

A visit to the Park Boulevard store Kristine Anderson has operated for 14 years is a fashion trip through time.

In the front is pop apparel from the 1960s. There are shelves of Beatle boots and racks of bowling shirts, miniskirts, lettermen jackets, sharkskin suits and even a pair of paisley pajamas.

Farther back are racks of clothes from the 1950s--circle skirts and crinolines, pleated pants--and, from the 1940s, wool blazers with padded shoulders and tuxedos with tails.

All the way in the rear are the real old-fashioned fashions: gracious lace, silk and velvet evening gowns from the 1930s; audacious beaded dresses from the 1920s, and, inside glass display racks, flowing Victorian gowns of white lace.

Aside from a few clearly labeled reproductions, Anderson said, everything’s original--the result of countless visits to swap meets, auctions, estate sales and manufacturers’ warehouses.

The penchant for old clothes, Anderson said, isn’t limited to any one age group.

“We get teens who romanticize about the 1960s because so much of the music they listen to is influenced by ‘60s bands,” she said. “We get people who want to make their own personal fashion statement, Baby Boomers who wear old clothes to costume parties, and members of car clubs who want to wear clothes that fit in with their cars.”

In most instances, she said, her customers keep coming back because they have found they can purchase the original fashions for a lot less than the reproductions offered at other stores.

“Almost every day, someone asks me when is the fad for old clothes going to be over,” Anderson said. “And I always remind them that as long as designers keep stealing from the past--which they do every season--I’ll be in business.”

Formica Counters, Gravy

At Rudford’s Restaurant on El Cajon Boulevard, a real “Happy Days” diner, it’s thumbs down on California cuisine--and on California cuisine prices.

For just over four bucks, you can get the Thursday Special: a hearty lunch of roast pork, stuffing, gravy, green beans, mashed potatoes and a salad. It’s all made from scratch, and it’s brought to your table by a motherly waitress who won’t bring you dessert until you’ve cleaned off your plate.

“We pride ourselves on the home-cooked food and on the homey atmosphere,” said Maryanne Carlin, the operations manager. “You don’t get that at very many places, and our regulars appreciate us for it.”

The world around it may have changed, but Rudford’s--a City Heights institution since 1949--hasn’t changed at all.

There are the same Formica counters and imitation leather bar stools and booths, the same neon sign that sticks out from the rooftop, the same round windows, the same linoleum floor and many of the same waitresses.

More importantly, there’s the same food: biscuit-and-gravy breakfasts, grilled-cheese sandwich lunches, chicken-fried-steak dinners.

“It’s a real old-fashioned diner, open 24 hours a day,” Carlin said. “And if we changed anything, I think we’d be losing our image.

“Even when we’ve tried to make small changes in the past, people say, ‘No, don’t do that--we like it the way it is.’ So now we plan on keeping it this way forever.”

Many of Rudford’s customers, Carlin added, are regulars--like 45-year-old Susan Zoltan, who lives in Normal Heights and has been lunching at Rudford’s almost every day for the last 16 years.

“The waitresses here are all like mothers,” Zoltan said. “They pamper us no end. Every day, I have the same thing: two eggs over medium with bacon and home fries.

“I don’t even have to order anymore--my waitress, Peggy, has been here for as long as I have, and every day around 2 p.m. she has everything ready: even my hot coffee and two glasses of water.

“All the regulars have their favorite waitresses, and they all get taken care of. Nothing ever changes around here, and that’s why I keep coming back.”

Sputnik Lamps, Philco TVs

The pop culture of the recent past is alive and well at Metro, a unique shop housed in a stylish art deco building at 6th Avenue and Evans Place in Hillcrest.

On display--and for sale--are hundreds of advertising exhibits, household items, toys and other relics from the golden days of American know-how: the 1930s through the ‘50s.

There are shelves of plastic AM radios; rounded Philco televisions; three Burgermeister beer displays, one replicating a flying saucer spinning on a top; an assortment of neon signs, including a huge red Clearasil sign and a multicolored Pacific Drive-In marquee; a steel Sputnik lamp; wire-frame satellite chairs and sleek oil-cloth bar stools; a rusty red cigarette machine; a life-size “Creature From the Black Lagoon” made of fiber glass, and even a telephone switchboard from the 1930s.

They’re all monuments to kitschy opulence, especially the items from the 1950s that Metro specializes in.

“After the atom bomb and the start of the space program, everything was just wide open,” said David Gardenhire, who with his wife, Beverly, has operated Metro for 18 months.

“Nothing was impossible in people’s minds; there were no limits on anything, even design. And that’s evident in everything from 1950s architecture, and the big-finned cars with lots of chrome, to the furniture and advertising displays that fill our floor space.”

Gardenhire, 46, said he and his wife find most of their wares at garage sales, auctions, antique shows and estate sales.

Their customers run the gamut from collectors to young adults trying to recapture the glittery, often outlandish, character of their younger days.

Richard Glick, 38, a musician, said he tries to visit Metro at least twice a month. Rarely does he leave empty-handed.

“On my last couple of trips, I’ve bought Henry Miller chairs from the 1950s and floor lamps from the 1940s,” Glick said. “My house is furnished with items from every decade, from the 1920s to the ‘50s. It’s very eclectic.

“This is the main source of my inspiration. The owners just have an eye for the right stuff. To find these same items at garage sales takes years of luck.

“But here, you just walk in and they’re there.”

Glick said his shopping trips to Metro are prompted by his love “for the happy feel of styles of the past, particularly the 1950s.

“A lot of these things are still around, but as the years go on, there are fewer and fewer,” he said. “And I want to get them now, while I still can.”

Flash and Dash With Neon

Towering above the Honda of San Diego car dealership on El Cajon Boulevard is a totem pole of garish lights and gaudy space age design.

Five blue missiles, surrounded by white neon, frame each letter in the “Honda” name. Up on top, a rotating wire atom explodes in a wash of blues and reds.

When Dick Grihalva first erected it in 1953 to advertise his new line of chrome-heavy Buicks, the sign was a symbol of post-World War II prosperity and a reflection of the public’s growing fascination with the infant space program.

Those were the days even before Sputnik, you may recall.

But today, it’s among the last of the great neon signs that used to line this town’s major drags in the 1950s and ‘60s, hyping everything from new cars to root-beer floats.

And it may soon come down.

“When we took over this dealership in 1981, we spent more than $50,000 on fixing up the sign and replacing the ‘Buick’ letters with new ones to read ‘Honda,’ ” said Richard Whalen of Honda of San Diego.

“People stop by almost every day, admiring the sign. But now, because of the sign ordinance, the city wants to make us take it down by the end of the year.

“That’s why it’s not quite like it used to be--a lot of the lights have gone out. And even though we’re trying to get an extension, based on the sign’s historical significance, we’re not going to spend any more money until we know for sure whether the sign will stay or not.

“Although it goes without saying that we’d sure like to keep it. It’s the last one on the boulevard, you know.”

Fab Four, Dave Clark Five

Last weekend, Garry Shrum doubled the size of his Blue Meannie Records store by moving into larger quarters on Broadway in El Cajon.

That says a lot about the popularity of old records, particularly the collectible rock singles and albums from the 1960s that constitute the bulk of Blue Meannie’s inventory.

“People just like the music they grew up with,” said Shrum, 34. “Most of our customers were raised on rock ‘n’ roll, and as the years passed many of them were too busy with their careers and their families to bother with music.”

Now, Shrum said, many of those same people have settled down, and they want to replace the old records they danced to, listened to, or partied to in high school; records that, in many cases, have gotten scratched or misplaced over the years.

That’s why Shrum’s selection of new wave and heavy metal imports is overshadowed by original records, many of them in mint collection, by everyone from the Beatles, the Rolling Stones, the Who and the Beach Boys to cult favorites like Lothar and the Hand People, Fever Tree and the Chocolate Watch Band.

Once Blue Meannie’s move is complete, Shrum said, the back wall will be devoted to a rock museum consisting of such collectibles as a Buddy Holly autograph, the original sheet music to Bill Haley and the Comets’ “Rock Around the Clock,” and Beatles gold records, purses, hats and nodding dolls.

Also on sale at Blue Meannie are old copies of rock magazines and books, original picture-sleeve singles by the likes of the Byrds and the Jefferson Airplane, and multirecord anthology collections by such venerable rock acts as Jerry Lee Lewis, Ritchie Valens, the Yardbirds and the Velvet Underground.

Shrum opened the store in 1976 as a depository for the thousands of Beatles discs he had collected over the years. Originally, he specialized in records by the Beatles and other British bands like the Kinks and the Dave Clark Five; later, he added records and memorabilia from American bands, as well as more contemporary rock imports.

“But we still pride ourselves on our selection of old rock ‘n’ roll,” Shrum said. “There’s a variety of sounds, a simplicity in lyrics and music, from the old pop stars that the new ones just can’t master.

“And even a lot of kids who weren’t even born when these bands were around dig the old music, just for what it is.”

And There’s More . . .

And there’s more:

For aging hippies, the People’s Food Store in Ocean Beach is like something straight out of Haight-Ashbury, circa 1967: organic produce, groceries and vitamins inside; a constant stream of tie-dyed panhandlers outside.

Also in Ocean Beach is The Black, a head shop that sells bongs, body oils, black-light posters, underground comics and a wide selection of hippie garments like sandals, smocks and suede jackets.

Pal Joey’s nightclub in Allied Gardens is a miniature grand ballroom straight out of the 1940s. Each Friday and Saturday night, Fro Brigham and the Preservation Band play swing and Big Band oldies.

More vintage fashions may be found at more than three dozen shops all around town, such as Mixed Produce in Hillcrest, The Second Time Around in La Mesa, Vintage Fashions in Pacific Beach, and Your Favorite Things in La Jolla.

Likewise, old records are in abundance at Off the Record in East San Diego; the Hall of Records in Pacific Beach; Groovy Treasures in North Park; Folk Arts Rare Records, Rare Records and Nickelodeon Records in Normal Heights, and the Arcade Music Company downtown.

And fanciers of old diners might try the Pantry in Point Loma and the College Restaurant in East San Diego for some good old-fashioned home cooking.

Straight out of “Happy Days.”