u
j
X
The NEW BERN
■/-
PUBLISHED WEEKLY
THE HEART OP
’••M NORTH
S,
^^•255
VOLUME 16
NEW BERN, N. C. 28560, FRIDAY, AUGUST 24, 1973
number 24
Yesterday was when one of
the thrills for a boy growing up
was his first pair of long pants.
Something wonderful ended
when parents started buying
fulMength trousers for males
still in their infancy.
Back in the yesteryears, a lad
graduated from diapers to stove
pipes. Incase you’re so youthful
you don’t know what stove pipes
were, they were pants mat
extended no farther down than
the knee.
In early teens, or maybe
sooner, you mtto wear knickers
that bloused at the knee. Kids
loved them, if for no other
reason than that with knickers
you wore socks, instead of the
black cotton stockings worn
with stove pipes.
Every boy dreamed of
wearing long pants. It was a
phobia, like wishing some fuzz
would grow on your face so you
could have something to shave
off. It didn’t take much to make
a kid secretly use his dd man’s
straight razor.
What a fellow learned when
he climbed into his first pair rf
long pants was that a certain
amount of terror tempered Us
e:;^Ution. He Was dewnright
ashamed to apbear puljjlldy.
^fearing somelway w^via
snicker ei him.
. Truth of the matter, as we’ve
dismally discovered with the
passing of nuuiy years, is that
most of the time when we think
we’re being eiq>ecially noticed,
' we ain’t being noticM nary a
bit.
Age has taught us that, if
notUng else. However, a boy in
his first pair -of full-length
trousers was sure that
everybody on earth, and the
man in the moon, was staring
right at him.
It made the wearer un
comfortable, but pride
inevitably erased the
discomfoii, and by the second
or tUrd time you wore them you
felt just as Ug and important as
any full grown man in New
Bern.
Yesterday was when the
busiest juke box around was at
Shady Beach in Bridgeton, and
Ooofus was the song most
played. New Bern’s younger
crowd, eager to dance but
always sh^ on cash, used to
flock there.
As might be expected, the
guys who put on the most airs,
and trinM the li^t fantastic
incessantly with me prettiest
gals on the floor, never did put
any nickels in the juke box.
Ihey had their routine timed
perfectly. As soon as a record
started, thw would sw^ into a
spot near the music. Inen, as
the song went into its final
chorus, they would swecn away
to the other end of the floor.
They, of course, were the
same jerks who constantly
bunun^ cigarettes from other
ffi ‘hs, at the beach and on Um
Temple comer. You knew
vdiat was coming as soon as
thw put in an appearance.
Ihe smart thing to do was to
have a pack with just one
cigarette in it, and a second
R ack hidden in another pocket,
fot even a tightwad had the
nerve to bun your last smoke,
(Continued on page 8)
’-.•lisife
SURROUNDED—Last week when we front paged a
photo of New Bern’s first Cypress Gardens Aqua
Maid, Betty Bland, we mentioned Janice Shapou as
one of four other local Aqua Maids who gave our
town tremendous publicity quite some years ago.
Today we offer this picture of Janice, sent around
the world by the Florida Development Commission
to promote the Sunshine State’s famed oranges.