Dixie Cup
On Sunday I took Isa to a birthday party of her friend. The dad and step-mother happen to live in the Hollywood Hills. The expansive, modernist house has all the trappings one would think a house like this would have: a gorgeous view (see the ocean on a clear day!), palm trees, celebrity neighbors, a pool, and so on.
A bottle of red wine was opened and I was handed a cup with a "taste this!" so I took a sip. I examined the cup; it was what I would call a Dixie bathroom paper cup. It brought back memories of my humble background with the Dixie cup factory (above photo) in Easton, PA, being a place I drove by often (I assume it's still 'being converted to luxury lofts' as I write this).
My mom used to buy them for the bathroom. My brothers and I were constantly assailing each other with the trite riddles on special 'Riddle Cups' (with no internet research, I'm assuming these went by the wayside years ago, had some sort of resurgence recently which hasn't really gone anywhere).
Along with the rest of the partygoers, it was clear after a few refills that my Dixie cup was to be my cup for the party.
And after cake, I felt it only wise to refuse coffee.
Labels: Dixie cups, Pennsylvania
posted by Bernie at
4:03 PM
14 Comments:
I enjoyed this post a lot, Bernie! Knew about Crayola and Larry Holmes in Easton but not Dixie, and that great building. The first joke I remember learning came from a Dixie cup:
Q: How do you catch a squirrel?
A: Climb a tree and act like a nut!
Jack, now I'm geared up for my Kuebler beer post!!!
Wow, the Dixie cup. It really brings back memories of friends' bathrooms from the 70's. Now the only place I feel they exist is in anecdotal recollections of visits to the doctor, "Yeah, then after all that prodding and poking, he had me piss in a Dixie cup!"
An aside relating to my 70's memory... is it me, or does anyone else have memories of their 70's childhood that sort of play in the mind with the same kind of muted, slightly burnt yellowish tone of 70's films? Whenever I picture those days in my head, they always have that same visual styling of the films of that era. Maybe I've taken the things I've seen from those films and fused them into my memories in a sort of "mind matching movie" synthesis. That would mean, if the theory holds, that my memories from current times will all be HD and 16:9 widescreen format.
Back to the Dixie cup. Didn't they come in either a waxy finish or just the plain paper finish? I preferred the waxy I think, as they paper finish was very dry and tactilely unappealing.
If I remember correctly the original dixie cup was modified to avoid it being torn down. The color scheme in the picture of yellow/blue and red is meant to reflect the nearby high school team colors of Wilson (Warriors)and Easton (Red Rovers).
I used to eat the wax under the lip of the 'waxed' cups
my sister and i were photographed to be on the dixie cup box when we were little. i didn't get picked but my sister's mug could be seen on the box for several years. i stlll remember her greasy pigtails and seventies nightgown.
Echo everything Jack said - sincerely love the joke. ?-)
laffy taffy wrapper jokes
kept my spirits "high"
while cash registering at quickie mart for postgrad comm colleg tuition
(the 'rents helped graciously
with exorbitant Pitt! No. 21 this week.)
Would those pigtails have been as greasy in your memory had you not been cut from the box? It's time to let go, anonymous. You could still make the Solo cup box cover.
trust me chris her pigtails were super greasy...a result of us kids not washing our hair every night. i think it coincided with the year my dad cut the hot water off to see how much we would save.
and anonymous, after all these years did you google "Dixie cup" to find our blog?
There was a giant cup near my home in Freehold, too! it was out on the lawn of a Dixie plant on Route 36 in Hazlet, NJ. Eventually the offices changed from Dixie to International Flavors and Fragrances (IFF) and it always smelled good when we drove past. IFF is still there today.
Isn't it odd to think that common household objects used to be made in loft apartments all throughout America?
They still kind of are, Frank, if you consider crystal meth a common household object.
I want to say that I thought about it, and I think it was a Solo factory. They must have copied off Dixie.
I wish I could find some photos of it on the net, but I can't!
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