Vantastic! How to Build the Ultimate Shagging Wagon

'Tis that time of year when vintage car owners show off their chrome and wheels at cruise nights and classic car gatherings, but the custom van of the 70s usually isn't one of them. I don't know why no one is restoring these shag pads on wheels, because street vans were a huge automotive phenomenon during the late 70s and early 80s--there was even a magazine dedicated to them called Travelin' Vans. However, as a public service to my readers, I'd like to offer three simple steps on how to turn any mommy (or daddy) minivan into the Ultimate Shagging Wagon. Get ready to say to your friends and neighbors, "If this van is a-rockin', don't come a-knocking!"

1. Get a Custom Paint Job

Vans from this time period were adorned with a wild assortment of graphics and portraits, from bold, mod looking stripes to western landscapes. Nothing was too tacky for a 70s van, so let your imagination go wild--even if you're a Star Wars fan!

2. Get a Custom Interior

Don't forget about the inside of your vehicle! Shag or velour carpeting will make those trysts with your loved one a little more comfy (but watch out for carpet burn!) while curtains ensure privacy. A lava lamp, dashboard Jesus, or fuzzy dice adds a nice ambiance and sets the mood. For added flair, consider the chain steering wheel--it was a favorite of Cheech and Chong's, after all. 

Or how about some fiber optic lighting???

 

 

3. Go Where the Girls (or the Guys) Are

Take the van to the beach, local swimming hole, or your neighborhood block party. They'll flock to it like moths to a flame! 

Don't you just totally want one now?

Pinup Girl Clothing: Vampalicious Vintage Swimsuits and More

Mod Bow-tie mini dress, $128

All too often, I often forget to mention retro items that you can buy in favor of the usual Go Retro commentary. I'd like to remedy that by sharing the love for some of the cool vintage-themed stores I've found online, starting with the site Pinup Girl Clothing. I found them not long ago while looking for vintage-styled swimsuits online, but love all of their product departments, particularly the dresses and bags. If you're a woman looking to wear something bombshell sexy along the lines of Marilyn Monroe or Mad Men's Joan Holloway, this is the site to check out. The company also prides itself on using models of various dress sizes to show off the clothing and accessories. Here's just a few of the favorite things that I'd like to add to my wish list:

Birdie Party Dress in Red Vintage Floral by Pinup Couture, $118

Natasha Dress in White Pin Dot by Pinup Couture, $88

Paris Dress in Grey with Pink Trim by Dixiefried, $116

Look familiar, Mad Men fans? This is the Joanie Dress in Olive Green by Pinup Couture, $96

Retro Halter Swimsuit - The Bettie One Piece in Red Polka Dot by Pinup Couture, $78

Sailor Girl Nautical Bikini Top and Bottom, $56 for each piece

Red Sparkle Train Case by Pinup Couture, $112 

Just in time for the upcoming ABC series, the Pan Am Hat Bag, $87

There's oodles more where these goodies came from, so check out the site. Happy shopping!

And the Winner Is...

I just picked a winner for the Jacob Bromwell skewers. Needless to say, this being a retro themed blog, my method of choosing a name is old school...

I know it's hard to see, but the winner is...Mimi, of 1972: The Retro WW Experiment! Congratulations, Mimi! I'll be in touch to obtain the address to have the skewers shipped to. Enjoy, but don't go using these for your nasty gelatin Weight Watchers recipes (she knows how much I hate gelatin!)

Nice try to everyone who participated, and thanks again to Jacob Bromwell for reaching out to me and contributing the item. I hope to have more cool giveaway items for my readers in the future.

Go Retro's Summer Giveaway!

Now that I have your attention, I'm excited to announce that I have another giveaway item for my readers! Last week, the president of a company called Jacob Bromwell, Inc. reached out to me. Jacob Bromwell is a manufacturer of American cookware since 1819, specializing in vintage, nostalgic, and hard-to-find kitchen and campfire cooking products. Named for its founder, Jacob Bromwell, this company is recognized as America's Oldest Cookware. Best of all, every product is made with pride in the U.S.A. and backed by a lifetime guarantee!

Jacob Bromwell is offering a lucky reader of this blog a pair of Ohio Barbeque Skewers, pictured above, a $29.50 value. These beautiful skewers are 20" long and feature wooden handles to keep hands cool while cooking. They are right at home around a campfire or on the grill, and perfect for roasting or grilling marshmellows, hot dogs, kebabs, and more. You can see additional photos and read more about them on the Jacob Bromwell site here.

To win them, just leave me a comment on this post.  The only rule is I must have a way of contacting you, so any anonymous commenters must leave a valid email address where they can be reached. I'll draw a name Friday morning at 9 AM EST and will announce the winner then. The skewers will ship directly to the winner from Jacob Bromwell. 

I also encourage everyone to check out the Jacob Bromwell site to see all of the cool items they offer. Good luck!

Land of the Lost TV Series: Crime Story

This fall, NBC and ABC are going to try to capitalize on the success of Mad Men with two shows that are set in the 1960s: The Playboy Club (NBC) and Pan Am (ABC.) Time will tell if either of these dramas becomes a hit (I'm guessing no - too little, too late, folks,) but people may forget that this isn't the first time the 60s era was portrayed on network television. In the mid-80s, NBC did a pretty good job with a short-lived but compelling series called Crime Story.

Crime Story was produced by Michael Mann, who had left Miami Vice in 1986 to work on the new show, which took place in 1963 Chicago (and later, Las Vegas.) The series starred Dennis Farina as the tough talking Lt. Mike Torello, and Anthony Denison as his nemesis, gangster Ray Luca. Torello's thwarted attempts to bring Luca down was the underlining theme of the show, but other sub-plots were worked into the storyline, and both seasons ended with cliffhangers that left viewers wondering if the main characters would survive. 

A lot of that cool art deco style so prominent in Miami Vice oozed over into Crime Story and worked nicely in what has become known as the pre-Beatles period of American history. By the second season, each episode cost over $1 million to produce, because of the period costumes and props required and because it was shot on location. The opening theme was a cover of Del Shannon's hit Runaway, with the lyrics slightly altered. Although many clips of the show don't currently exist on YouTube, this 10-minute sequence was full of eye candy to me: a pastel colored department store, impeccably dressed extras, and shiny, fish-finned cars. Is it also wrong of me to think that the bad guy, Ray Luca, is kind of a hottie? Whoever the set director was for Crime Story, they captured the look of the time period as nicely as the crew of Mad Men does:

I get the impression that the Lt. Torello character rarely smiled in this show - he was the epitome of the crusty, hard working TV cop. This scene made me laugh - his marriage is ending, and he discovers his wife's lover in his home...but he's not telling him take the beloved TV set away from him!

Even though Crime Story only aired for two seasons, several big-time actors got their starts on the show. Julia Roberts made her TV debut playing a rape victim in one of the episodes. Gary Sinese starred as a man who robbed in order to pay for his wife's health expenses (see clip below) and Kevin Spacey portrayed a Kennedy-esque politician. Stanley Tucci played a bomber and David Caruso had a recurring role as a minor character in the pilot and some of the season one episodes. 

I regret that I didn't appreciate Crime Story as much when it first aired, but the premise just didn't appeal to my 14 year-old female mind (Don Johnson sans shirt, however, did.)The show did fairly well after its premiere, where it aired after Miami Vice on Friday nights. When NBC made the fatal move of switching it to another night to compete with Moonlighting, its ratings sunk. They tried the 10 PM Friday night slot again but to no avail: the show was canceled after the second season ended and we never learned if Lt. Torello and his colleagues survived a plane crash. 


Martin Scorsese noted that at the premiere of his film Casino that Crime Story served as an inspiration for the movie. It also was one of the first TV shows that followed a storyline over an entire season, instead of episode by episode, a format which later became popular with 24 and The Sopranos.

Here's the opening theme to Crime Story. Both seasons of the show are available on DVD.

Two Forgotten Friday Favorites: Heart

Before I get into today's Two Forgotten Friday Favorites, I wanted to let everyone know that there's going to be another giveaway after the long holiday weekend! So stayed tuned for more details next week...

Even though the sister-centric rock group known as Heart has their roots in the 70s, it's the hits they sustained during their comeback period of the 80s that I love the best: These Dreams, Alone, What About Love, and many more.  Throughout the group's band member changes, the beautiful sisters Ann and Nancy Wilson have remained the only two constants - except, interestingly, when the group was first formed by three guys. Ann met and fell in love with one of the members, and the rest was history.

Heart is still going strong and just released a new album last year which did very well on the Billboard album charts. For this week's Two Forgotten Favorites, I'm not going to choose Barracuda, Magic Man, Crazy on You, or any of the usual overplayed hits. Instead, I really want to hear 1987's There's the Girl - the video is quintessential 80s. I'm cheating a bit on the second song as it's not a true Heart song, but one that features Ann Wilson performing a duet with Mike Reno of Loverboy on one of my favorite sappy love songs of all time, Almost Paradise. Also known as the love theme from Footloose. Yep, I realize I just lost my male viewers with that one...but I can't help it. Just last week I listened to the song for the first time in nearly 25 years!

Garish Rooms of the 70s

A look at the bold and tacky decorating tastes of the 70s is certainly nothing new on any retro blog; I think Retrospace has the best collection around (check out That 70s Home.) However, I scanned the following images from a couple of old Family Circle magazines that I picked up at a vintage flea market last year and it would be a shame if I never shared them with my readers. Where the 50s and 60s gave us flattering earth tones and the right amount of color on walls, furniture and even kitchen appliances, the 70s took hues and patterns to the extreme. There was no such thing as too much color as these examples demonstrate...

I actually like the room on top...which I'm guessing served as the home office/music room (and note the requisite fern plant that was seen everywhere in the 70s)...there's something about the green and orange that doesn't bother me at all. But the yellow, red, and orange color scheme of the dining room is a little too saturated for me (I do like the chairs...but was it necessary to make the doors yellow as well?)

This room was part of a "Two Rooms in One" series in one of the magazines...the glass/acrylic table and shelving is reminiscent of the furniture that came with my Barbie town house when I was young...the fur throw on the fold-out futon adds a nice Austin Powers-esque touch. But that wallpaper and matching curtain (!) is enough to burn out anyone's pupils.

Lime green, orange, yellow, pink...I lost count after four colors. Perhaps a child's bedroom was the only room in the home where such a color palette worked best. I honestly don't know what the difference is between the "day and night" shots in this example other than the bed on the floor...but I do like the groovy Siamese cat. 

Granted, this last example is an advertisement, but it shows that not even the bathroom was safe from the extreme color/pattern fad. The arrows really put it over the top. I believe the floor is also wall-to-wall carpeted...a really common but gross 70s trend when you consider the kind of thing that can miss the toilet if one isn't careful with their aim...sorry, had to mention it!   


Still, if I had to choose between a bland beige interior and a 70s style, I know I'd go with the latter.

And the Winner Is...

Well, I have to admit I'm a little surprised that more people didn't submit entries for the Famous Face contest...maybe because they saw a few readers had the correct answers early on? We did have two people who got all six photos correct: Tom and Barbara. Just to recap, the names of the celebs in the photos were: 1. Jon Hamm, 2. Bill Murray, 3. Stephen Colbert, 4. Sandra Bullock, 5. Kirstie Alley and 6. Sheryl Crow. Great job, guys!

I wrote both names down on paper, put them into a hat (a very small one - ha) and the winner is....Barbara from If I Didn't Have a Sense of Humor!

So, congratulations, Barbara! Send me your email address to my email, GoRetro1@hotmaill.com, and I'll order that $25 gift certificate to Plasticland for you today. Enjoy!

BTW, I may have another cool giveaway prize in a few weeks, so stay tuned!

Announcing the Who's That Famous Face Contest!

Well guys, I'm pretty excited to announce Go Retro's first ever contest! After a few years of running this blog and attracting a nice little devoted following, I figured it was time to reward my readers in anticipation of its 4th anniversary. The prize? It's a $25 gift certificate to Plasticland, the "purveyors of kitsch curiosities and retro clothing since 2002." Admittedly, this site will probably appeal more to women than men; however, I invite the guys out there to check out the home decor because there are some items that men will like..including a Star Wars wall clock! Also, other online retro stores that I contacted about securing a gift certificate or promo code never got back to me. This was one of the only ones that offered it.

Here's how to win it: this is graduation season, so I've collected some high school and college shots of famous people (3 girls, 3 guys) when they were in school. I've tried to include some that you can't find simply by Googling "celebrity yearbook photos"; that would make it way too easy! All you have to do is leave a comment on this post listing, in order, who each famous face is. The contest will run for 48 hours, until 10:45 PM E.S.T. At the end of the contest period, I'll collect the names of everyone who has the correct answers and will randomly choose a winner, who will be announced on Friday.

RULES: 1. No anonymous comments, please - I have to be able to email you the gift certificate! 2. If you subscribe to the blog's feed, you MUST leave your answers in the comments section on the actual blog...do not email me your answers or I cannot include you in the running!

Hints? Well, I really don't want to give any because that would make it too easy and because I know you have the smarts already. However, I will give you one clue: all of these people are still alive. Ready??? OK - here you go, and good luck! Have fun! Remember, you have to leave your answers in the comment box - no exceptions!  

Happy Father's Day!

To all the dads out there who read Go Retro, here's wishing you and yours a Happy Father's Day!

This is a picture of my own (late) father, I'm guessing from the late 50s or early 60s. He really wasn't a "partier" per say, at least not by today's standards, but it does look like he was a having a good day or night here. I got a kick out of the pictures of the chickens on the wall...this may be from my parents' original house that they lived in, not the one I grew up in. 

I miss you, Daddy!

The Death of the 'Stache

Maybe it's just me or the corner of the country that I live in, but I cannot remember the last time I saw a guy sporting a mustache. Of all men's facial hair trends, this one seems to have fallen by the wayside in recent years. I still see plenty of goatees, beards, and the occasional soul patch but nary a 'stache. I can't think of too many famous men today who regularly sport one (with the exception of Dr. Phil) and flipping through any magazine, you'd be hard pressed to find a male model with a mustache. Even John Oates shaved his off years ago!

I'm actually not complaining about this fashion trend; truth be told, I prefer the clean shaven look on men or the Don Johnson shadow if they can pull it off without looking too sloppy. Many of my long-time readers also know by now that I adore sideburns. But I've never been a fan of mustaches and I'm guessing that today's Gen Y and Gen X men echo that sentiment. So what happened?

I think the mustache - which lost its popularity during the 40s and 50s but gained it back in the 60s along with long hair - is too closely associated today with 1970s tackiness and porn film stars, such as Ron Jeremy and fictional anchorman Ron Burgandy. Although it was considered macho back in the day, the 'stache has a somewhat cheesy and sleazy reputation now. Back to Hall and Oates, I can't tell you how many times I watched one of their videos on YouTube only to see someone in the comments ask who "the guy with the pornstache" was!

I also think there may be some gay connotations with having a mustache (think Freddy Mercury and members of The Village People) or that it's the facial hair pattern of choice by child molesters and Adolph Hitler. 

Despite the stache's decline in pop culture and the general public, there is a group dedicated to men who still proudly wear one: The American Mustache Institute. They even have an annual charity event called the Stache Bash. And new this year is a book just published in called The Moustache Grower's Guide. Since fashion trends are cyclical, it's quite possible the Tom Selleck look could make a comeback. 

So, readers, what do you think? Do any of you guys out there wear one, and do you ladies like a guy with a stache or not?

The Tanning Craze

It's unofficially summer, which means the reminders to use sunscreen have begun - but as you probably already know, this wasn't the case during the mid-to-late part of the 20th century. It was ALL about getting a sexy tan! 

But let's backtrack a bit. Believe it or not, at one time pale skin was in fashion. Way back at the turn of the 20th century, tanned skin was looked down upon because it was associated with farmers and anyone else doing outdoor labor work - in other words, the lower class. Impressionist paintings often show people carrying umbrellas and wearing long sleeves to shield themselves from the sun. It wasn't until fashion icon Coco Chanel returned from a cruise in the 1920s sporting darker toned skin that the public suddenly considered the look to be chic. We've been paying the price for that ever since, as melanoma cases continue to rise. 

From the 50s through roughly the 80s, having a tan was associated with being healthy and sexy. There are literally tons of advertisements from these decades that attest to that belief. Many products touted healthy skin and promised a fast tan. There really wasn't any public awareness of the increase of wrinkles, discoloration and skin cancer that sun exposure would later be associated with. The introduction of the bikini, which exposed more of the female body, no doubt contributed to the popularity of tanning as well.

Indeed, I'm ashamed to admit that as an 80s teenager I was taken in by the St. Tropez ads for Bain du Soleil that featured a sexy model with beautifully glowing, shimmery skin. I shudder to think that as a result I baked my pale Polish skin in my backyard a few times while listening to Sade on my Sony Walkman (it's not Sade that makes me shudder, but of course the thought of purposely lying in the sun's rays.) 

What do you know...I found the commercial on YouTube. Interesting how minimal the SPF levels were back then...SPF 2 for the face???





Indeed, sunscreens from a few eras ago didn't have as high a SPF rating as what's available today. The first sunscreen to have a SPF rating of 15 hit the market in 1978. I don't really remember paying attention to SPF ratings until the 80s, however...and I knew a few people who used baby oil and/or UV reflectors while out in the sun!

Yes, these folks were getting their share of vitamin D along with a dose of wrinkles. Today, of course, we're more aware of how the sun can damage the dermis. But in many ways, I don't think the tan has ever truly fallen out of fashion. It amazes me how many people play Russian Routlette with our shrinking ozone layer. They also visit tanning salons, and products that claim to give you a realistic looking "fake" tan are everywhere. I think Western society in general is way too hung up on looking tan instead of just embracing their natural, healthy skin tone. Today, I'm pretty proud of my ivory skin and prefer to keep it that way, with the help of hats, sunglasses, and sunblock. Will we ever learn?