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Discussion (4)

  • EJHill@EJHill

    Just a little background. The blue bowl that James talks about in this episode was issued as a premium by Ralston-Purina.

    They started out as white. This sample was sold on Etsy:

    At the bottom of the bowl it reads "Copyright 1925 Ralston-Purina Co. St. Louis"

    Don't know when they switched to blue-on-blue, but this is the version James tells me he had as child:

    Like so many iconic US brands, Ralston-Purina was gobbled up by a multinational. Nestlé acquired the company in 2001 and now concentrates solely on the pet food business.

  • She@She
    ReplyingtoEJHill

    EJHill (View Comment):

    Just a little background. The blue bowl that James talks about in this episode was issued as a premium by Ralston-Purina.

    They started out as white. This sample was sold on Etsy:

    At the bottom of the bowl it reads “Copyright 1925 Ralston-Purina Co. St. Louis”

    Don’t know when they switched to blue-on-blue, but this is the version James tells me he had as child:

    Like so many iconic US brands, Ralston-Purina was gobbled up by a multinational. Nestlé acquired the company in 2001 and now concentrates solely on the pet food business.

    Lovely story. I've collected, for quite a while, bits and pieces of the Royal Doulton "Peter Rabbit Collection," not the ones I had as a child, but the same age as, and because they remind me of, the ones I had as a child:

    Then there's "Bunnykins." A couple of weeks ago my sister and sister-in-law hied themselves over from the UK, each with an extra suitcase that they'd paid for in their luggage. (Day was--in my time--that you got two free checked suitcases each when you travelled. That's no longer the case, at least if you fly steerage which--face it--is about all most of us can afford these days.)

    Those extra suitcases were stuffed full of memorabilia from my childhood, something I'd never have gotten any other way, and which--when you consider what it costs to send things via the mail or common carrier these days--was much more cheaply delivered as an "extra" via the airline. Among them was a set of "Bunnykins," china, something which almost all English kids of my generation assumed as a birthright. I was gifted with a couple of mugs, a plate, a bowl, and an eggcup, things that actually were from my childhood. And I remember it all:

    Lord, how I loved digging down through my porridge or my custard to find the bunnies underneath.

    There was so much else, an awful lot of it silly but memorable, and a few things of which made me cry. Chief among the latter was the little tinsel "Christmas tree" (in its original box) which Granny and Grandpa sent me when I was about three for one of my Christmases in Nigeria. Many years, it was the only real Christmas decoration in the house. Today, it makes even Charlie Brown's Christmas Tree look lush and full:

    Funny, but occasionally heartbreaking, what we remember. Pass it on.

    PS: @jameslileks, if you haven't seen Toby Jones in Mr. Bates vs The Post Office, you should take a look. A television program that changed the country. (Alan Bates himself is now known as "Sir" Alan Bates.)