21 August 1956 “Some Fun Tid-Bits from 1956”

I thought for today I would post some fun random happenings and items from this year, 1956.

i-Pod, CD player, cassette, 8-track, radio? Yes, they even, back in 1956, were thinking of how we could ‘take along’ the music we wanted to hear.

“In 1956 they teamed with CBS to create the “Highway Hi-Fi” – an under-dash phonograph that played vinyl records at a super-slow 16-2/3 revolutions per minute. The slow speed allowed a small disc to pack up to an hour of entertainment on each side. Special mechanical engineering reduced the number of times and distance the needle would skip across the disc as the car drove over bumps in the road.”

Here is Elvis ‘at home’ in 1956. This year Elvis is really gaining popularity. He is still not quite the superstar he will become, but I would definitely know who someone was talking about when they mention his name. Here you can see he is enjoying a modest home with good success. I wonder, sometimes, if superstars and mega singers, if their lives would have been better off if they could have made a ‘decent’ living and lived comfortably but not insanely wealthy so quickly. It often lead to others taking advantage and a destructive lifestyle (which was certainly the case with Elvis). Sometimes I think the ‘Get it all’ dream of wealth and fame is often the path to self-destruction. Who knows, if Elvis had been a good stable mid range star (in a world where we did not have Super Stars but many talented people we could enjoy that got paid good salaries and were not marketed into a product) He might still be around today, crooning and singing for us.

This is a 1956 VW bus. It seemed odd to me, because we so often associate the VW bus with the 60’s hippie generation. But, I suppose they were not buying brand new assembly line buses, so I am sure many of these became hand painted with flowers and sayings in another 10 or 15 years.

Here is the lovely Marilyn Monroe this year (1956) on Long Island, NY. You have to appreciate a gal who is sexy when she is as full bodied as Marilyn. Her thighs and her bottom, even her arms and back would probably be considered ‘chubby’ today. And can you imagine how unflattering even she would look in modern bikini’s of thin strips of fabric ill-placed? There is a lot to be said for the vintage 50’s suit both in comfort and style.

Bobby Fischer at age 13 here in 1956, is beginning to get noticed for his Chess genius.

“By the age of 13, Fischer's talents were already gaining notice. In a feature story filed in 1956, a journalist wrote, "While his hands may be fidgety, the eighth grader's eyes are riveted on the chessboard before him. His goal is the U.S. National Chess Championships, and he's made an excellent start toward it."

 This is Diana Dors, The UK version of Marilyn Monroe, leaving Cannes film festival this year (1956). She made film and even had her own tv show in the UK

Well, there you go, some fun little tidbits from this year to peruse over your Saturday.

Until tomorrow, Happy Homemaking.