BajaNomad

Good Ol' Days

sloopy - 5-27-2008 at 07:52 PM

Anyone remember in the 50's when we use to take our customed, lowered cars to TJ to get Tuck & Roll? If you didn't stay with the car, they'd fill the rolls up with paper of all sorts and sand on the vertical ones.
Of course, if you didn't stay, you wouldn't notice it when you returned. You'd be lucky to find the place you left your car, let alone checking the job they did. But if you found an honest, good place to go, it was well worth the trip and wait. What an experience that was way back when Bill Haley, Sanford Clark and newbie, Johnny Cash was starting out......

Chamaco - 5-27-2008 at 07:54 PM

um...................no, i wasn't born yet :)

rts551 - 5-27-2008 at 07:59 PM

No not in the 50's. Only the 60's. and it was in Mexicali (closer). 57 Bel Air

805gregg - 5-27-2008 at 08:19 PM

Yep, I wasn't driving, but everyone knew TJ was the place to get your upholstery done.

fulano - 5-27-2008 at 08:34 PM

My earliest memories of TJ were in the 50's and making sure I brought back Mexican jumping beans to bring to school for show and tell, tacky bongos that had to be heated over a stove to tighten the skins enought to play, and of course sneaking back with as many firecrackers as I could to sell for a profit to my buddies.

Barry A. - 5-27-2008 at 10:14 PM

Quote:
Originally posted by fulano
My earliest memories of TJ were in the 50's and making sure I brought back Mexican jumping beans to bring to school for show and tell, tacky bongos that had to be heated over a stove to tighten the skins enought to play, and of course sneaking back with as many firecrackers as I could to sell for a profit to my buddies.


-------and those were REAL firecrackers!!!!! loved those firecrackers!!!

--------and yes, I sure remember the "tuck and roll" shops in TJ, tho I never used them.

I used to drive down to TJ a couple times a week just to eat dinner at El Especial, and have a Carta Blanca, or 2----sometimes alone------sometimes with a friend. I loved TJ back then, and it was only a 20 min. drive.

Barry

baitcast - 5-28-2008 at 06:29 AM

My first liberties were pulled in TJ in 54 while in the Navy:o MY GOD thats over fifty years ago.
Rob

sloopy - 5-28-2008 at 05:28 PM

Yeas, i forgot about the firecrackers and the jumping beans. Also, the race track and the dog track and the big bull fighting ring.....
th:lol:ose were the days......:lol:

EARLY FIFTIES SMUGGLING

bancoduo - 5-28-2008 at 05:42 PM

My dad would have bottles of booze shoved up thru the bottom of the car seats and I would have firecrackers stuffed in my pockets.:cool:

[Edited on 5-29-2008 by bancoduo]

CaboRon - 5-28-2008 at 07:16 PM

Quote:
Originally posted by sloopy
Yeas, i forgot about the firecrackers and the jumping beans. Also, the race track and the dog track and the big bull fighting ring.....
th:lol:ose were the days......:lol:


And don't forget the Jai Lai Palace ... incredable game and great betting action.
I had my '53 Merc convertable done in TJ ... red nauga tuck 'n roll. Beautiful .. had to bring my own thread as I recal.
And the 50 cent house special at the Hotel Nelson.
And the ******************** WOW !

CaboRon

sloopy - 5-29-2008 at 06:50 AM

Speaking of Mexicali....I remember in the 50's walking across the border and going to the right, down the street a little bit. There was a horse track betting parlor there with all the US tracks and the one in TJ. Won $80 bucks on a horse I knew nothing about, just like the name.."Willie the Whale"..
Mom got 5 out 6 in the TJ track pick six.....usually 5 got the big money but this particular time she split it with 19 others. We crossed the border with almost 9 grand in small bills. She paid a local cop $10 to escort us to the border.....
Surprisingly enough, the place is still there!!! at least it was on my last trip there a few years ago.....

sloopy

Baja Bernie - 5-30-2008 at 07:49 AM

Welcome and you brought tears to my eyes............and so many thoughts to mind.......Thanks

jodiego - 5-30-2008 at 08:04 AM

Don't forget the elixir of love....mexican fly. Never bought any but heard lots of stories about it's magical qualities or lack thereof. Wouldn't that be considered a date rape drug now?....and just what the hell was mexican fly?

[Edited on 5-30-2008 by jodiego]

DENNIS - 5-30-2008 at 07:16 PM

Quote:
Originally posted by jodiego
Don't forget the elixir of love....mexican fly.


Spanish Fly...it was called. Never worked. I tried it on myself and my hand laughed at me.

CaboRon - 5-30-2008 at 07:20 PM

Quote:
Originally posted by DENNIS
Quote:
Originally posted by jodiego
Don't forget the elixir of love....mexican fly.


Spanish Fly...it was called. Never worked. I tried it on myself and my hand laughed at me.


:lol::lol::lol::lol::lol::lol:

How about the 40's

Juan del Rio - 5-30-2008 at 08:11 PM

[Edited on 5-31-2008 by Juan del Rio]

donkeycartX.jpg - 7kB

CaboRon - 5-30-2008 at 08:19 PM

Juan,
You can go ahead and make the pics quite a bit bigger up to 50kb . It is a little hard for these old eyes to make out these small pictures clearly.
Thanks,
CaboRon

fishbuck - 5-30-2008 at 08:29 PM

Ya, I went with my buddie Tom Cruise. We went down there to loose our virginity.
Oh wait, that was a movie. "Loosin it" I think.

Sharksbaja - 5-30-2008 at 10:38 PM

Nice pics there Grover. have they been colorized?

Packoderm - 5-30-2008 at 10:42 PM

Sloopy, as far as the olden days go, all you can do is hang on.

vgabndo - 5-31-2008 at 12:06 AM

I remember going to TJ (The long bar??) on liberty one time in the early sixties with a couple of other teen-aged Marine buddies in an old DeSoto that one of them had bought. We got there, got good and stinko, headed back to Camp Pendleton and the water pump started going out. We just kept turning up the radio until it finally boiled out and quit. Must have been about San Juan Capistrano where we left the keys and pink slip on the seat and hitchhiked back to the base.:lol:

Back in the days when playing with big guns and DUI were some kind of cool.:?:

Funny Banco...I got out in '64 and went to work in a top 40 radio station. In a six hour weekend board shift I must have played Hang on Sloopy...twenty times a shift.:lol:

[Edited on 5-31-2008 by vgabndo]

DENNIS - 5-31-2008 at 07:06 AM

Quote:
Originally posted by grover
Hotel Caesar




The cars parked, "En Cordón", [I think that's what it's called]. I wonder why they don't do that today. It would help, some anyway.

Kell-Baja - 6-2-2008 at 05:11 PM

Well I'm too young for the 50's but I do remember when I was little in the 70's we would go down for Lobster Dinners & instead of it being in a restraunt, it was in a Mexican Family's living room that they had opened up to the public. I also remember dancing on the dance floor @ the Rosarito Beach Hotel. Funny thing is I went to the Rosarito Beach Hotel about 15 years ago & the bartender had been there for years & remembered me as a little girl.