Monday, June 12, 2017

Coffee and other grandest things


[Life, December 15, 1941. Click for a larger view.]

Yes, as the advertisement says, Mother’s taste is superb. I like the swanky living room, though it seems a little short on seating materials.

Is daughter home from college? And has she picked up a tiny coffee habit while away? And why is everyone exchanging presents already? It’s only December 20. And why is the Christmas tree out in the front yard? I need a tiny cup of A&P coffee to clear my head.

What most caught my eye (while it was looking for something else: grandest. I think of Marty (dir. Delbert Mann, 1955), when Marty describes his kid brother’s wedding: “I never saw anything so grand in my life.” And of 42nd Street (dir. Lloyd Bacon, 1933), when Peggy Sawyer’s character exclaims, “Jim! They didn’t tell me you were here! It was grand of you to come.” But most of all, I think of older relatives and the Irish-American grand. How are you feeling? Oh, just grand, thank you.

The December 15, 1941 issue of Life has a young actress on its cover, Patricia Peardon, who was appearing in the Broadway show Junior Miss. The United States was not yet at war when that issue went to press. On the December 22 cover: an American flag.

Related reading
All OCA coffee posts (Pinboard)
The Irish “grand”

comments: 2

Slywy said...

Maybe the room is HUGE, and there's more seating but it's cold away from the fire. Mom seems to be in danger of falling off, though. Why are they drinking from such tiny cups? The coffee is so bad it's best drunk from as tiny a cup as possible?

At least they have some books (not to be confused with some rocks). I can't tell you how many places I've been in that are bereft of books. I don't know how such people live.

Michael Leddy said...

Judging from old movies and photographs, coffee cups were typically smaller. (Ditto soda bottles.) But these cups look like dollhouse accessories. Wait — maybe it’s a Twilight Zone episode, and there’s a giant child outside the window ready to move them around!