Roller-Scooter truck assemblies

[From the Johnson Smith & Co. 1938 catalog. Click for a larger view.]

The pitch begins:

What boy doesn’t want a snappy scooter – ’specially if the toughest work is all ready done for him and he knows that when he’s finished he’ll have the smoothest running, fastest shooting scooter any kid could help to build!

And only 65¢!

Well, sort of. What’s for sale here is not a scooter but “truck assemblies.” Truck? I had to look it up: “a small wheel.” What your 65¢ is buying: roller-skate wheels. That’s all, folks.

Lose the tie and sweater and knickers, add a t-shirt and dungarees, and the kid in the advertisement could have stepped from the pages of my youth. In the early 1960s the big kids on my block in Brooklyn rode scooters like this one. The front was a milk crate or produce crate, with a piece of wood nailed across the top for handlebars. The kids rode in the street, which was narrow and one-way, with cars parked on both sides. I remember that they were somehow engaging in games of combat — taking swings at one another, or crashing into one another, or something. I watched from the sidewalk.

Here’s a page with some history about these scooters. Here are some Life photos of scooters. And here’s a post with a cartoon scooter, a real-world scooter, and previous reverie.

Also from this catalog
Comical motto rings

[Every post right now is a retreat from all forms of news.]