My first real job at 50+ hrs/week was in an olde tyme hardware store, run by an extended family, Broadhurst was the last name, in Bethesda Maryland in about '59 -61 time frame...not only covered many many car parts, but just about anything else your/our sick minds could dream up, and they had it in stock....didn't matter if you wanted the nose cone from a freaking rocket ship, Al knew where it was on the top shelf...maybe full of dust, but it's there...

that was a neat place, only matched in site and smell by smaller olde tyme small town hardware stores today, birdseed, fertilizer in the basement next to the Kerosene and Varsol tanks...full of caked up combo on the floor, WHY in hell that place didn't become a smoking crater is well beyond me, now.....

needed gas pipe?? threaded?? what length??? galv?? copper???
no plastic in them days.....had the cast iron though....
toilets?? sinks??? kitchen sinks??? you name it....cookware??? up front with the wives/sisters managing that department....
garden tools, lawnmowers??? in back downstairs,....then became another building .....
any grade bolt to hold anything together, from about 1.5 inches diameter down to no seeum size....

brass bolts?? how many???

I was totally amazed when a cabinet maker came in and asked for Soss hinges.....I looked at him totally blank, as that one was bout 10k feet over my head....glanced at Al, he grinned, and said to the customer.....'please show this kid where the Soss hinges are"........so the customer took my back through the extensive collection of cabinet hardware, over behind the tool section, and pulled out this brown box with tissue paper wrapping, (now when is the last time you EVER bought anything in a brown box with tissue paper wrapping??).....there was a Soss hinge.....tons of them....any size you needed....

go nucking futs today finding a Soss hinge.....good freaking luck....

GENE

 

Our little town had a nice one. Wooden floors that creaked when you walked on them. Every thing was in that place. It had been there for over 100 years. It burned to the ground about 5 years ago. Sad. Still an open vacant lot right on the corner with grass growing where the building once stood.

 

Eddie, what a hell of a loss, I'd been crying crocodile tears over that.....

MY hardware store, they saved the front of the building, with the worn out wood floors, as a 'shrine' to old town Bethesda....today the original site, and the entire town is a mausoleum to high rise living,....apartments and offices....
looks like NYC there, so it seems....

shame really, the last place to go that I so fondly remember was the old Hot Shoppe on the corner.....I think it was the original chain that Marriott owned....

been a while...no lie...

GENE

 

Unfotunately, we all share the blame for the demise of the old-fashioned hardware store. Each time we buy something at a "superstore" to save a few pennies, we take that money away from the mom-and-pops.

The only place these little stores are surviving -- and even thriving (at least around here) are in the "chi-chi" areas. They serve an upscale clientele who care about good service and quality products. Go figure!

 

Have one near me but their hours stink; close at 6 during the week, close early on Sat and not open Sun; so I have gotten used to going to the big guys. Too bad since the few times I have gone there they have given me excellent service.

 

Gene,

Boy that brought back memories. I worked my way thru hi-school in the '60's in a old hardware store....I can still remember the special smell that the place had.

Pots/pans, etc. we in the front....a place for the wives and girlfriends to shop. Also had little unfinished wooden purses and all the little brass hinges and other supples for them to make their own.

Nailes were in big bins....not little boxes. How many you need...sold by the pound. Anything you wanted....from #2 finishing nails to 24-D spikes.

I was cleaning the back storage area one day when I found a box of "Mend-ixs". Special kits to repair holes in cooking pots. Contained a machine screw, 2 overside washers, two cork washers, lock washer and nut. Instructions showed how to put togeather to repair holes in pots. Had a price sticker of 5 cents.

I also found a box of receipt pads with the date pre-printed "194_". The owner said they were the "new-style". The older ones didn't have the date. I can't remember the phone number...but I know it wasn't a 7 digit number....I think is was just 4 digits.

 

We still have a few of the olde school hardware/country stores near us.
One place in Milford NH - County Stores - has EVERYTHING, just like you described.
Also, as a lessor alternative - Hollis NH has Hollis Grain, a hardware and farming
store with extensive and unique hardware.

Sadly, the hours and prices will sometimes drive me to the Depot, etc.
But, I know that they will have the parts I need - if I wait for the weekend.

:seeya

 

We still have one that our family owned back in the 20's some of the stuff is still on the shelves :eek:

 

We've still got one here, run by one of my friends, his wife and their two grown sons. I have yet to go in there and ask for something that they didn't have, from A/C filters, to rollers for 30 year old pocket door tracks, to miscellaneous parts to fix Rain Bird Sprinklers.

Usually have a cup of coffee and B.S. with the rest of the customers before I leave. :yesnod:

 

Martin, yup, nails by the pound.....I remember freaking out once when seeing nails in boxes for the first time.....

we even had nails in buckets for contractors.....gotta hit a supply house for that today, but today they are collated for the nailers...no more barrels...

UHHH>....what's a Carter 2bbl????
or was that a Rochester 2bbl???
used to be 3 of them on some vettes a few years ago....
cars had only 3-4 sizes of bolts on them...I can tell that by the wear patterns on my first tool set....
1/2, 9/16, 5/8, 3/4 and if that didn't do it, well, a pair of good solid slip joints or maybe vice grips would.....

today, no, it's 6.5mm, and 4.8 mm....and so forth....

then there is that new size....59/64ths.....

gotcha on that one, Snap On ONLY.....

GENE

 

There's one in this little town outside of Jackson. I go there every year to get a pickup load of cotton gin compost. The family also owns a cotton gin and they let the gin refuse compost all year, then sell the compost the following spring. They have frickin huge piles of the stuff. Like 200' x 300' and higher than a Caterpillar front end loader. The stuff is black, fertile and will grow anything. N-E-Way, I hafta go in the store and pay for it. This place is real old, board flooring, musty smell, lotsa stuff and it's a fairly large operation. Tack, seeds, clothing, cookin utensils, hardware, and thats just the stuff from the front door to the counter where I pay. Real interesting place.

Brett :thumbs:

 

Got a place a lot like that nearby. Creakign floorboard and all. I've stopped in there many times to find the odd bolt or rivet or tool for working on the vette. This place has been in the same family for 3 or 4 generations now. :thumbs:

 

we have a hardware store in town that is OLD style!

here is the URL for the website!

http://www.unifour.com/deturner/

 

Rose, Mooresville NC is a step back in time!!!!


GENE :D :party:

 

Sounds like the little place I started work as a 13 year old kid. Couple of brothers owned it and about half of the county... :D

I remember those creaky wood floors and the musty smell. We used to even make sausage and salt cure and sugar cure hams... :eek:

Makes me dream of the "gold ole' days" when a '55 chevy or a '72 Vette would come screaming in for some "white gas" 97 octane... :cool:

 

It is a very ODD mixture of the ''Old'' & the New''!!

Downtown could be a picture of ''home town USA''!!

but go out towards the Interstate and it is a BOOMtown!!!! :crazy: