Things you could order over 50 years ago that you can't order now !

[Jstpssng]

I have one on my nightstand still working.

It's amazing that it has lived this long. You must have it on one of those Holistic diets or something.

 

[jigs_n_fixtures]

They sold everything in their heyday. I have a JC Higgins .22 by Sears, as well as a Hercules 16 gauge shotgun by Montgomery Ward.
Both were my father's.

I always found the internet and online shopping destroying Sears, and JC Penny as semi humorous in a slightly twisted way.

You had a store chain, which built itself as a mail order catalog enterprise, which then branched out to brick and mortar where they stocked the more popular items from the catalog, but which still had their catalog.

The the internet move started, and they still had their catalogs, and brick and mortar stores. The internet ate into their mail order sales so the got rid of the catalog division, and moved to just brick and mortar.

If they had only had a modicum of foresight, and actual intelligence: They could have moved their catalog, (it was already in HTML, and it would have been pretty straight forward), to an online presence they would still be world class enterprises.

 

[/pine]

You could never buy a WWII jeep in a crate. That never happened. No one has ever experienced buying a jeep in the crate in parts covered with jelly. It was a con-man that sold info on how to go to USA Military actions that posted the ads in the back of Popular Mechanics ads that just sold you a guide on how you could go to a USA Military auction in the 60's. No one ever bought a MIL Spec jeep in the way it was advertised. No One EVER bought a WWII jeep this way. Olive Drab Unicorn? The Truth behind the WW2 "Jeep In The Crate"

I believe the part about being $50...but take that out of the equation and a lot of this story is a big myth...
There were lots of surplus jeeps sold after the war and individual vehicles rarely made it to US surplus auctions...most were sold to businesses or individuals that could buy stacked railroad cars or multiple railroad cars of the jeeps...it was those entities that then sold them individually at surplus auctions (not sanctioned my the US military and not for $50...)...

 

[Jstpssng]

I always found the internet and online shopping destroying Sears, and JC Penny as semi humorous in a slightly twisted way.

You had a store chain, which built itself as a mail order catalog enterprise, which then branched out to brick and mortar where they stocked the more popular items from the catalog, but which still had their catalog.

The the internet move started, and they still had their catalogs, and brick and mortar stores. The internet ate into their mail order sales so the got rid of the catalog division, and moved to just brick and mortar.

If they had only had a modicum of foresight, and actual intelligence: They could have moved their catalog, (it was already in HTML, and it would have been pretty straight forward), to an online presence they would still be world class enterprises.

I've always felt the same thing. It's too bad because in the day they were a good store. I believe that another mistake they made was when they bought K-Mart.

 

[JasperFrank]

"If they had only had a modicum of foresight, and actual intelligence: They could have moved their catalog, (it was already in HTML, and it would have been pretty straight forward), to an online presence they would still be world class enterprises."

The collapse of SEARS is quite the amazing story. They had all the mechanics in place to be Amazon. I remember getting the catalogs, and they were like DREAM books, cause you could buy just about ANYTHING if you had the money.

 

[bullbreaker]

Wasn't that long ago but how about Heathkit stores. And Curtis Mathes TV 's ?

 

[alexpops]

I've always felt the same thing. It's too bad because in the day they were a good store. I believe that another mistake they made was when they bought K-Mart.

Yeah, they overpaid for KMart, thinking the land value would bail them out, then to pay down the debt for the purchase price they lowered quality thinking they'd bring in more revenue, instead they drove Sears customers away & the KMart Shoppers thought everything was too expensive even as price followed quality down. Suppliers cut back their credit as the slow decline happened, so ... inventory was spotty at best. Got to where you couldn't find anything in store that you wanted & what was there looked like it had been there for a few years. Pity. Used to buy lots from Sears in the 70's and early 80's since it was literally a 1 stop shop ... tools, guns, ammo, fishing gear ... Oh yeah, wife wanted a blender and frying pan ... that's why I'm here.

 

[Larry Caldwell]

I've always felt the same thing. It's too bad because in the day they were a good store. I believe that another mistake they made was when they bought K-Mart.

It has been sad to see the retailers pull men's products out of their stores. Granted, women conduct 80% of retail sales, but they eliminated 20% of their customer base when they closed out power tools, guns, men's magazines, and the in-store deli. I bought my first shotgun at K-Mart, and along with GI Joe's I dropped big bucks on shells there. I bought the greatest 2-pole cabin tent I ever owned at K-Mart. After 30 years it aged out, and I tried to replace it, but Coleman doesn't make one like it any more. I bought it because they had it set up in the store, and when I realized it was 6' head height wall to wall, I was sold. Wards sold me 300 lb. test extension ladders, a transit, and the best 1/2" drill motor I have ever owned.

I'm still using a Radio Shack DX-440, a weather cube, and a VOM. When I was 9 I ordered a transistor radio kit and learned to use a soldering iron. My first stereo amp was a Heathkit, and I still have a couple Eico monophonic amps that are miracles of vacuum tube tech. I also bought a quad channel decoder from Heath about 1970. My roomie had a Dynakit amp with the center channel bass tap, and we had a 5.1 channel vacuum tube sound system in 1970, Gerard turntable with a Grado stylus that shipped with its own oscilloscope trace. Quicksilver's "Happy Trails" album was a marvel in surround sound.

Is J. C. Whitney even in business any more? They used to sell fiberglass bodies that would turn a Volksbuggen into a flashy car. Scrounge a Porsche engine and transaxle, and you could really be unsafe at any speed.

 

[JasperFrank]

I built a heath-kit stereo amplifier from one of their kits in the early 70's. Learned electronic schematics and how to solder. In my mid-life, 1980's to about 2003, this turned out to be a very important skill in electronic repair. Then surface mounting became the norm and I couldn't deal with that. Components were too small, and too packed together on the bus for my shaky hands to work with.
I applaud folks like Louis Rossman, that on Youtube shows how you work with the tiny components and surface mounted chips. I just don't have the hand control anymore, to do anything like this.

 

[stuckmotor]

I believe the part about being $50...but take that out of the equation and a lot of this story is a big myth...
There were lots of surplus jeeps sold after the war and individual vehicles rarely made it to US surplus auctions...most were sold to businesses or individuals that could buy stacked railroad cars or multiple railroad cars of the jeeps...it was those entities that then sold them individually at surplus auctions (not sanctioned my the US military and not for $50...)...

Something similar happened after WW1 with army wagons. My great grandfather and his brothers bought a box car load. One of them hung around the farm unil my grandfather sold it in the 1970s or '80s. I don't think it ever made it overseas.