Then…
When I was 10, I always got my butter-rum Life Savers from Erickson’s Pharmacy on West Government Way. This traditional drugstore and soda fountain resided in the curve on that street in the small clump of commercial shops.
Those of us who lived in Pleasant Valley and more north on the Bluff spent time at this soda fountain, while other Magnolia children and adults were patrons of the better-known Magnolia Pharmacy in the Village.
I remember the Life Saver display at Erickson’s. It was next to the cash register, at the west end of the fountain counter. It had exact metal replicas of the many different Life Saver packages that nestled a real roll and stored more above in long rows. When you took out your selection, the whole row rolled forward filling in the gap. I loved that display.
Mr. Erickson was between nice and gruff, depending on the day, the transaction and his moods. It was rumored that he lost the function of one of his arms in “the war.”
He was the pharmacist, soda maker and salesperson. He employed a staff that also included another pharmacist, and his wife was usually on hand working on the inventory in back or dusting, rearranging the shelves or making sales.
He always wore an official and very white, crisp medical shirt that added an air of authority as the pharmacist.
I didn’t really go there because of Mr. Erickson — he kind of scared me. But what I did go for was his inventory. It could take a good half an hour to take in the shelves of the unusual dime store-type merchandise he carried.
I remember when I would get one dollar to buy a birthday present for a friend’s upcoming party; Erickson’s was where I went. Living at the north end of the valley, it was more convenient for me than going to the Village, and the selection was great: all kinds of knickknacks, ‘50s kitsch and unique novelties.
My favorite was a small, plastic case about the size of a deck of cards. It had a clear front connected to a black plastic back (classy!) that showcased the tiniest glass tubes, each with a small droplet of real perfume: My Sin, Muguet de Bois and Tweed were encapsulated in those tubes. It was a virtual sampler of perfumes of the 1950s. And, it came with a “map” that showed which little tube — marked with a colored dot at each end — had which perfume.
The neat trick to me was you carefully broke open the tiny glass sticks of perfume and got a daylong sampling of a sophisticated smell. I considered it the perfect birthday present for my girlfriends. And it was often my selection, coming in at just less than a dollar.
Coming from a family of 10 children, it was never really an option to spend the time or money at the fountain. I remember looking longingly at the blackboard with neat, white letters of selections.
Instead of the fountain fare, it was a more common lunch experience to head in the other direction toward the gate of Fort Lawton. On a sunny day, we rode our bikes and carried a brown sack lunch of peanut butter and jelly or American cheese, mayo and a cucumber chip sandwich with a piece of fruit. We sometimes got a rock-hard homemade oatmeal cookie with raisins, and we never got potato chips or Twinkies.
But the lunch was not the main attraction to us, anyway. As we waved to the guard in the little building at the entrance, we headed nonstop for the cemetery. There was a lot of reading of the headstones and jumping over the buried bodies so as not to bring bad luck and a haunting upon oneself.
We spent hours eating and exploring, making up stories of the German and Italian prisoners of war, set off in separate graves at the back of the cemetery. Storytelling took on Halloween proportions as we lay against the trees that surrounded the neat rows and rows of pure-white headstones. We particularly were interested in wondering about the born-in-1800-somethings and the babies and young children buried there.
Now…
The little cluster of shops now include longtime resident Robert’s Cleaners, which was there when I was a kid, and new businesses: Seven Hills Running Shop, The Paper Mache World of David Garza (both in the space once where Erickson’s was), Fitness by Design, Next Level Personal Training and Universal Salon.
As I have grown up, it is a coincidence that the stories of old fountain drugstores, the Fort Lawton Cemetery and the dead soldiers are now part of what I study and research as co-president of the Magnolia Historical Society.
The fort — always a private park to us Magnolia kids — is now Discovery Park, officially the largest park for the citizens of Seattle.
One of the Magnolia Historical Society’s primary purposes is to collect written history of the neighborhood. Two award-winning/nominated books have been written with Magnolia residents, and we continue to collect memoirs and academically researched writing as part of our ongoing mission as a society.
Twice a year, fall and spring, we offer a free memoir-writing workshop to the public, with published writers to guide participants, prompts, gentle critiques and a supportive environment to help them write their childhood memories. To get on a list for the spring workshop, call (206) 284-2430
I still prefer butter-rum Life Savers to any other flavor, and the neatly laid-out cemetery, the only property slated to permanently be retained by the Army, brings me back to the freewheeling days of the 1950s, when the security guards waved back at you as they let you trespass and you could spend an afternoon without adult supervision playing in a cemetery.
MONICA WOOTON is co-president of the Magnolia Historical Society (www.magnoliahistoricalsociety.org/blog). To comment on this column, write to QAMagNews@nwlink.com.
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