Researching the past. 1939

I found a 1939 nickel when I was cleaning change out of my purse. Once I stopped wondering what it was worth in today’s market. (Somewhere between fifty cents and five dollars, according to Cointrackers)

I started wondering what it would buy in 1939. I love research. I may want to set a story in 1939. Or it may inform my writing in other ways, i.e., a grandmother’s remembrance. I plunged joyfully into Google. The results were not quite what I expected.

The cost of living website says

The average house cost $6,980   

Equivalent today: $109953

The average car cost $700

Equivalent today: $11,027

The average wage was $1,253

Equivalent today: $19,738

That’s roughly 24.00 a week On other websites I saw average wage of $1,850 – roughly 35.00 a week. I suspect the truth was somewhere in between these figures.

In 1939 you could buy a Hershey bar for a nickel, Or a cup of coffee. Or a loaf of bread. You could cook off with a Popsicle.

Children learned to read with the Dick and Jane Books, first published in 1931

Ludwig Bemelman’s Madeline was published in 1939 as were the 16th Nancy Drew Book. The Clue of the Tapping Heels and The Hardy Boys number 18, The Twisted Claw. The fourth Little House Book, By the Shores of Silver Lake, made its appearance.

The17th Newbery award went to Thimble Summer by Elizabeth Enright.

The second Caldecott went in 1939: Mei Li by Thomas Handforth (Doubleday)

The average hardbound book cost 2.75

On June 19^th, 1939 Robert De Graff introduced Pocket Books to the American public, changing the face of reading. The first paperback books were 25 cents a copy. (That link will take you to an interesting article,.)

Magazines cost ten cents.

 So did Comic Books

 

The First Superman comic came out in 1939

In 2010 a rare copy of Detective Comics No. 27 from 1939 went for $1,075,500  Don't you wish your grandparents had saved them?

 You could go to the movies for 23 cents

 Popular movies from 1939 included

• Gone with the Wind
• The Wizard of Oz
• Stagecoach
• Of Mice and Men
• Wuthering Heights
• The Hunchback of Notre Dame

The 12th Annual Oscars read like a who's who in film history.

The rest of the world was at war, but in America, we were still on the sidelines.

The1939 Worlds Fair in New York in introduced the first televisions and the.NBC/RCA 1st public TV demo with FDR at opening of NY World's Fair

England already had TV, but broadcasting closed in 1939 because of the war. TV broadcasting didn’t resume until 1946

I would have like to have seen Elektro, the robot who could smoke a cigarette and say the Lords Prayer in 300 languages.

The most popular attraction was The World of Tomorrow and The Futurama exhibit designed by Norman Bel Geddes showing what the world would look like in the far off 1960's.

I found a food price advert:

You could buy a Phonograph for twenty-five dollars. But I couldn't find the price of a record. I found that Frank Sinatra quit his twenty-five dollar an hour job and moved on to sing with Harry James band for the princely sum of seventy-five dollars a week.  But I couldn't find out how much a record cost. If any of you know, please tell me.

Research on the internet is fun and can be a greater time sink than Facebook. I am so glad there are still libraries. I think I included links to the information in this post. Some are video links. Who knows? You might want to write a book set in that period. I am writing a book with a heroine who time travels from 1824 to 1940 Britain. Lord Byron's Daughter. Lots more research coming up.

For those of you in the know. How did 1824 ballgowns fasten? I was unable to find it on Google. A book to the person who gives me an answer. Right now I'm going with cloth covered buttons.

Do you like to go to the past via Google?

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Research Adventures

View from my window on East 116th St

I am in New York City, staying at an Air B and B in East Harlem.
Why?
To celebrate my 91-year old cousin Ansley's brand new Master's degree and to do some research for my book.
I am working on two separate novels, both of which have New York scenes. When I started to describe Kate's street and her apartment, I realized I was going on sights and sounds from the time I lived in New York city in the 1960's and 1970's.
Things change.
West 86th with it's sounds of Haitian drums is a memory. It is rich people territory now. Alphabet city in the East Village (Avenues A- D,) used to be a slum. Now it's a ritzy address. My cousins' 4-story brownstone on East 8th street between Avenues C and D which they bought in the 1960's for 24,000, recently sold as four separate units for 1 million dollars per floor.
My fifth floor walk-up on Cornelia Street in the West Village has gone condo.
Was there anywhere a bookkeeper/struggling author could still live in New York? Where? Were there any rent control buildings left in the city? I needed to find out.

Wonderful banister on West 45th

My cousin's graduation celebration gave me a great excuse to come and walk the city and see for myself.

I started by trying to find an affordable place to stay. I was lucky enough to find an AirBnB room in East Harlem in a building with an elevator. (My knees are not fond of 4th floor walk-ups.)
Maybe East Harlem is the answer. Not this building. My room is perfect and my hosts hospitable. But this building is too fancy for Kate.  However the black garbage bags piled up on the curb are just right as is the babble of Bangali at my local Dunkin Doughnuts. As I walk cross the street, the patter of rap from an open car window competes with the mariachi music floating out of the Mexican bodega on the corner.
From my window I hear the rumble of the overhead train,  the occasional siren, and the ever present swish of traffic.
I want Kate in a fourth floor walk-up. In a brownstone with a front stoop,  Maybe with a railing like the one I spotted last night on 45th street above Ninth Avenue. I could always transpose it to another building. All I have to do is find the address.

Tonight I went down to West 17th street to meet my cousin, And I got lost. My head made an arbitrary decision that they were staying on East 17th street. I thought that between Broadway and East 17th street, I might find Kate's perfect brownstone.
After I walked the 1.5 miles to East 17th street, grumbling all the way cause Goofle told me it would be a ten minute walk, I realized my mistake. Since I was now more than thirty-five minutes late, I decided to take a cab to the right address. I learned 17th Street, East or West is far too fancy for a struggling bookkeeper/writer to afford.

I did fine one beautiful place which I might use in another story. Love the Tudor detail. The paneling is smoke blue. To be continued,

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