Dad, the Philco and a Swivel Chair - 1959

That's my dad.  I shot this picture with his Argus C-3 when I was about 8 years old.  No, I didn't have great photography skills.  I applied a little Lightroom magic to improve it a bit.  The original is in the inset below.  A little straightening, cropping, color correction and way less dust removal than is needed needed, but the resulting photo is a little bit nicer than the original snapshot. 

That Philco TV in the background  was only 6 years old when the photo was taken.  I say "only" because it would provide 16 more years of service before it was finally retired.  Things lasted a lot longer back then.  Whenever that TV developed a problem we would call Leonard Herdzina, the TV repair man.  He would roll up in his station wagon and either fix the TV on site or, if things were really bad, take it back to shop.  I remember his name because he was as important to the family as our doctor.  In those days, they both still made house calls.  Visits to Leonard's TV repair shop were how I got interested in electronics, but that's another story.

​Check out that haircut on Dad.  They called that a flat-top.  It looks a little long.  He was probably due for a trim.  We went to the barber (Ray Watson) every other week, regular as clockwork.   I'm not sure of the real color of the shirt.  It's pretty washed out from the flashbulb.  

That rocking chair is a classic.  It rocked AND swiveled.  My cousins and I used to sit in it an spin around until we were dizzy.  It must have made Dad a little annoyed because he eventually removed the swivel mechanism.  After that it was just a rocking chair and was not anywhere near as much fun.​  ​

The swivel mechanism showed up much later in a table that he made.  The top looks like a big gear and rotates.  He attached the table top to the pedestal base with the swivel mechanism.   The top and feet are laminated from reclaimed pallet wood.  The pedestal is part of an old support pillar left over after he remodeled our front porch.  Dad didn't throw a lot of stuff away.  He was pretty good at finding new uses for stuff.​

Times have changed a lot.  TV's don't last as long, we replace instead of repair, doctors don't make house calls and the list goes on.​

By the way.  I just replaced the rocking chair in my family room.  It rocks ​AND swivels.

​-gs-