Pop Goes The World
Last Saturday I went to Walmart to stock up on some essentials when I saw the banner with the words that spell the end of summer – “Back To School.”
It’s hard to believe, but in just about two weeks’ time school will be starting again in Rockbridge County.
There was a time when those words would cause me a great deal of anxiety knowing that the upcoming school year was near but now I actually feel relieved to know summer’s end is imminent and my favorite season, fall, is not far behind. Already I’m getting reels in my Facebook feed about fall and Halloween projects requiring just a few items from the dollar store.
Though going back to school was low on my list of things I liked about fall, I did enjoy the shopping aspect of classes resuming. Stacking a cart full of new notebooks, pencils, pens and paper took away a bit of the sting of summer’s passing. I received a new Trapper Keeper each year and it didn’t take long before the pad of paper that came with it became the place where I wrote my countdown to Christmas break.
July has always been about the time that stores begin beckoning shoppers to come in for new school clothes. On Monday I looked back at some of the ads in News-Gazette issues from July 1986. I would have been preparing for my sophomore year in high school then.
Leggett was a department store in downtown Lexington. It operated for many years in the building where the County Administration building is now. Leggett was a loyal advertiser with The News-Gazette. It also had the first back-to-school ads that year beginning mid-July. Fashions from that period were typically bright and colorful so it was hard to convey the styles in the store in the black and white block ads. Leggett promised that a full color back to school circular would soon appear in mailboxes everywhere. For girls the look that fall was oversized sweatshirts paired with skirts, slacks or leggings. Boys were encouraged to wear oxford shirts, chinos and fleece jackets.
Back then the legendary Buena Vista boutique Becky’s was not only the source for formal wear, but also for casual wear. In 1986, Becky’s alerted young women that the look for fall was all about lace and denim. In a series of block ads, Becky’s featured young college women from the area modeling the fashions of the time.
Burris was still in business then. In its ads, Burris showcased the women’s footwear fad of laced ankle boots in black or bone leather. Izod shirts were still in vogue and Burris had them in assorted colors.
Shoe Show, the shoe store whose sign often had both S’s on the fritz making it look as though Lexington has a shop called Hoe How, advertised “wise buys for school,” specifically drastically reduced prices on ballet flats and loafers. Kids were encouraged to go back to school in KangaROOS, an American brand of athletic shoe with a built-in pocket for small personal belongings. The aerobics craze was still in high gear so Reeboks were a popular choice for women.
Radio Shack did not take out back to school ads, but it did advertise its electronics which all must have seemed really high tech at the time. The store sold pocket calculators that had the BASIC computer program installed.
Caper’s, a hair salon on north Main Street, was offering back-to-school perms at 10% off. As a young woman who had her share of perms in the early 1980s, I could practically smell that rotten egg odor of perm solution just looking at that ad – no scratch and sniff sticker necessary.
I did not start my sophomore year in high school with a perm, but I always started a school year with new shoes and new clothes. I remember my mother’s uncle Charlie took me back-to-school shopping at Lord & Taylor in Washington, D.C., that year and I thought the black and white striped long-sleeved shirt and black skirt he bought for me made me look like a French girl. I was walking down the stairs at Lexington High School thinking that I looked very chic when I heard someone calling my name. I thought I was going to be complimented on my stylish appearance. Instead, the person told me discretely that my skirt was not zipped up.
If I had shopped locally, the oversized sweatshirt at Leggett would have covered up my unfortunate wardrobe malfunction.
