Afton Star Enterprise - I remember Afton 2

When I got half growed up and could get away from my Mama’s ever-watchful eye for even a half hour, I’d dig in my jelly jar savings bank and run off uptown with a dime or a quarter and a hard decision to make.

Would I go to “Sheets” or to “Sales”?

Sheets Drug (Rexall) was on the corner of Hwy 169 and Kansas Street. Sales Drug was another half-block east, just the other side of Broeker and Siddens, the tavern.

Sheets gave you a choice of sitting in one of the big old block booths that’d hold about 6 half-grown giggly girls if we leaned in tight or sitting up front. Perched on round, red cushioned chrome stools at the bar, you could watch the soda jerk or maybe my sister Beth mix fountain drinks and malts and watch yourself or the boys in the big mirror. If you wanted to tell secrets then you made for the booths.

Sales had a big bar and stools too but if you pushed further back into the dim, cool interior of the old fashioned building, you could sit four girls at one of the metal ice cream tables. Goods and merchandise displays surrounded you and made you feel inconspicuous and safe. It seems as though we spent half of our (very limited ) drug store time at each soda fountain. I’m pretty sure we didn’t have a favorite.

Once the location was chosen, there were still serious decisions ahead. Living on a fixed income of 25 cents allowance, or later 50 cents, I wasn’t wanton or wasteful in my spending. Would I have a fountain drink, a Green River or a Chocolate Coke? Would I have an ice cream cone. I wasn’t situated well enough to have a malt or a Sundae. My choices were limited to a dime drink, a 20-cent ice cream cone (I don’t think I every opted for the 39-cent large cone) or a nickel candy bar.

Wait, but wait! After all the previous decisions there were still more to make. Shall I buy a Hershey candy bar with almonds, a Clark Bar or a maple Bun? A pack of candy cigarettes or a yellow bubble gum cigar? I went through a spell where I bought a pack of Baseball cards every chance I got, hoping to get all New York Yankees. I probably spent $200 in my youth on two-cent Double Bubble Bubble Gum, one piece at a time. Okay, I confess, two pieces at a time. Yes, I did. I chewed two in hopes of blowing bigger Double Bubble gum bubbles.

In my memory, Sheets had the bigger candy rack but that wasn’t always the deciding factor in choosing which drug store to go to. Looking back, I now know how lucky I was to grow up in a small town in the mid-west and especially in a town with two soda fountains! I, fondly, remember Afton.

Nancy Austin Hofmeister