Garden Grove is
a city not far from my home of Midway City. In the 1950s its old downtown
area, Euclid Street was giving way to new commercial development along several
miles of Garden Grove Boulevard that stretched eastward to Beach Boulevard,
the highway we lived on, a few miles south….
The largest grocery store in the area was Cole’s Market, located near old
town Garden Grove. Because the Kraft family shopped there for groceries,
we also patronized many of the businesses along the way---Judkins Music,
Priscilla’s Cake Box, The Surplus Store, and Pete’s Brake Shop to name a
few. As Garden Grove Boulevard grew, we witnessed it.
In 1957, or thereabouts, construction began on a large building on the north
side of Garden Grove Boulevard between Cannery Street (now Magnolia) and
Wright Street (now Brookhurst). It was across the street from a growing collection
of stores that one day would become Garden Square shopping center. Each time
we drove by on the way to Cole’s Market, or one of the other stores, O eagerly
noted the progress being made on the new building. “What’s a futurama?” I
asked Dad. “The sign there says futurama is coming.” Don’t know, Bub,” Dad
said. “We’ll have to wait and see.”
The construction stood very close to the roadway, and it was sort of squeezed
between a gas station, a car wash, and a motel. As construction proceeded
it came to have an ultra modern exterior. A thick overhand along the entire
frontage was made of stucco, made to look like granite and giving the impression
that it was very heavy, yet floating, almost weightless, off the front of
the building. A few wide steps led up to a corner entrance just under the
overhang. The entrance, other parts of the façade, and much of the
interior was accented with flagstone, and its overall appearance recalled
elements of “Falling Water”, the house built by Frank Lloyd Wright. The last
thing to go up, in space age letters on the overhang, was “Futurama Lanes”.
It was a bowling Alley.
I knew nothing of bowling, having never seen it before, not even on TV, so
I was caught by complete surprise one afternoon when, after leaving the Surplus
Store, we had not gone two blocks and Dad turned into the strip of single
parking spaces along the front of Futurama Lanes. The weighty overhang hovered
over the hood of our red 1955 Mercury. “Come on, Bub,” Dad said. “Let’s see
what’s in here.”
We left the bright, warm afternoon sunshine and entered a new realm of low-light,
air conditioning, and the muffled sound of rolling balls and crashing pins
that echoed throughout the building. Only a few lanes were in use. It had
just opened.
The interior was as sleek and modern as the interior promised. Lighting on
the upper concourse was subdued, except for the main desk which stood out
in comparative brightness. Each light fixture was a starburst of brass rods,
each ending in a light bulb shaped like another burst. Glitter embedded in
the stucco ceiling reflected the light, and it sparkled like star shine.
Underfoot, the carpeting seemed super soft. I was in awe, never before having
seen anything like it. On a lower level twenty-four brightly lit alleys gleamed,
their light-colored wood stretching to twenty-four Brunswick automatic pinsetters,
a fairly recent technological development I would come to learn. All furniture
in the bowling area was plastic, molded in a swept-back style that evoked
a feeling of ultra modernity.
As Dad and I approached the main desk, I noticed the music that was coming
from speakers hidden in the ceiling,
“….She got plenty of rhythm, plenty of jive,
And when we dance we really come alive.
My love for her is so tender and sweet.
My heart starts pounding every time we meet.
A Be-Bop Baby, still in her teens,
Just as sweet as sweet as she can be.
A Be-Bop Baby, in her old blue jeans,
It’s a Be-Bop Baby for me,
A Be-Bop Baby for me,….
Ricky Nelson. Hmmm. Girls liked Ricky. They mooned and
swooned over his dreamy eyes and all that. Guys liked Elvis and left Ricky
to the girls. But still, the music was good. It rocked.
At the desk Dad learned the prices, 25c a line: he got
us a lane, a paper score sheet, and rented us special shoes. After we got
to our lane and put on the shoes, Dad showed me how to select a ball to fit
my hand, inserting my thumb and stretching my fingers over the other holes.
I was maybe twelve years old, and I could not handle a full-size sixteen
pound ball, but I did not need a featherweight either. I tried every ball
there until I found two or three that seemed to fit. Dad found one and we
began an endeavor that would last for decades. Dad showed me the three approaches,
---3, 4 and 5 steps--- and taught me how to keep score. Well, he had to ask
a man in the next lane a few questions about scoring, because he was a little
rusty, but then he taught me how to keep score.
A waitress with a small, round tray came down and asked
Dad if we wanted anything. He ordered a beer and asked when he asked about
soft drinks she suggested something called a “Hopalong Cassidy for me. Dad
approved after she told him what it was, Seven-Up and grenadine, syrup made
from pomegranates. When she returned she gave me a tall glass, filled with
a bright red drink, with two cocktail straws and a cherry. It was very adult-like.
It was delicious and instantly became my favorite drink.
Dad and I only bowled one game that day, but he said we
could come back, and we did. Over the next few months our visits to Futurama
Lanes became more frequent; quickly evolving into one of the things that
Dad and I did together. At home we watched the bowling programs on TV, picking
up tips on how the pros did it. Our role models were men like Don Carter,
Andy Veripappa, Glenn Allison, Ray Bluth, Billy Welu and Carmen Salvino.
We both liked bowling and enjoyed the time together. In the fall, Dad encouraged
me to join a Junior League at Futurama Lanes, which I did, and he looked
into joining an adult League.
As Dad’s next birthday neared, February 12th, Mom asked
me what we should get him. “That’s easy,” I said. “A bowling ball and bag.”
Dad and I already had our own bowling shoes; we had just got them as Christmas
presents. After much consideration, I picked out a red leatherette bag with
western accents, red being his favorite color. Inside Mom put a gift certificate
for a Brunswick bowling ball, as every had to pick out his won; it was a
personal thing. I went with Dad to the pro shop at Futurama Lanes when he
selected his ball and was fitted for it. I was with him a few days later
when he received it, and I think it was one of the best presents he every
received.
On my birthday about five weeks later, March 19th, Mom and Dad returned the
sentiment. They gave me the same bag, in white, and a gift certificate for
my own bowling ball which Dad helped me select.
Our actual bowling exploits are other stories for another day. Dad and I
each bowled in separate leagues, and we bowled together, too, outside the
leagues until I left home for college. Doris’s husband, Mark, also took up
bowling, and the three of us bowled on holidays and other times when I returned
home. Sometimes when I came home from college, I went with Dad to his league
and kept core for his team.
Futurama Lanes was soon eclipsed by newer and larger bowling alleys, one
right across the street in the expanding Garden Square shopping center. Though
I returned to Futurama occasionally in the Junior All-Star Traveling League
and Junior bowling tournaments, I don’t think Dad ever went back after that
first year or two.
A block from our home was Midway City Liquor, the 7-11 of its day. We stopped
there frequently for small purchases such as milk, butter, soft drinks, and
ice cream. One day Dad and I were there and I asked the owner, Paul Alford,
about grenadine since I wanted to make my own Hopalong Cassidy drink at home.
He plucked a brown bottle from the shelf behind him and set it on the counter.
On the brightly colored label was the image of a happy, dancing Polynesian
woman wearing a grass skirt, a shell necklace, a big smile and large very
naked breasts. I looked at it agape, while Dad just shook his head. “I don’t
think your mother would appreciate that,” he said with a chuckle.
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