"Cinti" -- never heard of that particular abbreviation for "Cincinnata," as some Buckeyes referred to Cincinnati.

The Orange Crush beverage I recall was late 1940s vintage in the ripply brown bottles. It contained real orange juice and pulp with a lot less sugar.

At our local "mom & pop" convenience store you leaned over the water-filled cooler, lifted one of the heavy double doors, plunged your hand into the cold water filled with various brands of pop and wiped the dripping bottle on an equally soaking wet cloth.

Then you put your selection in the bottle-top remover on the cooler and snapped off the cap, which dropped down into a receptacle that the local boys were only too happy to empty. We'd remove the cork liners, place the metal part on the outside of our T-shirts and push the cork liner from the inside our T's back into the back of the cap.

This gave us instant "badges" looking a lot like military medals and we'd see how many we could get on one shirt. It was great for playing soldier! The caps were also scratchy against our bare skin.

We also collected paper milk bottle caps. There were always a bunch of different dairies who delivered door-to-door with their horse drawn wagons. But that's a whole other pastime.

We seldom had money to buy baseball card bubble gum packs. These were the days of very low tech, no-cost activities we neighborhood kids would do during summer vacations.

We never seemed to get bored.

My first job in the early 60's was making Orange Crush for a local distributor in Fall River, Mass. Delco Bottling. I remember the time we put root beer bottle caps on the Orange Crush. OOPS!

Foxon Park in East Haven still makes white birch beer and it's still great. They use real sugar, not high fructose corn syrup. You can order it from their website:

http://www.foxonpark.com/

I'm sure a bottle will show your taste buds to be fine.They also make Iron Brew, which some people compare to Dr. Pepper. If you like Moxie, you'll like Iron Brew.

At expos today, they usually use models. This girl looks a little like Jerri Blank.

Previous commenter said grape was invented years later, but there it is on the sign behind the balloons.

[He was talking about Nehi Grape. There was also Nu-Grape, seen here and here. - Dave]

I'd imagine most site visitors between the ages of 30 and 50 now have the same R.E.M. song stuck in their head.

I was pleased to learn that the drink is still made, though not as widely available as it once was. It had been around for about 10 years when this picture was taken; Lemon and Lime Crush were newer introductions.

Don't know if these orange drinks were nationally distributed or regional but having spent my first 24 years in Connecticut, I also loved Pal, a non-carbonated orangeade. Crush was good too, but carbonated. Much later there was a grape Crush and also a Nehi Grape. The Northeast also had birch beer which I have not found anywhere else around the USA. There was dark birchbeer, white birchbeer and red birchbeer, a very refreshing cold drink, especially good with Connecticut pizza. (Come to think of it, I don't think I have ever seen a white birch tree since I left Ct.) Everything was so much tastier in those days, maybe my tastebuds have died. Thanks for the wonderful "blasts from the past", I love them all.

I can understand the Lemon and Lime Crush. But the Schmidt's... is that the non-alcholic version made for prohibition era markets? I can't find a good picture of the label of that brew.

I wonder if they took these just before the doors opened. They all look curiously void of customers compared to trade expos I've visited.

Looking in the background, they had lemon and lime crush too. Huh, I never knew that.

I'll have an orange crush for 5 cents please.