Posted 4 years ago
Retrofutura
(99 items)
I grew up in New Orleans, where, every Sunday night on the way home, we'd pass the Falstaff Brewery.
You couldn't miss it.
It was topped by a 21-story-tall neon sign that spelled out the name as a way of forecasting the weather.
If the letters lit in order, the temperature was dropping.
If they lit from the bottom up, it was getting warmer.
There was a large globe atop the sign.
If that globe was lit up green, the weather would be fair.
Red meant it would be cloudy and flashing red meant rain was coming.
We couldn't wait for it to come into view so we could try to be the first one in the car to correctly tell Daddy the forecast.
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One night, when I was 8 or 9 years old, Daddy came home from work and asked, "Do you want to see something cool?"
Of course I said "Yes."
He went out to the car and came back inside through the back door, carrying something under his jacket.
He said "Don't tell your Mother." Then he pulled out this sign!
Plugging it in next to the toaster, he told me to wait a minute while it warms up.
It had that great Falstaff logo in front of a 10-inch-tall, 3-dimensional glass of beer with actual liquid in it!
I thought it was pretty cool already, but when it heated up a little, bubbles slowly began to rise from the bottom of the glass.
It looked like a real beer glass with the carbonation fizzing out of it, making endless streams of sparkling bubbles!
It was the coolest thing I'd ever seen!
Man great story! Thanks for sharing the memories. I've seen pictures of this sign, but never knew it did all that stuff. Love the top, looks like a tesla tower!
Thanks, dav2no1.
The brewery gave out business cards with all the sign info on the back.
My Dad always carried one in his wallet.
I found it interesting that one of the codes was
a flashing red & white ball meant a hurricane was coming.
The card said the ball on top was 256 feet from the ground
and that the sign could withstand winds of at least 120 mph!
It was built in 1952 and has survived ALL the hurricanes during those 68 years!
They made stuff good back then!
BRAVO for the added photos!!!! <cheers><applause>
Bubble lites 0-calories
Most Excellent life of Family story
Very cool is right
To have a Dad like that
Do you know how he got it
did he win it off the bartender
While He was making groceries
at Schwegmann’s
Cheers to you all,
AnythingObscure.
blunderbuss2,
Ben,
fortapache,
Vynil33rpm,
Hoot60
and everyone who stopped by to let me share my little illustrated tale
of indelibly-impressed and iconic images from my earliest childhood encounters with trademarks, logos and branding identity successfully masquerading as true and lasting works of art!
Hmmm...
Why am I feeling thirsty now?
Vynil33rpm and AnythingObscure,
It's too hard for me to type on that little phone screen.
I have to enter the text on the computer and then add the pictures from my phone.
However, the listing requires you to add at least one photo, so I put in a temporary 'place-holder', then replace the placeholder with the actual pictures, which are inside my phone files and not currently accessible from my computer.
Sometimes it takes a minute or two for the website to load them onto the existing post.
Please pardon this technical inconvenience until I can summon my computer back from the grave.
Thanks for the great comments!
Thank you for the <cheers> and <applause>, AnythingObscure! Bravo!
When I was stationed near St. Louis in the late sixties there was a Falstaff Brewery there and the Falstaff Museum. I was raking in $88 a month and was always broke, no money for beer. My buddy and I found out about the Museum from another GI. He said if you took a short tour of the brewery you could go to the Museum and eat pretzels and drink beer for free until it closed around 1800, 6 pm. We found out it was all true and would head to St. Louis whenever we got the chance. I remember having a green Falstaff Beret that I bought from there. I don't know if they found out about us or not, but within a few weeks they put a limit of two glasses in the Museum. It was fun while it lasted.
Sounds like a good time was had by all, WillSol!
Thanks for that fine Falstaff memory and thanks for hitting that red button!
Thanks, officialfuel!