West Rome kicked off its basketball season on November 23rd with an away game against Cartersville, and Coach Randall Kent was cautiously optimistic. "I think the boys are tired of losing," Kent said. "The boys are seniors now and they realize that this is the last time for them to prove themselves. "The biggest thing we have going for us is that the boys feel like they've got to win now or never, so they're really hustling." All that hustling paid off with a 56-54 win to kick off the season, with Kenny Stephens scoring 18 of those 56 points on his own.
Rome burglars were back in action... but they were not particularly good at the "craft." On Monday night, burglars broke into the Rome Beauty School on Broad Street, but were unable to find anything that was worth stealing (there was no cash at all in the school). The next night, burglars broke into the Gas Light Restaurant--but once again, they stole nothing because all the cash had been deposited the night before.
The Rome Housing Authority received two loans totaling $4.5 million to finance construction of more than 300 housing units for low income families--some for the elderly and some for families on public assistance. A number of the low-income homes were to be built on a fifty-acre West Rome Site bounded by Fortune Street, Georgia Avenue, and Battey State Hospital.
After having reached an agreement with Southern Railway earlier in November, Rome crews began preliminary work on the removal of the Shorter underpass this week in 1968. The work was expected to take at least a month. "Some blasting will have to be done, and we prefer to do it ourselves," city manager Bruce Hamler said. "We want to be very careful to protect the property owners around the underpass."
Rome got the news that a new fiber plant was scheduled to open in April near the former Anchor Rome Mills property in South Rome. The plant was expected to create 40 new manufacturing jobs once it opened. Romans also learned that ABC Industries was expanding their carpet printing facility on Redmond Court and adding another twenty jobs.
The 1960s--a time when cross-dressing was merely silly entertainment. A "womanless wedding" was held at the West Rome High auditorium on Saturday, November 23rd. The fundraising event was sponsored by the Youth of Trinity Methodist Church; tickets were available at Candler's Drugs and Garden Lakes Pharmacy.
Now here's a toy I remember: Super Discount Stores (known to most of us as "Super D") had Mattel Thingmakers for $6.92 a set. These toys, which could be used alone or in conjunction with Mattel Vac•U•Form machines, enabled kids to make their own plastic toys. Of course, they were more expensive than just buying ready-made toys, but what's fiscal logic to a kid?
TV prices continued to come down, with Rome Radio & TV offering a 23" table-top television for $449 and an RCA 23" console TV for $499--the first time that name-brand consoles had fallen below the $500 mark (if only by a dollar).
Norwood Griffin, Rome's "catalog showroom" store that took orders for merchandise from customers who could then pick up their orders a few days later, expanded its product line for Christmas 1968, adding a larger selection of giftware, tableware, toys, jewelry, musical instruments, television sets, stereos, and cookware. Their ads stressed, "We have no inventory to pay for, so we can sell at dealer cost!" A decade later, stores like Service Merchandise would follow a similar model, putting the locally owned catalog stores out of business.
Piggly Wiggly had Cudahy ham for 39¢ a pound, celery for a dime a bunch, and Borden's ice cream for 69¢ a half-gallon. A&P had cubed steak for 99¢ a pound (a lot of money for touch steak beaten into submission), Ritz crackers for 37¢ a box, and fresh cranberries for 29¢ a pint. Kroger had baking hens for 39¢ a pound, angel food cakes for 39¢ each, and yams for 25¢ a pound. Big Apple had sirloin steak for 89¢ a pound, Dole pineapple for 33¢ a can, and Luzianne coffee (with chicory!) for 55¢ a pound. Couch's had Butterball turkeys for 49¢ a pound, Hormel chili for 33¢ a can, and fresh coconuts for 19¢ each (don't fall for it--I got my parents to buy one once, and it was less tasty and more trouble than I had imagined it would be).
The cinematic week began with The Boston Strangler (starring Tony Curtis) at the DeSoto Theatre, Helga (starring Ruth Gassmann and featuring, "for the first time on the American screen, the complete birth of a baby") at the First Avenue, and The Hell With Heroes (starring Rod Taylor) at the West Rome Drive-In. The midweek switch out brought West Side Story (starring Natalie Wood) to the DeSoto Theatre, Prudence and the Pill (starring David Niven) to the First Avenue, and The Killers Three (starring Robert Walker) at the West Rome Drive-In.
Diana Ross & the Supremes' "Love Child" took number one this week in 1968, ending the Beatles' nine-week hold on the charts as"Hey Jude" fell to #2. Other top ten hits included "Magic Carpet Ride" by Steppenwolf (#3); "Those Were the Days" by Mary Hopkin (#4); "Abraham, Martin, & John" by Dion (#5); "Who's Making' Love" by Johnnie Taylor (#6); "For Once In My Life" by Stevie Wonder (#7); "Wichita Lineman" by Glen Campbell (#8); "Hold Me Tight" by Johnny Nash (#9); and "White Room" by Cream (#10).
William Shatner & Nichelle Nichols shared the first interracial kiss on US television on November 22nd; the kiss was part of the Star Trek episode "Plato's Stepchildren."
The Beatles, also known as The White Album, was released this week in 1968, and you can be sure it was on a lot of Chieftains' Christmas lists. This was also the week that Elvis, the soundtrack to Elvis Presley's 1968 TV Special, was released (the special wouldn't actually air until early December).
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