Don Canney

Ahh, penny candy. Remember it? It was called penny candy for obvious reasons – each piece could be had for a mere penny! Is there anything we can buy for one cent today? I don’t even dare use the phrase, “A penny for your thoughts” any longer for fear a thought has risen to a dollar or more! Unfortunately, today many thoughts remain more valuable unannounced.

I can remember frequenting several mom and pop stores as a kid in my tree street neighborhood. Ray’s Variety on West Pearl Street, Cohen’s Variety on Walnut Street and my cousin’s store, Penney’s Variety on Palm Street. All had a delectable selection of single candies that we could buy for one penny each. One of the toughest things we all had to do as kids was spend that nickel or dime we had wisely and get the most candy we could for our money. Some of that money was hard earned, perhaps by shoveling snow, or doing chores, some of it was a weekly allowance or was gained simply by returning soda bottles and getting two cents for the “small” ones and a whole nickel for the “large” ones.

We would stand in front of a long glass candy case for what must have seemed like hours to the poor store employee waiting there with the small brown paper bag opened, hoping we’d make our next move quickly. I liken it to buying a dozen mixed donuts today at the local bakery. Um, let’s see, I’ll take one glazed, one cruller, one jelly… And we’d inevitably scoot from one end of that long candy display case to the other, prompting the poor clerk to shadow us while opening and closing each sliding glass door along the way.

Let’s see, do I want Squirrels? (No, not the yard rodent). Mary Janes? (Which eventually became a slang for something that was most certainly not penny candy). Fireballs? Or how about wax lips? Or a long paper full of colorful sugar dots? Maybe those waxed soda bottles? Root beer barrels? What about Bit-O-Honey’s?

I can remember developing a liking for hot tamales, partly because I liked the taste but mostly because I could get four for a penny, or a whole twenty for a nickel!

In our pre dental filling days, many of us would opt for Bazooka bubble gum and the comics wrapped within. Or maybe a mint julep. How about bullseyes, those chewy rolled caramels with the white cream center? Tootsie Rolls? Yup, all a dentist’s dream.

I liked the licorice records, no, not a 45 or an LP, but a long string of strawberry or black licorice tightly wound around a small ball of hard candy.

Or, if we were fortunate enough, we could opt for a whole nickel candy bar. Of course, we can still get Hershey bars, but not quite for a nickel. Popular candy bars of the day included Sky Bars, with four sections containing assorted flavors, Chunky bars, packed with raisins and nuts and Waleeco, “the wonderful coconut bar, only five cents.” Boxes of Good and Plenty were endorsed by Choo-choo Charlie.

New Englanders were fortunate enough to have NECCO Wafers (manufactured by the New England Confectionary Company, thus the name NECCO, who also made the Sky Bar). As kids, my cousins and I were borderline sacrilegious, playing church and using the wafers as communion. Hey, we didn’t know any better back then.

And speaking of a dentist’s dream, Charleston Chews and Bonamo’s Turkish Taffy Bars were big favorites. We’d pop them in the freezer and smack them down on the table when frozen. It seemed safer on the teeth to let each piece melt in your mouth.

Does anyone remember those throwback gumball machines? Slide a penny in and get a gumball that was arguably older than the machine. I can also remember stores having “winning” gumballs. If you got one with dots, it could be used to buy two pieces of penny candy. One with stripes could buy a whole five cents worth!

Hmm, writing about these childhood treats reminds me, I have a dentist’s appointment soon.

Don Canney is a freelance writer and professional voice artist. He was born and raised in downtown Nashua with great interest in Nashua history circa 1950-1970. He now resides in Litchfield.