Before Plastic Sacks

Remember before Ziplock (and other brands) of storage bags? I still have a hard time throwing away a bread bag. I come from a generation that never threw anything away, as you might need it later. Plastic bread bags were a classic example. These were, of course, washed and dried for use another day. I remember many housewives used the cardboard roll saved from wax paper, etc., to roll these bags on. I am sure that others might have just stuffed the dried bags into a kitchen drawer for the next use. This, of course, was “before the green thing,” that we see so many jokes about.

Your view of what was stored in the bag was not as good, as it was not a nice clear sack with no advertising on it, so you might not always know just what you had put into that bag. Probably homemade cookies, or homemade bread, or maybe that is just what I would have liked to find in my bags. You might have stuck some garden produce in them and shared with a neighbor.

Oh, I almost forgot, using them for dirty diapers. They worked great to stuff in the diaper bag. You needed to bring those diapers back home with you, as they were not disposable at that time, and were also washed for another use.

What did our ancestors use before those throw-away plastic sacks, and for that matter, just how was purchased bread packaged before plastic bags? So many questions and so few people left to answer them.

Just a last-minute thought concerning recycled bread sacks and Ziplocks. Youngsters of the past obviously didn’t have either on their back-to-school list. What did they use? Oh, maybe their lunch pails.

O.K. enough of my sick humor for the day, but it is fun to reminisce.