The Honeymooners Apartment

They spent all their money on pork rinds.

He was a bus driver and Norton was a sewer worker.

(and Trixie ad Alice were lazy layabouts who did nothing)

Don't type too loudly OP. Nurse will switch you off.

Why aren't you out looking for Pokemon, r3?

I thought it interesting that they never showed the Kramdens' bedroom. Not once.

You saw the Nortons' apartment in a couple of different episodes and it looked pretty nice. They obviously were living much better than the Kramdens.

It was modeled after the apartment Gleason grew up in at 328 Chauncey St. in Brooklyn.

Because Ralph was a tightwad. Norton, being more affable, was more free spending with his money. In the episodes they did later on as part of Gleason's variety show the Ralph and Alice had a more updated apartment.

My question is, what did Alice do all day? She had very little to clean, no tv, no radio, primitive stove etc. no wonder she was such a bitch.

She was fucking Norton on that rickety kitchen table.

Good question, R7. She must have been horribly bored all day as cleaning the apartment would probably only take about 10 minutes.

A bit off-topic: I met Joyce Randolph several years ago. Very nice, very lovely and gracious lady.

I thought about that too. How much can you clean two room apartment and she certainly wasn't doing any gourmet cooking.

The bureau against the wall between the bedroom door and the front door always looks like it gets changed out for a different one from episode to episode. I think that was obviously intentional just for wtf purposes.

The episode where Mother Kramden makes a surprise visit always had me wondering where she slept. Alice takes her things and puts them in the bedroom as if she will sleep there... were we supposed to believe they'd share a bed?

So what is the rent these days?

Did they have a bathroom?

They probably had a bathroom in the hall that was shared by everyone on their floor.

Damn, what did they pay for monthly rent $.05?

They probably had a bathroom in their bedroom. We never saw what was inside, perhaps it was spacious and they had additional pieces of furniture in there.

That door did not lead to the bedroom. It opened to a long hallway with a parlor, dining room, 2 bedrooms and a bath and a half.

Alice waited for the Iceman to cometh.

Alice could have easily brightened that space with a few handwoven Turkish rugs, some lace curtains hand sewn by Carmelite nuns in the South of France, antique Italian pottery and a wall color made from ground sea shells found along the Aegean Coast.

It was a much more realistic New York apartment than Monica's apartment on Friends.

Bang. Zoom!

Audrey Meadows said that women across America would send her curtains for the window and handmade frilly aprons, with notes advising her to spruce herself and the place up a little. It's been speculated that part of the reason The Honeymooners wasn't initially a success (only lasting one season but forever flourishing in reruns) is that it was too depressing in the "America Has The Highest Standard of Living in the World!" '50s.

Not lace curtain Irish, that's for sure.

It looks like a theater stage with minimal furniture and props.

Alice spent all her household money on having her wardrobe tailored and on professional hair and makeup.

Audrey Meadows said they were very dubious about casting her as Alice until she returned for a call back audition with no make up and a frowzy house dress. Character actress Pert Kelton, who had an aged pug Irish face and lumpy body (she was Marian's mother in The Music Man), played Alice in the original pilot. And believe it or not, Elaine Stritch played Trixie in that pilot and the character was a showgirl at the Copa!

Of course, in the end, they did make Meadows quite attractive and she certainly gave the Kramden relationship some much-appreciated sex appeal.

The set was indeed primitive but not so much worse than most sit-com sets from the earliest years of TV, especially those shot in NYC. Compare with I Remember Mama and The Goldbergs to see what I mean.

Good question - just what did they do with their extra money. Yeah - they were low-income but not given to frills or extravagance, and Ralph was a tightwad. There must have been some left over. Maybe they had a few dollars in the bank ...

Weren't bus drivers unionized back then? With a decent wage, insurance and benefits??

Trixie was always a former showgirl in burlesque. Ed said every night she went on stage he met her and gave her a rose. "it was her costume."

Squalor, OP?! That's NYC at its best.

[quote]Maybe they had a few dollars in the bank ...

$12.83.

It was one of the first shows to set the sitcom standard of ridiculous husbands with beautiful, sensible wives.

I always wondered why the couldn't at least afford a pair of curtains. They certainly weren't that expensive. I had no idea the show only lasted one season. It certainly is popular in reruns.

That apartment would be 3k a month in Brooklyn now

It's interesting how publicity stills for "The Honeymooners" will show the four actors but watching the show, Trixie was never really given that much to do. She basically just got a few lines per episode and that was it -- in fact, it almost felt at times as if Norton was a single guy instead of a married man given how often he hung around the Kramdens without her despite the fact she was supposed to be Alice's best friend (I guess it could be argued she and Alice saw each other often during the day while the husbands were at work). Probably the episode that featured Trixie the most prominently was "Alice and the Blond" (also reportedly Audrey Meadows' favorite) in which the Kramdens and Nortons went to dinner at the home of Ralph's boss and his ditzy young wife.

[quote]It was one of the first shows to set the sitcom standard of ridiculous husbands with beautiful, sensible wives.

True, though I did feel there was one -- and only one -- episode of "The Honeymooners" in which Alice was 100% wrong and Ralph was 100% right. It was the episode in which Alice's bitch of a mother came to visit on the day Ralph had scored tickets to a popular murder mystery on Broadway and the mother, being the usual cunt she was, purposely spilled the ending. Ralph hits the ceiling (as anyone would in that case) and orders her out of the apartment but Alice, instead of siding with Ralph, defends her mother instead and then packs her bags and leaves with her. Ralph then spends the rest of the episode trying to win her back, doing so by recording an apology to her to get her to come back home. I actually hated the episode because I would've told her to keep her ass at her mother's permanently until they both apologized to me, not the other way around.

She defended her mother over her husband. What's so strange about that?

Pert Kelton as Alice.

Pert Kelton was fired when her named appeared in Red Channels, exposing supposed Communists in radio and television.

Alice did have a job. In the episode where they were looking for a housekeeper, Ralph told the interviewer "Mrs. Kramden is a career girl." Alice said she stuffs jelly into doughnuts at a neighborhood German bakery.

r27 is correct. "Mama" and her family lived in a two-story Victorian at 115 Steiner Street in San Francisco. "The Goldbergs" had a two-bedroom apartment with dining room at 3080 East Tremont Avenue in the Bronx.

I didn't realize this show only lasted one season. Incredible and that tip about Chanuncey Street too.

I wonder why they never had children?

Wonderful episode when Ralph and Alice tried to adopt.

Was Alice a chubby-chaser?

What did they do to relax? They had no tv, stereo, nor couch. What happened when the wanted to put their feet up and lay back in a comfortable chair? In that era, it would not be custom to use the bed for anything other than sleeping and sex. Funny thing is a lot of NY apartments were like this, so what did they do in their spare time?

The Honeymooners as a half hour sitcom only lasted one season, but the characters themselves originated on the Jackie Gleason show, and we're wildly popular for four years. In fact, for all intents and purposes, the Gleason show became The Honeymooners for 2 seasons, and they had hour long Honeymooners skits. The lost episodes are derived from these. And once the 39 episodes of.The Honeymooners completed, the Gleason show returned in the same time slot, and was heavily Honeymooners centric again(more lost episodes). So in one form or another. The Honeymooners were a regular fixture on prime time television. But only the 39 went into syndication, and have been rerun continuously since 1957.

Gleason wanted the apartment to reflect the kind of home he was raised in. His father abandoned the family and because he was so proud of his mother raising him alone, he always wanted Alice to win the battles.

Don't worry r61. We didn't read past the first sentence, having figured out you're a bitter piece of cat sick.

Fuck DL. wrong thread

And remember that Gleason grew up in that Chauncey Street tenement in the teens/1920s when it wasn't uncommon for entire immigrant working class families to live in a couple of squalid rooms, with no electrical appliances.

For excitement, they'd go out on the fire escape with a home-made lemonade and a cigarette.

I'm not so sure how realistic that apartment was for a married NYC bus driver but it certainly gave the series an iconic dramatic (and comedic) poignancy.

Funny how so much was made of Jackie Gleason's weight and shape but looking at old series now, he was barely fit fat.

[quote]Weren't bus drivers unionized back then? With a decent wage, insurance and benefits??

Not sure, but it's interesting to ponder that, realistically, shouldn't the Kramdens have been living better from Ralph's salary as a city employee than the Ricardos did on Ricky's earnings as a singer in a nightclub?

I always got the impression that Ricky Ricardo, like Desi Arnaz, came from the Cuban aristocracy.

Ricky didn't waste his money on get rich quick schemes like Ralph did.

Ricky was Fred's kept boy.

I'm also very surprised to hear that The Honeymooners only lasted for one season. It's such a part of American pop culture, I thought it aired for years like I Love Lucy did.

The things you learn from DL!

It did, R57. Read R47.

As another posted noted, Ralph spent all his money on crazy schemes, like the "uranium field in Asbury Park."

Norton's apartment was basically like Ralphs only they had a couch and some wall paper and a TV and phone. Norton was always paying on time.

Alice did have a radio in some episodes, but she also did all the laundry by hand which seeing how large Ralph was must've taken days. Can you imagine his skidmarked drawers and pit stained t-shirts. Yech, poor Alice.

Ralph's salary was $52week . And his rent is 33/month, so he's not even paying 15% of his salary on rent.

The REAL reason they're broke is simple.

Alice's Mother) You look thin dear, are you getting enough to eat

Alice) Oh sure mother, you wouldn't say that if you saw our food bills

Alice's Mother) I don't doubt the bills are high, I just wonder how much of the food you're getting.

R29/53 Since 1937 NYC bus and subway employees have been represented by the Transport Workers Union Local 100 with 35,000 current members.

What salary would a NYC bus driver make today?

R61 NYC bus drivers can do very well with overtime and get benefits. Not a bad gig at all. R47, thanks for the info.

Are there any apts still like that in Brooklyn or have they all been "renovated"?

Kramden was also the safest bus driver at the company.

328 Chauncey St. is still there.

I don't blame Alice's mom for being pissed. Alice could have done so much better.

Ralph worked for a private bus company, not the NYC Transit. My guess is the salary wasn't as high and who knows what the benefits were if any. I think as they do today, NYC bus drivers did make a very nice salary. Also, I don't know if this is still the case, both NYC bus and subway employees could work as much OT as they could handle in their last year or two before retirement and their pensions would be based on that. So a person could earn maybe 3-4 times what they were paid for most of their working life and be really set for life with a pension that usually ended up giving them more than they had actually earned for most of their years.

Also they got to keep great medical insurance for them and their wives for the rest of their lives.

I wonder if it is still like that today.

[quote] Alice and the Blond" (also reportedly Audrey Meadows' favorite) in which the Kramdens and Nortons went to dinner at the home of Ralph's boss and his ditzy young wife

Leave it there. The cat'll get it.

[quote] Funny thing is a lot of NY apartments were like this, so what did they do in their spare time?

They probably had a radio in the bedroom. Also, they went bowling, roller skating, to shows, Chinese restaurants. Lots of people -- not the kramdens -- belonged to churches or synagogues and volunteered or had entertainment like picnics, pot lucks, bake sales, dances. I used to volunteer at a church where they set up tables and chairs, served food and had dances like a:supper club. Catholics had bingo and card games.

People belonged to bridge clubs, played mah Jong (sp?), pinochle, poker, gin rummy. . I remember my grandparents generation playing cards a lot. They got together at one another's houses and served peanuts, pretzels, chips -- nothing gourmet. They might have a "highball." Everyone had a card table. I imagine Ed and Ralph, Alice and Trixie might play cards at the Kramden kitchen table.

Ralph and Ed were members of the Royal Order of Racoons.

Don't fall down!

Movies were cheap. People knew their neighbors. In my husband's Brooklyn neighborhood all the parents watched all the kids outside. People sat on the porch together and talked to neighbors who walked by. In summer it was so hot indoors you had to go outside. Going up on the building roof and looking at the stars while listening to the transistor radio was a thing.

My husband's neighborhood was a little too "cozy" for me. He said neighbors and relatives would just open the door and walk in to his apartment. Especially relatives. They'd knock, but open the door as they were knocking.

I lived in the "new" suburbs, and people sat outside on the "stoop" after "supper" in folding chairs. Some would walk down the street to talk to others and stop to say hi. When it got dark out, we kids would play flashlight hide-and/seek up and down the block, running in and out of everyone's yard. We didn't have front "lawns", we had yards. All yards had trees to cool the house in summer. The idea of a perfectly manicured lawn, a patio, a deck, a pool didn't exist.

But as people moved away and as evening TV shows became more scheduled as opposed to old movies being rerun and things like fights being broadcast, , we stopped going outside after "supper." Sitcoms entranced us kids.

A string of poloponies.

Pickalilli and chow chow

YOU, are a blabber-mouth ....

Do the Hucklebuck!

Audrey Meadows was awesome!

Hey, get a load of fatso over there!

There are very elderly people in NYC who live in apts. like this because they've been living there since WWII or earlier and are rent controlled. I have done some volunteer work with seniors and have seen some. They pay under $200 for their apts., but because they retired years ago, their social security is very low, but at least they can still afford the rent.

Norton: Mind if I smoke? Ralph: I don't care if you burn.

Don't forget the 50 minute lecture!

[R80] - That's awesome!

Ed Norton: Poor little pizza, ain't good for nothin'!

Fascinating link at r65. Thanks for posting that

I think Alice probably went to double features a lot, they were cheap.

Back in those days you would get a double feature, good A not B movies, a 15 minute newsreel, 1/2 hour of cartoons and coming attractions all for 50 cents. For another 50 cents you could buy enough at the concession stand to fill you up for the entire day. Also, at least in Brooklyn, NY, there were several movie theaters in every neighborhood, all showing different things. What each one showed changed every week or so. Alice could have had a great time. There were also inexpensive places to shop in every neighborhood like Woolworth's. Every neighborhood had a couple. Most had just about anything you could want from makeup, to housewares to clothes, to notions to things like curtains, tablecloths and if it was your desire you could even buy a parakeet or some goldfish or small turtles. They also had wonderful lunch counters with fountain service for ice cream and soda treats.

There were no or very few supermarkets. You went from the butcher, to the fish store, to the bakery to the grocery, etc. Usually you were known in each store and would spend a lot of time chatting with the owners.

Most women didn't work and if you remember Ralph didn't want Alice to work. She wasn't lazy. She wanted to but it was an embarrassment for the working class or poor husband if his wife had to work.

All and all Alice would have had her days occupied inexpensively. I imagine too that Ralph liked to come home to a good dinner, not fancy, but good, pot roast and such. That takes time. This was before TV dinners and other frozen foods were popular.

The one thing I can't understand though is no couch or even one comfortable chair. I imagine even very poor people could pick one up cheap at used furniture stores. It would probably have bedbugs but then in NY tenements all the apartments had bedbugs and roaches and mice, rats were fairly common too. Also they had little closet space, if any there was probably just one in the bedroom. Perhaps they had one of those that are part of a bedroom set. I forget what they call them.

I also think Trixie wouldn't have had a problem allowing Alice to come upstairs and watch TV in her apartment. I think it would have been more annoying at night when Ed got home to have both Alice and Ralph come up and watch TV.

Didn't Fred and Ethel often come to Lucy and Ricky's apt to watch TV? I think F&E had a TV but I don't remember. I do remember that Lucy and Ricky once bought them one.

TV really changed society. The worst punishment for a kid in the 60s was "no TV." To have to go to school the next day and be the only one who didn't see Twilight Zone....oy

When I was very young, idiot think the news was on tv after dinner. Because I'm pretty sure my parents would have watched it instead of sitting out on the stoop

i remember when the hearings about organized crime were on TV in the daytime. I had no idea what they were talking about. But when there was a government hearing, it was on tv. You didn't wait roses it on the news. You watched it in front of you

How do we know what's happening on the fourth wall of that room? Any guesses?

Perhaps that's where the chaise lounge is.

I call you Killer, 'cuz you slay me . . . . .

In one episode Alice complains that she wants a TV and points out that the Nortons have one and lots of other things. Kramden points out that they are in debt up to their ears because of it and that he has money in the bank. It's an absurdly low amount but enough to cover, say, a month's rent if he loses his job. He's tight with a buck.

Their apartment door opened into the hallway. Always bothered a friend of mine.

Why wouldn't an apartment door open to a hallway? Every apartment I ever lived in opened to a hallway

The door should open into the apartment, not out into the hallway

My door opens out into the hallway. I have lived in four NYC apartments, two opened in and two opened out.

I am the only girl in town with an atomic kitchen. This place looks like Yucca Flats after the blast.

We'll just have to get a smaller tent with a smaller snake.

Where was the tub? Was it in the hallway with the toilet? I read an article about how NYC bathhouses were popular with families because tenements didn't have proper bathrooms.

Hopefully the Kramdens didn't have to go outside to use the toilet!

I was in the rent controlled shotgun apartment of a friend and that bathroom was horrible. Since it was rent controlled it had not been updated since maybe the 1940s. There was a lightbulb on the ceiling and a string to pull it on and off. Peeling paint. It was the only room that you didn't walk through. There was a small hall space and a door, then you were in the kitchen. It was $500 a month, a three bedroom in a tenement. It was a walk up and they were on the fourth floor. I was winded going up the stairs.

The apartment had a front and a back door. Both doors were wooden and the top part had a big glass window. They had white curtains in the window part.

I would not have wanted to live in that apartment with glass window doors in the 1970s and 1980s.

Isn't that a good idea, Tubby?

The urban poor are so depressing. But funny!

I brive a dus

I never understood the deliberate squalor of the Kramdens. I read one viewer actually sent curtains to "Alice" because she couldn't stand it. No reason for them to live like that, not believable at all.

I have a friend Shirley who's bigger than you.

I think since Gleason was so used to performing solo on a stage he wanted a big open space where he could really inhabit Ralph Kramden with his big gestures, so that's why there wasn't any furniture except a table and bureau.

But they really needed curtains.

[quote] Tenement life improved somewhat after 1901, when new-law tenements were mandated by the city: These were required to have bathroom facilities and running water in each apartment, and a window in every room

When I sold my apartment in 2005, a lot of people in my building made two large bedrooms into three small ones, but they were not allowed to advertise the apartment as a 3 bedroom because every room had to have a window.

When Ralph and Alice fought, which was frequently, they "acted out" by throwing and smearing greasy food on the walls.

R104 takes sitcoms way too seriously.

Even Alice's mom wonders why they don't have any furniture!

I can't imagine sleeping in a room without a window. But recently I've looked at a few places that have exactly that. They call it loft style.

Back in the 90s I had a place with no windows in the living room, but it opened onto a windowed bedroom with four huge folding doors. Most of the time I kept them open. Ceilings were 14 feet. I toyed with the idea of building platforms but the building was sold, all tenants were evicted, and it was demolished.

Well I'll ask you again, what WAS her cat doing in this apartment?

Don't touch me nurse, I'm sterile!

What did the set look like in color? Can someone post a link?

Here ya go, r114

So that must be Norton's apartment because it has curtains. How come the windows themselves are so different in that apartment. Don't buildings usually have the same kind of windows in every apartment?

BTW, thanks for that color link. I've never seen any of the episodes in color.

In NYC the private bus companies were bought out by NYC just before WWII, so Ralph, would've had to work for the city, but on the show he didn't.

Boy I hope someone got fired for that blunder.

r112

That wasn't a cat, you had your raccoon hat on backwards

That picture at [R115] was from a Lost Honeymooners episode where both couples moved into one new apartment to save money.

Thanks R119. I never knew that. I've only seen the 1/2 hour black and white episodes.

R61, the driver of the bus I take every day recently retired after 33 years. Told me he made $90,000 in 2015 with overtime. IIRC, overtime is first offered to employees who plan to retire so they will have a bigger pension

Ralph drove the Madison Avenue route for New York City Omnibus Corporation which, according to Wikipedia, ceased operation under a new name in 1962.

That color apartment was tricked out. Imagine you and your partner living in a small apartment with another couple to save money, and it looks like this one only had 1 bedroom. WTF?

BTW, thanks, R115.

R122 here.. Excuse stinky linky. If webmaster restored PREVIEW, it could have been prevented.

He drove for the Gotham City Bus Co.

I always think of the Kramdens and the Ricardos living in NYC at the same time but worlds apart. The Kramdens probably couldn't afford tickets to Ricky's show at the Tropicana.

R125 if you search Google Images "Ralph Kramden Bus Driver" you'll find pictures of him in a bus which shows "New York City Omnibus Corporation" on the side.

Jackie's beginningson Chauncey Street with photo of the building.

R100 what is a "shotgun" apartment?

NYC's Highest Paid Bus Driver

A shot gun apartment is one in which you have to go through one room to get to another. No hall ways. Very typical in NY tenements.

Well, there's more than one idea as to why they're called "shotgun," but I always understood it to mean that with all the doors opened, you could shoot a shotgun and the bullets would pass cleanly through the house front to back. Which concurs, kind of, with R131, but the implication as I grew up hearing it is if this is your residence, you are generally so poor you don't have anything in that house for the bullets to hit.

There was an episode where Ralph got a TV and tried to stay up late to watch it. He sat on one of the chairs from the kitchen table, still in his shoes and his uniform, still with the blaring kitchen light on. Everything about the scene, including Ralph's posture (his arms crossed, his back straining against the chair), looked uncomfortable and conveyed the opposite relaxing feeling that a TV at home should bring.

They were two of our first childfree couples?

I lived in Louisville years ago and the small cottages there were called shotgun houses because they looked so small and narrow from the front but extended quite far directly behind. Same idea as shotgun apartments.

R130 Bravo to that bus driver, he probably brought some comfort to his family I'm guessing his salary is helping support a number of people and even if it isn't, he worked hard and thats hardly a huge paycheck, all things considered in NYC.

You may find yourself living in a shotgun shack, and you may find yourself in another part of the world, and you may find yourself behind the wheel of a large automobile, and you may find yourself in a beautiful house, with a beautiful wife, and you may ask yourself-"Well...How did I get here?"

Ralph consistently says he works for the "Gotham City Bus Company." He usually works the Madison Avenue line.

Lucy and Ricky paid $125 a month for their 2 bedroom apartment versus $33 for the Kramden's. Of course Lucy's apartment was in the East River.

I lived in a shot gun tenement in the East Village in 1986. Exciting times. . Seems as far away as Sally Bowles and the Weimar Republic.

Aren't those kind of apartments also called railroad flats?

No, a railroad flat is/was analogous to a train, hence the name. A narrow long hallway with small rooms off of it.

Thanks R141. I wasn't sure what it was.

Ralph was a mope. A big mope.

[quote]Ricky didn't waste his money on get rich quick schemes like Ralph did.

Oh, really?

Well that railroad definition seems to match r131's description, that you need to walk through each room to get to the next.

There is no "hallway" per se in a railroad flat, since the rooms off it don't have a fourth wall or doorway...

I could never picture Ralph and Alice fucking.

I actually really like the curtains Alice got at r115

Lucy and Ricky's apartment in color. This still looks pretty good today.

I loved the episode where Alice wins a contest to get the whole apartment refurnished, only for Ralph to think she's having an affair with the interior decorator Andre(who more than likely was family), and screws the whole thing up by spying on them from the fire escape!

For the above posters who ask why Alice was with Ralph, I have an amusing story. When I was kid in the 1970s, there was a couple in the neighborhood everyone used to call Ralph and Alice (government names: Jim and Kelly). The guy was big, fat and average looking like Ralph with a crappy blue collar job, while the wife was thin and pretty like Alice. Kelly/Alice had been a cheerleader in high school. Word was Jim just kind of blended in in high school. It was always the talk of the neighborhood as to why Kelly/Alice was with Ralph/Jim, although honestly they seemed like a nice couple who were happy together.

Well, one day when I was around 12 years old, I was in a public restroom, and back then the urinals were lined up on the wall with no separators like many of them have today. In comes Jim up to the urinal next to me. I would always sneak a peek at the guys next to me, so he was no exception. He pulled out a HUGE cock, big and veiny. I almost gasped it was so damn big. Now I knew why Kelly/Alice was always so happy!

The next day I was at my cousin's house. She was in her early 30s and she and her two kids lived nearby, so I'd stop to say hi sometimes. I was the youngest of all the cousins and she was the oldest, so we had a pretty unique bond because of that. I think she saw me as almost like a kid brother. She was always very candid with me and we talked about all kinds of adult things, which I found refreshing compared to my uptight mother. Anyway, her kids were outside and the topic of "Ralph and Alice" came up. I smirked and said I had recently figured out why Kelly was with Jim. My cousin shocked the hell out of me and said, "Oh, it's because he has a huge penis. I slept with him once when I was younger and he nearly killed me with it." Of course I was just a budding gayling back then, but damn I was jealous that my cousin got to get fucked by that massive wang!

So, perhaps Ralph was packing? Maybe he would send Alice to the moon after blasting a massive load while she was riding him? Hmm, now that I think about it, that's exactly how it would happen because It's easier to have sex with chubbier guys if they're laying on their back and you ride them. Damn, what I would have given to ride Jim/Ralph!

Has anyone here ever noticed the similarities between The Honeymooners and The Flintstones?

Actually the Honeymooners was a rip off of radio's "The Bickersons"

R151 Chrissy-- for your next investigative report, check out "Sgt. Bilko" and "Top Cat."

Yes R151! I first realized the connection when I noticed Top Cat's cronies were almost all voiced by cast members of Bilko. I loved TC, my favorite cartoon series after Bugs Bunny/Looney Tunes.

Isn't it shantung shack?

r145, I am the poster at r131 (definition of a shotgun apt.) and r141 (definition of a railroad flat).

It sounds like you haven't been in many low rent apartments in NY. There are definitely both kinds.

Lizzie Borden had a shotgun house.

Tunafish? What am I a cat or something?

You're gonna do the Mambo on the moon!

Glow-in-the-dark wallpaper!

Would Ralph be considered an abusive husband by today's standards? He's was always threatening to send Alice to the moon or give her one, "right in the kisser."

Bensonhurst 0- 7441

[quote]Would Ralph be considered an abusive husband by today's standards? He's was always threatening to send Alice to the moon or give her one, "right in the kisser."

Nope. The reason was Alice was never the least bit afraid of Ralph. Watch and see, Alice just sits there and stares, then tells him to "Shut up" or "buzz off." Audrey Meadows said, that if Alice had shown any fear or emotion, the audience would see Ralph as a bad guy. This way the audience only saw Ralph for what he was, a big blowhard, all talk.

Alice) What's wrong with you now?

Ralph) I got a stomach-ache

Alice) My...That is a big problem.

Well, I don't want to look at that icebox, that stove, that sink and these four walls! I WANNA LOOK AT LIBERACE!

"YOU! are a BLAAAAABEMOUTH.

If these are the servant's quarters, I QUIT!

[quote]Ralph consistently says he works for the "Gotham City Bus Company."

I remember it as the Gotham Bus Company, not Gotham City. Isn't that right?

He brives a dus

Yes, the Gotham Bus Company. Gotham City belongs to another television hero.

Did Ralph wash his gunt in the kitchen sink?

They had a bathroom sink, many time Ralph would go into the bedroom area to "wash up." So I assume the bathroom was in the bedroom.

Ralph) You're the type to bend WAYYYY over to pick up a pocketbook on April Fool's Day. I wouldn't

Alice) You couldn't.

And I might as well tell you somethin' else, right now: I get Thursdays and Sundays off, see? My work is through the minute the supper dishes are done. I don't work in no house where they got no pets, so you might as well get rid of one if you got one. If you're gonna have a party, I get time-and-a-half over and the next day off. And, uh, if you're planning on having any late snacks, I don't do no cleaning up the next morning. And this boy looks like he has plenty of late snacks.

Ralph) What are you doin' with all that material, making a bed spread?

Alice) I'm lettin' your pants out, again.

Ralph) Don't you uh... think you let 'em out, a little too much?

Alice ) I haven't started yet.

Minneapolis??? Gentlemen, we are going in the other direction to Norfolk, Virginia.

Either that's wine on the table or somebody upstairs just got stabbed!

We have to boomf our way out!

ALICE (reading newspaper): It says here that Mrs. Delany asphyxiated herself.

RALPH: Had she left the gas on?

ALICE: No, she thought it was her comb.

Does anyone know what that area of Brooklyn that the Kramden's were supposed to live in is like now? Is it still a working class neighborhood or has it been turned into Hipster Douche Central like Williamsburg?

See r65

We haven't talked about the gorgeous music that plays to the opening credits. What is that?

Was it written for the series? There's so much passion in that tune, in some ways it seems very much at odds with the comedic tone of the show and yet, it exemplifies the sustaining love of Ralph and Alice.

R178 I...don't get it.

My elderly grandfather, who grew up in Depression-era Brooklyn, has said that even he didn't live in an apartment as depressingly poor as that of the Kramdens.

Agreed R181, the music was exquisite. My mother had one of his albums and it was the same lush wonderful sound.

Were it not for Gleason's outsize personality, I don't think audiences wood have accepted the dreary set decor.

The instrumental theme song for The Honeymooners, "You're My Greatest Love", was composed by star Jackie Gleason.

sorry, here's the correct link

^would have

Jackie Gleason was considered an enormous whale of a fatass in his time, but today you see men who are fatter than he was everywhere you go. He doesn't look all that big today.

Jackie Gleason was an enormous talent (and no not size-wise) He was not only funny, but a great actor and musician.

It was a subversive show compared to what drivel was to come on American television for the 60s and 70s. The show's very title was sarcastic. It had a live audience of the canned laughter that pervaded sitcoms. Instead of wifey running to the door in pearls to greet husband with a kiss when he arrived home, the wife was as wisecracking as the husband was. They had no kids. They didn't live in suburbia or an oversized NYC apartment. Instead of mother-in-law jokes about an over-the-top woman, Ralph's mother in law also gave as good as she got.

Trixie was a nude dancer in the past. She and Ed didn't have kids either, and didn't want them. Characters paid for things on credit and talked about it instead of having a beautifully furnished home with all the modern luxuries. They didn't have cars. They argued all the time.

It wasn't until the 70s that tv tried to recapture working class families in sitcoms.

[quote]Trixie was a nude dancer in the past. She and Ed didn't have kids either, and didn't want them.

Trixie worked in burlesque and there were "hints" of a runway, but that is all we really know. Trixie seemed very offended when anyone hinted she worked the runway.

In one episode when Ralph is angry with Trixie, he says to her "If the shoe fits, take it off!". An obvious reference to Trixie being a stripper, and it made her livid.

Hello ball!

There are a few references to Trixie's burlesque background in the lost episodes (e.g., Norton: "Every night I'd meet her backstage and hand her a rose ... It was her costume!").

Who thought up the name The Honeymooners?

Gleason did, R196. Another writer wanted to call it THE BEAST, but Gleason interjected and said "That doesn't work, he really loves this broad!". So he came up with THE HONEYMOONERS. The.first Alice was Pert Melton, but she was replaced when Gleason moved from the Dumont Network to CBS.

R197 My name is Pert Kelton darling...

Sorry Pert, it's the damn spell correct on my Kindle.

Pert, it must be lovely to be named after a shampoo!

R200 Thank you darling for noticing even though I got no royalties from those bitches Helen of Troy manufacturers. The nerve..

And why was Trixie always mad? Because she was NOT a stripper. If she was she wouldn't have been so mad..

Alice said there were nine million people in NYC, WRONG.

I didn't call the doctor on account of the bump ON your head, I called the doctor on account of the bump IN your head!

Just go for the gold, you've already got the pot!

[quote]The.first Alice was Pert Melton, but she was replaced when Gleason moved from the Dumont Network to CBS.

I would say this is one of the very rare instances in which a replacement actor (in this case Audrey Meadows) turns out to be the greatest thing that ever happened to a show as opposed to the original cast member who came before. In fact, the only other case I can think of is Diana Rigg, whose Emma Peel was introduced years after "The Avengers" began but became Steed's greatest and most popular partner.

Alice was turning tricks and taking working class loads in Manhattan at $3 per pop. Her place of business is now a Gap Kids store.

[quote]Good question - just what did they do with their extra money. Yeah - they were low-income but not given to frills or extravagance, and Ralph was a tightwad. There must have been some left over. Maybe they had a few dollars in the bank ...

Hated the show because he treated her so bad. He wasn't a tightwad, he spent it all on himself. Didn't the Lodge have monthly dues? Wasn't he a bowler? I watched some reruns and stopped when he wouldn't let her have a phone.

Those statements about Trixie were simply joke punchlines, not facts. You also hear Ralph saying, "Why is your drawer full of clothes, while there's only one pair of pants in my drawer?" And Alice says "'Cause one pair of your pants is all that will fit in that drawer."

That isn't reflective of reality, it's just a punchline, the same way when Ralph says "If the shoe fit's take it off." Neither are correct, they're just punchlines.

I was the first to go.

What about Alice's mambo lessons from a professional dancer? That couldn't have been cheap.

And we all know Carlos Sanchez was a queen.

Oh HAR-VEY??? Har, har HARV-VEY...He's gonna tell his friend HAR-VEEEE

Harvey's a lovely name!

My friend Harvey is even bigger than me.

I have a friend Shirley who's bigger than you!

A pox on you and all your ancestors!

If I told you once, Alice, I told you a thousand times; don't carry that heavy basket of laundry.

Make two trips!

:"Do you mind if I smoke?"

"I don't care if you burn!"

Why oh why was I blessed with this musical talent?

THAT'S Swanee River????

So how exactly did the show end? Did Ralph and Alice make it out if thecity? Did they take Norton & Trixie with them? I always wanted them to have a baby. I imagine Alice really wanted a baby.

I couldn't watch that show because of Jackie Gleason's screaming and that ugly, dirty stained apartment

Off the market.

Chauncey Street is near a subway stop and although it isn't filled with hipster douches, they are circling.

If I'd had my way I would have bulldozed that fucking apartment and put in an expressway.

Sewer work doesn't pay that well.

They had a window, OP. Hardley squalor.

"All in the Family" was the first TV show that showed what my home was like. And from old photos, the Honeymooner's apartment would have been about right before my parents achieved 'prosperity'.

The apartments were the same basically, but as Ralph put it Norton lives in dept. He has accounts at every major dept store. As Ralph says "So he has things, let him keep his things, I have peace of mind, our bank account is growing, there's $42 sitting in their accumulating interest."

Plus whenever Ralph had an extra money he spent it on fly-by-night schemes and his food bill probably was in the thousands.

Pert Kelton was kicked off The Honeymooners and network television altogether because of blacklisting in the era of McCarthyism. Gleason and his producers tried to protect her reputation by stating that she left the show only due to illness. Gleason didn't want to let her go but CBS insisted. Luckily for Kelton, Broadway ignored the blacklists.

Incidentally, Kelton played a dance hall girl named "Trixie" in the 1933 film The Bowery. She returned to The Honeymooners in its 1960s incarnation as Ralph's mother-in-law, the mother of the character she had created.

I agree it with the poster who asked what did Alice do? She would always bitch about housework but what was there to do?

Alice had to change the drip pan under the ice box several times a day. She also had to put up with the ice man grumbling about having to lug blocks of ice up three floors for the only cheapskates in Brooklyn who still owned an ice box instead of a Frigidaire.

[quote]She would always bitch about housework but what was there to do?

You're forgetting laundry. Handwashing one pair of Ralph's skidmarked undies would take the better part of a day, not to mention wear one out.

Did they have laundromats back in that day?

I hated that apartment. I hated watching the show because of it.

Look what happened to YOUR washing machine

I don't know how you put up with a mopse like me

When I was a kid, Ricky and Lucy looked kind of plump. I am so old, most people were thin when I was a kid.

It was weird but in the 50s, men did not want their wives to work. It was always a big fight, of course they were suppose to have children.

Yes, hard to believe that this is NYC, but this how many people lived in the city back then. Given how Ralph wasted money, Alice could barely have enough for food. I'm sure people who are bus drivers today in the city can not afford to live there. I wonder if people back then even thought about what their apartments looked like.

[quote]I am so old, most people were thin when I was a kid.

HFCS is a helluva drug.

The apartment actually seemed dirty- it's not as though Alice actually did anything so why didn't she ever clean the place?

I'm still reeling over how many of you have said that Gleason looks "normal" and "barely fit-fat" to modern eyes! He was a serious tub of lard back then and he still is now! He's a huge fatass.

Seriously, what kind of Trump-loving food desert wastelands do you peasants live in where he doesn't look fat to you??

Alice probably had to wash all the clothes and linens by hand. She didn't even have one of those hand cranks to squeeze water out of wet laundry. I'm surprised the Kramdens didn't have a bathtub in the kitchen along with a clothesline.

Any pics of what the "updated" apartment looks like in the skits they did after the original run?

I found it unbelievable that they at least couldn't afford window shades. We never saw their bedroom but they had one. Bus drivers may not have made much but they could have managed a few basics like another chair to sit in.

This was the early days of TV. TV stage sets were modeled after stage sets you would see in the theater. The show was shot as if it was a play which is why you only see this one room, occasionally the bedroom door would open and you would see part of a dresser.

Still, I never watched that show because the apartment set depressed me.

[quote] The apartment actually seemed dirty- it's not as though Alice actually did anything so why didn't she ever clean the place?

My grandparents were poor. Their kitchen had been added to the house sometime in the early 1900s. Prior to that, the kitchen had been in the backyard. The reason for this was to keep the house from burning down if there was some kind of accident in the kitchen.

My sister moved into their house after they died. The kitchen foor was atrociously dirty. My sister and I decided to wash it as thoroughly as we could. We scrubbed, washed and dried that floor 3 times and it looked just as dirty as it always had. The linoleum was worn and scuffed and nothing made it look clean. Other parts of the kitchen had been discolored from years of kitchen smoke, grease, humidity and cigarette smoke. A window frame had cracked wood.

I used to call the kitchen "the honeymooners room."

But.... the bathroom was even worse. You can't imagine the horror. It was like a shed. It too had been added to the house in the early 1900s. It was a long, narrow, dank room inadequately lit by a bare lightbulb on the ceiling. You turned the lightbulb on by means of a dangling piece of string. At night, you walked into the bathroom and waved your hand around until it hit the string, since it was so dark you couldn't see it. Then you grabbed it and pulled on it. There were spider webs everywhere. We'd go in, knock the webs down with broom and mop handles and they'd be back the next day.

I always figured the honeymooners' apartment was old and dank and neglected by the landlord and that's why it never looked clean.

Thankfully, someone in the family bought my grandparent's house and remodeled it. They also put heat on the second floor. The house had a grate in the floor of the dining room. Inside the grate you could see metalworks. When the heat was on, the metalwork glowed red. There was one hole in the floor of the second story. That hole had a grate. The warm air from the first floor was supposed to rise through the grate and this was the heat source for the second floor. There were no bathrooms on the second floor because the pipes might freeze in winter. My mother told me that her bedroom had icicles on the window in winter. The icicles were inside, not outside of the house. Before going to bed, my mother and her siblings laid bricks on the first floor grate. When the bricks got hot, they'd each wrap theirs in a rag, run upstairs, pull back the covers on their beds and move the brick along the mattress and covers to warm them, then jump into bed and pull the covers tightly around them. Naturally, there were far too many children, but this was a good thing in winter, since there were two kids in each bed. They kept each other warm.

My grandfather was a drunk and that explained a lot.

R250, someone should buy the rights to your story.

for rent on 336 Chauncey St, Brooklyn, boy have times have changed:

A few tidbits:

- Jackie Gleason HATED to rehearse and was usually drunk or too busy chasing showgirls so they rarely rehearsed but he felt they were all able to give better, more natural performances because of it. Audrey and Joyce hated not rehearsing - the shows were live - but Jackie was the boss. There are numerous mistakes throughout the series that they just rolled with - one of the best being when Jackie realized his fly was open so he turned around to zip himself up and started cracking up. There were also doors that didn't close, cues that were missed and lines that were flubbed. All the stars really had to be on their toes.

- To the poster who said Jackie was big and fat and not really 'normal' by today's standards, his weight actually went up and down throughout his life, yo yo dieting, etc. And throughout the run of the show and its different incarnations, Jackie goes from being just a little heavy to being really large. The fat jokes obviously worked better when he was bigger.

- His music was the real deal and very very popular and well-appreciated. It wasn't a vanity project.

- His grandson is actor Jason Patric and he does bear a resemblance

-

[quote]I found it unbelievable that they at least couldn't afford window shades. We never saw their bedroom but they had one. Bus drivers may not have made much but they could have managed a few basics like another chair to sit in.

They probably didn't want to bother. I live in Chicago and the older sections, the apartment building are very tall, narrow and only five feet (or less) from each other. In my flat, I have windows facing a wall. I could get shades, but why, no one can see in. I can only see out if I stretch my head at an angle. Several times you see the Kramdens doing just this, peering OUT the window and stretching to see anything.

Their flat likely faces a wall of the next apartment building and was high up on a very narrow alley. Though in some sketches it clearly faces a street.

Bus drivers DID make a decent living and the Kramdens couldn't afford anything better because Ralph wasted all this money on fly-by-night / get-rich-quick schemes.

And as Alice's mother observed (about food bills) "I don't doubt the bills are high, but how much of the food are you getting?"

I was very poor as a kid and even my place looked better than that.

Handprints by the light switch drive me nuts

I found this show incredibly depressing.

I just couldn’t bear to watch it.

Alice) the only thing I don't have is anything from the "World of Tomorrow"

Ralph) "World of Tomorrow"? You want the "World of Tomorrow"? You're going to the MOON

Leave it there the cat'll get it.

[quote]A shot gun apartment is one in which you have to go through one room to get to another. No hall ways. Very typical in NY tenements.

Native New Yorkers call those apartments railroad apartments or railroad flat. They still exist, those types of narrow ugly places get renovated, then some miserable landlord, or real estate corporation, gets outrageous rents for those horrible apartments. What some people will do to live in NYC.

Gee, I didn't know Davy Crockett was so FAT!

It always looked so filthy and grim yet Alice looked like a typical 50s housewife. She should have put on a pair of jeans and picked up a broom and a paintbrush.

Shotgun apartments have no hallway. Railroad apartments have one long hallway that runs the length of the apartment with the rooms along it.

"You're living off the fat of the land,Alice."

"Ralph,you are the fat of the land!"

The sink and the icebox are just filthy. The sink looks like it would be in the janitor's closet of a bus station, and not because it's old but because it's dirty. I think they just went overboard on making the apartment look modest and ended up making it look miserable.

The set design makes the show too depressing to watch.

Agree r265.

In the early 90s, I had a friend who lived in the East Village. The claw foot bathtub was in the kitchen and it was used as storage with a board over it and became a counter. There was a shower stall next to it that they used for washing themselves.

There were two water closets in the hallway that they shared with their neighbors. I used it once, just for kicks. It was kind of weird.

[quote]Shotgun apartments have no hallway. Railroad apartments have one long hallway that runs the length of the apartment with the rooms along it.

As a native New Yorker, I've never heard the term "shotgun" used to describe an apartment.

Not all railroad flats have a long hallway. A friend lived in a railroad apartment on Second Avenue around 31st Street, the rooms were larger than a regular railroad flat, they were essentially box rooms. There was no hallway in this apartment.

You entered the apartment through a door in the living room, you entered the other rooms by walking through each room, that's a basic railroad flat. The tub was in the kitchen. My friend put his own tub in! There was no bathroom. He shared a bathroom on his floor, it was a toilet with a small sink. The apartment was such a weird set up, but the rent was super low and he had few problems, quiet neighbors. no roaches and he always had heat in the Winter, so he stayed there for awhile, until the shady landlord had the entire huge building burned down!

Another friend had the apartment you described, a long hallway, which essentially separated the bedrooms from the living room and kitchen. You entered through one end of the long hallway, to the left was the first bedroom which he used as a guest room/office, then he had another small bedroom which he used as sort of walk-in closet, the master bedroom was the third bedroom which was located at the front of the building.

At the other end of his long hallway, you entered a living room, the next room, which was basically the other end of the apartment, he had a fairly large kitchen. This friend was living in Bushwick long before it became expensive and filled with hipsters, this apartment was passed on to him from a relative. This building also no longer exists, I think senior housing has replaced the entire two blocks of similar buildings, his building was on Grove Street between Knickerbocker and Wilson Avenues, the next block was Bleecker Street. Yes, there's a Grove and Bleecker in Manhattan.

I wouldn't "ooh-ooh" you for anything in the world. Never again will I "ooh-ooh" you! You're a traitor and a turncoat, a disgrace to that uniform and the Raccoon Lodge! I should "ooh-ooh" you?

Ralph Kramden: What are you doing with all this material, making a bed spread?

Alice Kramden: No, I'm lettin' your pants out again.

Ralph Kramden: Don't you, uh, think you let 'em out a little too much?

Alice Kramden: I haven't started yet.

Har-har-hardy-har-har

Ralph) Nobody's one hundred percent.

Alice) You are. You've been wrong every time!

How did we get from a serious interesting discussion of the Kramden's apartment to quoting dialog from the series?

Why does Ralph keep telling Alice

"Baby you're the gayest?"

What WAS that cat doing in this apartment?

I call you killer, 'cause you SLAY me

That wasn't a cat you had your raccoon hat on backwards

Back then you didn't grocery shop for the week, you shopped for meals every day and you cooked pretty much by scratch. And laundry was done by hand. No vacuums for the struggling, you cleaned everything on your hands and knees. Alice was busy but not the kind of work that brings in money.

EVERYBODY'S DOING IT? I don't do it, Norton doesn't do it. My GRANDMOTHER never did it.

How did the series end? Did they ever make it out of that dingy tenement? Did Ralph ever get that big promotion?

No, R280, they never made it out of that apartment. There was no series finale and the last episode was just a regular installment like any other. In fact, IIRC, when they had those "Honeymooners" reunion specials (in the '70s I think), they were still living there.

I just had an argument with a friend about this recently. I hated that dingy apartment. What a pig sty. Alice deserved better than that apartment and also deserved better than Ralph. What creepy guy.

The only realistic NYC apartment where blue collar working people live ever shown on TV. The only thing missing was close ups of the roaches and mice.

[qiuote]The only realistic NYC apartment where blue collar working people live ever shown on TV. The only thing missing was close ups of the roaches and mice.

Please, no one in my family who was working class and blue collar professionals (plumbers etc) and had a steady job, let alone worked for the city, lived in a hovel like the Kramden's apartment!

People without jobs lived like the Kramden's not working class working people. Everyone in my family who lived in a Brooklyn railroad flat style apartments had all the amenities middle class people had!

Rents back then were extremely low, one week's salary or less! There was no reason for working people to live like that in the 1950s. I always asked my mom about this series, she said this show was highly exaggerated. I wasn't born in the 1950s, but I do remember how my poorer relatives apartments looked in the 1960s, nothing like this depressing dump.

Care to explain how Norton, who worked in the sewers, had a lovely normal apartment? I don't recall if Trixie worked. Wouldn't Ralph have earned more as a bus driver? Wasn't his job considered more skilled than a sewer workers?

How about Ralph was simply a cheap bastard? Yet he seemed to have money for his Elk club fees and to go bowling?!

How much did the Ricardos pay for their apartment?

[quote]The only realistic NYC apartment where blue collar working people live ever shown on TV. The only thing missing was close ups of the roaches and mice.

Please, how old are you? No one in my family who was working class and blue collar professionals (plumbers etc) and had a steady job, let alone worked for the city (where salaries were always decent), lived in a hovel like the Kramden's disgusting depressing apartment!

People without jobs lived like the Kramden's not working class working people. Everyone in my family who lived in a Brooklyn railroad flat style apartments had all the amenities middle class people had!

Rents back then were extremely low, one week's salary or less! There was no reason for working people to live like that in the 1950s. I always asked my mom about this series, she said this show was highly exaggerated. I wasn't born in the 1950s, but I do remember how my poorer relatives apartments looked in the 1960s, nothing like this depressing dump.

Care to explain how Norton, who worked in the sewers, had a lovely normal apartment? I don't recall if Trixie worked. Wouldn't Ralph have earned more as a bus driver? Wasn't his job considered more skilled than a sewer workers?

How about Ralph was simply a cheap bastard? Yet he seemed to have money for his Elk club fees and to go bowling?!

[quote]How much did the Ricardos pay for their apartment?

Ricky was a professional semi-well known working musician with a steady gig at a NYC nightclub. As the series went on, Ricky became more famous. You cannot compare I Love Lucy with The Honeymooners.

Ricky paid $125 (at the series end for their two bedroom apt). Ralph paid $33/month..

[quote]A shot gun apartment is one in which you have to go through one room to get to another. No hall ways.

Nope, it's actually the opposite. You're describing a "railroad" tenement apartment where each room is end to end with the next like a series of railroad cars. A "shotgun" apartment has a very long narrow hallway on one side and all of the rooms are off of the one hallway which runs like the barrel of a shotgun. I've lived in both, a shotgun is much better for privacy, you're not having to trudge through one room to get to another.

Contrary to popular belief neither the Cramdens nor Nortons were "poor".

Both Ralph Cramden and Ed Norton earned same salary; $62.00/wk, which equals $3,334.00 for a 52 week year. The average household income for 1950 was $3,300 (U.S. Census data). So even by 1955 the Kramdens weren't that badly off.

As noted Ed Norton was willing to go into debt to gussy up his apartment so Trixie could have modern conveniences including a better furnished apartment. Ralph Kramden being a tight fisted SOB kept his wife on a tight lead and that including spending on household goods/furnishings.

Immediate post war years well into late 1950's saw a shortage of affordable and decent housing. New York City then like many other urban areas was still full of old five or six floor "cold water flat" type apartment housing. You can watch any television show or film set in this time period from NYC to SF and see same sort of conditions.

NYC rental housing for most part was still under rent control laws in 1955, and the Kramdens cold water flat was under that scheme. The LL in one episode talks about having to go down to the rent board to petition for an increase in rents. The Kramdens were lucky to have the apartment they did, and didn't have to share it with in-laws or other adult family.

Of course during 1950's many were fleeing cities for the new developments in suburbs like Levittowns. But often these families had help from the GI Bill and other benefits for veterans; neither Ralph or Ed seemed to have served (or at least cannot recall it being mentioned), so that avenue was cut off.

Like Ricky and Lucy Ricardo the Kramdens address is not exactly where said in NYC. The real 328 Chauncey Street, Brooklyn is in Stuyvesant Heights, not Bensonhurst.

R53

Ralph Kramden worked for a private bus company (of which there were many then) who had contracts to operate surface transportation. In fact up until city took over subways, buses, what was left of street cars and elevated train lines they were all operated by private companies under charters from city. There were some exceptions to this; such as the IND subway line which was built by the city.

Upshot was that Ralph Kramden wasn't a municipal employee.....

One thing loved about Alice Kramden from the start was that she gave as good as she got. There were more husbands and wives in NYC and elsewhere like the Kramdens than Ozzie and Harriet.

Ralph: [to Alice] Let's get something straight right now, right here and now: a man's home is just like a ship. And on this ship, I am the captain. I am the captain of this ship, do you understand that? You are nothing but a lowly, third-class seaman. That's all you are. Your duties are to get the mess, swab the deck and see that the captain feels good. That's all you have to do. Remember, you're nothing a third-class seaman. I'm the captain.

[He notices that Alice is leaving and he stops her]

Ralph: Where are you going?

Alice: Seaman Kramden, third class, is retiring to the poop deck until this big wind blows over.

[leaves the room]

Alice went to visit friends, and she went to the picture show. She probably went to the market nearly every day. Maybe she like lady ham and had some girlfriends.

PBS had a series, Pioneers of Television, that included an episode on early sitcoms. That's where I learned the Honeymooners sitcom lasted one season. It was knocked out in the ratings by? The Perry Como Show. That was another surprise. To me he was that sleepy old singer ridiculed on SCTV, but he was immensely popular in the 50s. His show almost knocked out the Dick van Dyke Show as well.

Pioneers of Television also had an episode about early variety shows, which is where I learned Pat Boone ?!? had had a half-hour variety show. Dick van Dyke gained a lot of early exposure appearing on Boone's show.

[quote]One thing loved about Alice Kramden from the start was that she gave as good as she got.

How true, one of the best lines

Ralph) Remember Alice, I'm the boss, what I say goes

Alice) Well then you better say "Alice," 'cause I'm going

How does Ralph owe $180???

For what???

How does Ralph owe $180???

For what???

R67

You're talking about something like Tier I state and local NY employees, which most have either retired or soon will be out the door. Tiers 2-5 began some reforms with the latter capping OT as part of pension at about $15k IIRC (indexed for inflation).

Grew up in the 1970's with family and parents of friends who were NYC or NYS civil servants that worked insane amounts of OT in their last years before putting in papers. I swear on paper it looks as if they worked 20 or more hours per day; but they got nice fat pensions.

Last time this really happened in large numbers was in aftermath of 9/11/01. So many FDNY and NYPD among other workers put in huge amounts of OT that they really had to retire when they could. If they remained those extra years would have diluted their pensions.

NYC transit bus drivers earn about $60k per year plus very good benefits and of course pension.

Would be tight raising a family today in city on that kind of money, but if both husband and wife work total household income can easily be well over $110k per year.

Think that dreadful Kramden apartment was more for dramatic effect than anything else. Any self respecting NYC or wherever wife would have tried to fix the place up. Alice like most women of her generation likely knew how to sew, and if she didn't own a machine probably could borrow one somewhere to run up curtains.

One thing to keep in mind is that NYS did not discontinue war time rent control laws when that event ended. Thus much like today still LL's didn't have much incentive to put money into their buildings or apartments because city was setting the rents.

Talk to people who lived in city in 1970's or even 1980's; there were still plenty of rent regulated apartments that looked as if they hadn't been touched in decades. Am not just talking about Harlem, South Bronx, East Village, Lower East Side.. but even in Greenwich or West Village, Chelsea, etc.

Some are still like this today well into 2000's. People moved in ages ago and never left.

Or this:

Ralph had a meth and gambling problem.

[post redacted because linking to dailymail.co.uk clearly indicates that the poster is either a troll or an idiot (probably both, honestly.) Our advice is that you just ignore this poster but whatever you do, don't click on any link to this putrid rag.]

2016?

Really?

People the REASON, as stated in some of these posts, that Ralph had no money is he SPENT IT on GET RICH QUICK SCHEMES.

r304

Why don't you step in front of Ralph's bus

R290:

328 Chauncey St. is in Bushwick.

[quote] GI Bill and other benefits for veterans; neither Ralph or Ed seemed to have served (or at least cannot recall it being mentioned), so that avenue was cut off.

Ed Norton was a WWII vet who served in the Navy. He used his GI Bill money to enroll in typing school. It has been mentioned.

[quote] A string of poloponies.

That’s POLO PONIES!

Would you bother to fix up your apartment if every night your husband was threatening to send you to the moon? Alice was TV's first battered wife.

Fun fact: Outside of Port Authority in Manhattan, there's a statue of Jackie Gleason.

R302

You might say Bushwick, others might say Bushwick, but today equally as many others (including RE babble) say 328 Chauncey street is in "Stuyvesant Heights" .

For various reasons RE persons and others have renamed and or pushed boundaries of many Brooklyn neighborhoods. Largely to make them more appealing to the hordes of transplants who have arrived in past two decades, and still keep coming.

South Brooklyn is now "Park Slope South" for instance.

"When he conceived The Honeymooners, Jackie Gleason insisted that the Kramden apartment be modeled after one of his boyhood homes in the Bushwick section of Brooklyn: 328 Chauncey Street, apartment 3-A. “The place was dull. The bulbs weren’t very bright. The surroundings were very bare,” Gleason said of the tenement apartment."

[quote]Alice was TV's first battered wife.

How? Ralph never hit Alice, and Alice gave as good as she got, right back in Ralph's fat ass

Jackie Gleason modeled the Kramden's apartment after a 1930's cold water tenement flat. There was no reason for Ralph and Alice to live that way in 1950's, especially since Ralph made decent enough money.

Surprisingly plenty of people in 1950's NYC still had ice boxes. Largest customers likely would be households living in old rental housing that either LL was too cheap to provide modern fridges, there wasn't wiring yet to provide juice to run the things, and or any combination of the two.

[quote] For various reasons RE persons and others have renamed and or pushed boundaries of many Brooklyn neighborhoods. Largely to make them more appealing to the hordes of transplants

Well, of course. Real estate agents are trying to make the neighborhood (any neighborhood) more appealing to a potential buyer. That doesn’t mean it’s not Bushwick. I can call my post “r315 Gardens,” doesn’t make it any more special than any other post on DL; and it doesn’t detract from the fact that it’s still on DL.

The few times they shows Trixie and Norton's apartment it was a lovely space. The absolute opposite of the Kramden's apartment.

That apartment now rents for $3,200 a month.

The few times they showED

[quote] That apartment now rents for $3,200 a month.

A mere bag of shells.

*snaps fingers*

I thought the Honeymooners was the most depressing show I ever watched...hated it. I dont understand its cult following

One word, r320.

Funny.

r319

Ralph) Peanuts, peanuts, what am I supposed to do with peanuts?

Alice) Eat them, like any other elephant.

When I lived in Park Slope there was the "South Slope" which was 3rd to 5th Ave. By the 90s 4th to 5th was solidly gentrified and felt like Park Slope. I never heard of "Park Slope South" in that order but I left decades ago. I remember "South Slope".

You know, just think if we got sent back 100 years it'd be 1920. Radio hadn't yet become the norm. TV didn't yet exist in any form that we'd expect. Oh books were around, and magazines, newspapers and other periodicals.

Now of course it's all online. Music, Video, books, magazines, newspapers. It's funny I read on how to make a pinata and they say use strips of newsprint. Um, don't get that anymore. Just junk mail which I dispose.

I was around and I was HIGH-stair-ick-AL

Remember Safety First in these times and the future. Or at least try.

r323

It still is "South Slope", but some people felt need to upmarket things to "Park Slope South".

They keep renaming places to make transplants feel better about paying huge sums to rent or own in former working to middle class neighborhoods.

My grandmother was a fan of Gleason. She wrote him a letter and mentioned they shared the same birthday, February 26, 1916. On her next birthday she received a signed photo and a dozen roses from the Great One himself.

R327 another time! sweet

I bet that was just some fat guy stalking her.

Would they have made it through coronavirus in that dingy apartment? I think Ralph would be one of the ones to refuse to wear a mask.

Did they have a bathroom inside or did they share one with the rest of the tenants on their floor?

This may have been mentioned (I haven't read through the whole thread), but they did show the Norton's apartment a few times and it was quite lovely.

R331, didn't the Norton's have a black and white tv?

[quote]She must have been horribly bored all day as cleaning the apartment would probably only take about 10 minutes.

What cleaning? Those walls always looked filthy.

Alice and Trixie saw gentlemen callers during the day.