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Day 200 – The Gloucester Spoon

40 years ago, while on a family trip to the east coast, I got my first souvenir spoon. 

It was July 19, 1977 and we were in Gloucester, Massachussets, visiting my Aunt Kit. My mother made me keep a daily diary of the trip, forcing…er…encouraging me to write SOMETHING every single day. 

Bless my mother’s heart, because without her constant pestering to record my thoughts about each and every day, I never would have ended up with this little gem: 

July 19, 1977

We went to visit Aunt Kit. I got a souvenir spoon. Gloscester [sic] is were [sic] we went.


You can’t really blame me for not being able to spell Gloucester. I probably couldn’t pronounce it, either. And the drawing of the spoon! So incredibly lifelike!

So here it is, in all its glory: the very first tacky souvenir spoon in my collection.

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Day 198 – The Happiest Place on Earth Spoon

July 17, 1955 was the grand opening of Disneyland in Anaheim, California. And it’s kind of surprising they’re still in business after such a disasterous first day. 

The Disney Company had sent out special passes for opening day, but unfortunately someone counterfeited them and the park ended up with thousands more visitors than expected. They ran out of food and drinks, there was a gas leak in Frontierland, the asphalt on Main Street wasn’t dry yet, and the Storybook Land Boats broke down and cast members in rubber boots had to pull them through the canals. 
This spoon (a twin design of the Walt Disney World Spoon from Day 103) isn’t from opening day, but it’s now a relic of another time, since Disney no longer sells spoons at the park. 

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Day 197 – The New Mexico Spoon

On July 16, 1945, the Atomic Age began when the United States successfully detonated a plutonium-based test nuclear weapon in the desert near Alamogordo, New Mexico.

This spoon from New Mexico is probably radioactive AND haunted.