SDCFans - The Unofficial Fan Site For Silver Dollar City
Silver Dollar City & Celebration City Discussion => SDC Memories/ Park History => Topic started by: Junior on October 18, 2011, 05:03:41 PM
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Many theme parks, including SDC, used to fill small fruit shaped plastic containers filled with various fruit juices and target them to sale to kids. At SDC the concessions department was responsible for hand filling these little six to eight ounce containers each night. It took about two hours to do so. They were filled in the commercial kitchen area behind the Mill Restaurant. (I did this task myself a time or two) Then, the lids were popped on. The sippers were put into big dairy crates or five gallon plastic buckets or on big trays, and put into a refrigerator all night to chill. In the morning, out on the streets, large cart like vending displays would be filled with ice, then the sippers brought in on a small Cushman electric cart before rope drop. Somebody would man the three or four locations around park and sell them for a buck or a buck and a half each (late 70s/early 80s price) and when a guest bought one, a plastic curly straw would be punched through the foil circle on the lid, and the kids would start drinking. These novely containers could be washed out and kept, taken home as a cheap souvenier. Problem was, many of the sipper containers would not be taken home. Some were dropped on the street, and many, many times, people would throw them in the pools of water in front of Grandfathers Mansion, Flooded Mine, and the Float Trip, or into Lake Silver. I personally also had to put on waders and grab a big net more than one time to fish a bunch of old sipper containers out of the water in front of the float trip...part of my duties later as a "river rat" at the ride. The sippers came in grape, apple, orange, and a few other flavors/shapes. Every now and then at my local grocery store I still see three packs of sippers (orange shaped) for sale so I guess they are still around to some extent. Believe it or not, sippers at SDC were phased out due to an employee campaign. All employees were given surveys to fill out by management to express ways of improving the park. Employees complained about picking up these tossed off containers so much they were removed from the concessions. They would have been phased out about 81 or 82. The change around park was noticiable within two or three weeks. The cast off sipper containers were all fished out of the SDC waterways, the streets were cleaner, and that was the end of it. However, those sippers were VERY popular with the kids, everyone wanted them! So it seemed. Any memories from some of you older folks about drinking sippers at SDC? Any old family photos in your scrapbook you could post of people drinking from them? Anybody still have some old sippers in your memories box in the closet? Let's see them! Post! Post! Post!
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This is hilarious, while cleaning the cave out over the years I have found some of these. I found a grape one just the other day. I personally don’t remember them, but I know they will last in extreme conditions for thirty plus years.
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I remember those old drinks, correct me if wrong but i think they had lemon also, and the grape looked like it was a bunch of grapes like it was just cut off the vine? I'm sorry i don't think we have any pictures in fact its kinda of a long story so i will shorten it up, after the grandparents past the family split and who knows where all our pictures are. i will look around and ask my mom if she will try and get some of the old photos because she has a better relationship with them than i do.
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It does ring a bell, Junior. Just been a long time, i had forgotten about them. :D
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I remember the drinks I was around 10 years old at the time and really thought these were good.
We were a little simpler even back then in 78....
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The mention of sippers brought back instant memories for me. I maybe got one a trip but it was very cool to get one. Thanks for the blast from the past!
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Oh yes! I remember these for sure! Loved them! I think we still have some of the containers at G'ma's house in the basement boxes (which we really need to go through still). I also remember we do have pictures with us as well with these. I remember G'ma would bring them out whenever we visited growing up like it was our special drinking cup the whole time we were here (usually 3 months) over summer. Man, I need to get my hands on some photos and things soon.... :D
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I posted a photo a while back of the stand of sippers, but I don't have it on my flickr right now, I will find it.
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Yes, I seem to remember lemon sippers, too. Rube, please post that sipper cart photo...I'd love to see who it is working at the cart. Could possibly be someone I knew back then. Oh, here is an insider tidbit for you...real trivia stuff...I seem to remember a few times when the concessions people did not have a variety of fruit flavors, so if they had apple juice and no grape or orange juice, they might occasionally have put apple juice in the apple, grape, and orange shaped sippers! Hey, the kids never knew the difference, they really wanted the sippers because of the colorful fruit shaped containers anyway! Ha!
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I remember sippers floating in Lake Silver. I am sure there are plenty more down there just taking up space in the lake just waiting to be found.
Next one you find Copper, throw in a box and ship to me! I'll gladly pay postage!
Fortunately I found in our photos the Fruit drink stand that sold sippers at the Greedy Bros. location , unfortunately the tarp is pulled over the merchandise, and we cannot give those who never saw them an image of them.
(http://i649.photobucket.com/albums/uu218/rubedugans/Picture013-1.jpg)
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Love this photo, Rube...but...this is not a picture of one of the sipper concession wagons. This is the fruit boat concession that sat right where the only remaining Tom Sawyer's Landing tower is today...the one where the kids dip their hands in wax. This concession sold fruit...watermelon, apples, oranges, bananas, and so on, along with fountain sodas, cartons of milk, coffee, and so on. This photo is probably from the period of 1981-1983. Now, again my memory dims a bit...it's possible that if this is part of the series of photos your dad took on vacation in 1984 (the same series as the diving bell photos) they may have moved the fruit boat to the area around where Greedy Brothers is, but I cannot remember the 1984 season very well because I was only on park for about three weeks in August. It seems that the tower at Tom Sawyer's Landing was put in place in 1984.
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The sipper concession wagons looked like little push carts. They had wagon wheels on each side, were themed to look as if they were made from wood but I think they may have been fiberglass. The container in the wagon was metal lined, and cubed ice from park ice machines filled it. The sippers were buried in the ice to keep them cold. Fresh ice was brought by each wagon two or three times per day. One sipper cart was on Main Street as soon as you entered park. Other carts were spread throughout...seems like there might have been three or four of them. In the 1977 season my buddy Randy Stowe sold sippers from a cart positioned between the rib house and the diving bell. In the 1978 season he worked at the diving bell as a Junior and at the train as a robber/conductor. Randy has enjoyed a long career with the park, and was a manager in the Entertainment Department the last time I met with him in 2007. Mighty oaks from little acorns grow!
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thats a great pic rube..
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I had that sneaking feeling this wasn't it...
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I'm glad you brought this topic. In my quest to remember everything about growing up in the 70's and 80's, these fruit sippers were definitely a favorite memory! I don't recall having them at SDC as much as I do Six Flags, St. Louis. In fact, if I recall anything about my times going to St. Louis were the fruit sippers and glow in the dark bracelets.
Anyway, I don't have any photos of these particular ones either, but I do have an actual orange from Silver Springs Florida, which is pretty much the same line of fruit drinks.
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My first sipper was an orange at Silver Springs, FL...home of the glass bottom boats and the mermaid show! A mid to late '60s visit for my family. We went to visit an Uncle and Aunt that lived at Clearwater Beach, FL.
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Like this?!
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It's been a few years, but I think the SDC sippers had the logo pressed into them. But yeah, the photo above is pretty close to the mark as to what the sippers looked like. Is the above photo from Silver Springs, Disney, or some other Florida park?
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The childhood memories are rushing back to me! How quickly, I had forgotten all about these things. :)
I'm trying to see, and read it, but it looks like it says "Florida Silver Springs" maybe?
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This is the one from Silver Springs
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Ok... Here's some weirdness associated with Orange flavored sippers.
I used to shoot the long cannon (napolean type) and the two mortars on top of the hill every night to signal park closing. great, loud fun! Much too dangerous and cool to exist as an activity any more... Anyhoo, an orange sipper full of water would occassionally find its way into the barrel of the big gun. I used a half-pound of single F blackpowder, a tight baseball sized wad of newspaper, and then the sipper "slipped" onto top of rammed load.
That dern thing would fly over the church and towards TableRock lake like a , well... BULLET! If you did not know if was in there, you could not see it fly. My buds were in on it and we would watch about two hundred yards downrange for the flying citrus.
Now THAT was fun!
And the statute of limitations has surely worn off, right?
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BAHAHAHA! Ozarkdrb, that's hilarious! I would like to see one of those things fly from a cannon.
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I seem to remember hearing a story or two about the sippers loaded into the cannon...seems like OLD GUY told me about that way back in the days I was on park. I wonder how many of those sipper remains are still off in the woods behind the church? HA!
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Now that sounds fun!!
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hahahahahahahahahahahahahahahaa! Thats funny stuff now! :D
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I found these orange sippers at Walmart!
http://www.flickr.com/photos/76324302@N06/7349302504/
Thought of yall!
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OMG!! :D
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There are 3 sippers for sale on Ebay right now: http://www.ebay.com/itm/Vintage-Silver-Dollar-City-Them-Park-Souvenir-Sippy-Juice-Cups-Containers-/221051802374?pt=LH_DefaultDomain_0&hash=item3377b6d306 (http://www.ebay.com/itm/Vintage-Silver-Dollar-City-Them-Park-Souvenir-Sippy-Juice-Cups-Containers-/221051802374?pt=LH_DefaultDomain_0&hash=item3377b6d306).
Grape, lemon, and orange. If the sippers were before your time (like for me), take a look!
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Now which one of us lucky kids will be the owners of these??
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Wow. Been a number of years since I've seen one of those sippers. They are in excellent condition. Best of luck to any bidders here. And yes, they are from the early 1980s.
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awesome!
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One bid, that's all? $9.99! These don't come up often, that was a steal for somebody . If the winner is reading this, maybe we can talk them into breaking up the lot to share the wealth! I'd pay $3.50 for one ! I think I'd choose the grape. What about you? Which would you pick?
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Those sippers, back in the day, sold for a buck each...full of juice, too! However, the sipper containers are hard to find now. Even with the price adjusted for inflation, the ebay price ain't too bad.
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If any others come up, I am going to have to jump on them seeing that they are something I could never have as a kid, maybe as an adult I can have them! I might need to scour the hillside behing the homestead! That or find the buyer and offer to split the eBay cost for a sipper...anyone...anyone?
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the problem with the Sippers was that people didn't keep them as souvenirs. Instead they tended to pitch them over the sides of the paths where they would be found floating in every stream pond and other waterways, dangling from tree branches and generally causing an unsightly mass. Also they were decidedly out of theme in an era when even formica countertops were looked at as un Silver Dollar City. They came and went quickly along with the remotecontroled boats on Lake silver that came that same year.
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remote controlled boats? would that be the same boats that ended up at CC? ???
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it's possible but I rather doubt it. these boats went away in the early eighty's. I kind of doubt they kept them around for that many years tell cc .
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I can imagine the boats at CC were their when it was Branson USA.
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The remote controlled boats did not stand up very well, as folks tended to run them into one another, and my pal Roger who ran the concession was constantly doing repairs to them with a glue gun. I remember pulling the little model obsticles in the water that atmospherd the boat area at the end of the '81 season. Me and Randy Stowe put them in the atmosphere barn and I never saw them again.
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I was just at SDC over Memorial Day weekend and mentioned to my kids how my cousins and I looked forward to the SIPPERS! I always tried to find the Pineapple shaped one, loved Pineapple Juice. If not mistaken I believe my mother may still have this. She's a Hoarder :)