In the 1950s, not long after my tenth birthday, I walked over to "Town" on an errand for my mother. As usual, on the way back I took a short detour past Boslet's Hobby Shop on Herzog Place. In the window, I saw something new:
HO Scale Heinz Pickle Car model by Revell Inc., c.1957
worthpoint.com
A railroad car built to carry only vats of pickles seemed strange to my young brain.
On the wall next to the model there were old photographs, pictures of a local pickle works. Hicksville had had a pickle factory? For the first time, I really understood that, before the shiny new suburbs of my childhood popped up, there once had been a rural village here. It would be many years - decades - before I looked back to that day, and decided to investigate the story of Hicksville's Heinz pickle works.
