“Candy-coated popcorn, peanuts, and a prize
...that's what you get in Cracker Jacks!”
...that's what you get in Cracker Jacks!”
I think that was the first contract I ever entered into that went badly. Today I would probably have to sue for breach of implied happiness, pain and suffering, emotional distress, and of course actual tangible losses, plus punitive damages. But on that particular April afternoon forty-eight years ago, when I poured out the last of my candy coated popcorn and a peanut or two, and no prize came out, all I could do was stare into the bottom of the box in shock and disbelief. There was no lip-smacking', whip-crackin', paddywhackin', knickaknackin', silabawhackin', scalawhackin', crackerjackin' going on for this toy deprived kid. But despite my long gloomy walk home from the park, there was no call to a lawyer... because in those days we knew how to suck it up accept disappointment.
Cracker Jacks are a lot like social security. The prize was always in the box when I was a girl, sixty years ago. Now there are no more prizes.
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