The "Shopping At Market With A Wooden Basket!" Story

It was an ordinary day.  Reading the "Living" section of my local Sunday News when I came across a story titled "Memories fill market baskets for many shoppers."  Featured a story written by a local woman by the name of Pat Webber who told of her trips to Lancaster's Central Market as a child and always helping her mother carry a wooden market basket.  

Lancaster's Central Market on the left side 

At the time the baskets were made of willow wood and often had a rectangular bottom shape to allow you to sit your basket on the wooden shelf that was in front of the market stand.  At times the baskets were painted or lacquered.  My mother also had such a basket and I too remember well the trips to market and having to help her carry the wooden market basket.  In front of just about every market stand was a wooden shelf about knee high that was meant to hold your market basket while you were visiting the different market stands.  Some of the the shelves were painted, but if I remember correctly, most were just lacquered or left unfinished.  Quite a few of the stands' owners slanted the selves toward their stand to make sure it wouldn't fall off, but after a few years, the shelves were made flat to keep any liquids from running over the sides of the containers that had already been purchased at a previous stop.

You can see the wooden slats to hold your market basket

I can remember helping with my mother's basket until I was about maybe 8 or 9 years old, then she stopped using the basket since it tended to become very heavy when loaded full of market purchases.  Instead, we would share carrying the items that she would buy to take home.  On a recent trip to Lancaster's Central Market I took notice that there are still a few market stands that still have wooden shelves along the front of their stand which might stick out abut 6".  I then looked to see how many people still carry wooden market baskets.  I was pleasantly surprised to see maybe 10% of the shoppers had a wooden market basket with them which they sat on the wooden shelf of those stands that still had them.  A few also had large paper bags with handles on them that they used to carry their purchases and also sat on the wooden shelves.  As for me...I usually am able to carry the plastic bags they supply at each stand that have small holes in they for carrying the items.  I've been visiting Central Market in downtown Lancaster, Pennsylvania for slightly over 70 years now and never tire of making visits to this piece of history located in the center of the city of Lancaster.  It was another extraordinary day in the life of an ordinary guy.