Havng been dragged up and down many floors of Bloomingdale's, Gimbel's, Macy's, and other multistoried Department Stores by Me Sainted Mither, I'm very familiar with the old-fashioned elevator operator, where after a bunch of people got on board the operator would ask, "Floors, please."
This was throughout the forties and occasionally in the fifties.
Among the specific number answers, there was always a "Men's Wear, please," "Bedding, please." "Kitchens," and the like.
And not rarely, "Ladie's lingerie" or other feminine areas.
And occasionally, if the operator didn't quite stop with the elevator floor exactly even with the store's floor, he or she would say, "Watch your step, please." Nowadays, with computer controlled self-service elevators, this is no longer necessary, and the joke really centers around the difference between "then" and "now," and the notion that it would be <ahem> "notable" for a man to ask for the ladies' lingerie floor.
So there were some "nostalgia" aspects attached to the remark, as well as the humorous sexual aspect of the requestor being either a *Not nice word for gay men*(*) or a real horndog.
Or maybe just a fashion or cheesecake photographer.
Worth a hoot but not a suit.
Then there was the other almost-inevitable joke to the elevator operator: "Can you perform marriages?"
Terry, 230RN
* ETA: Contemporaneous term for "gayness." Didn't know it was a naughty-naughty word nowadays. Word-equivalent for a bundle of sticks.
