Remember When

[Columbia Craw]

I don’t feel old but I am a post WW2 child.  All things are relative but it’s fun to tell my grand kids stories of how it was for me.  Remember when:

 

We only had black and white TV

We had to get up and turn a dial to change the 2 channels.

Cassius Clay beat Sonny Liston

You opened your pop with an opener

Cloth diapers you dunked in the toilet

 

Listening to Wolfman Jack on your transistor radio

 

Learning to drive with a three speed on the column.

 

Feel free......

[MN Fisher]

I get a kick out of telling people that 'Yes, I walked uphill both ways when in school'.

 

Literally the case. Lived in West Warwick, RI for two years. House was west of the Pawtuxet River, junior-high was east of the river.

Down a hill, cross a bridge then up a hill...both ways.

[DaubsNU1]

I was born in 1967, and remember...

 

• Black and white TV's (not our primary TV, but we had one)
• Three channels on the television
• I remember watching Mohammad Ali fights as a kid...amazing!
• My first vehicle was a 1971 Chevy C-20, with a 250cid 6cyl, and Three-On-The-Tree
• Dad, grandpa, and uncle drank beer out of steel cans...then made "Polish-Cannon" out of empties...launching tennis balls 300+ yards!
• Pepsi and Coke sold in 16oz. glass bottles...that you returned to the store...
• People smoking everywhere...in stores, in restaurants, in hospitals, at the doctor's office...
• We lived across street from a public pool...never wore sunblock...would get a wicked sunburn the first few days of summer...wore a white T shirt for a few days...
• Piling the entire family in the front seat of my Dad's pickup...Dad drove, I sat next to him and got to shift (4spd manual), Mom was next, with brother on her lap.  Sister sat by the door...none of us had on seat-belts.
• Full service gas stations

[A-Jay]

Times were different.

May or may not mean better.

The racism was brutal.

 

I remember some obscure things like:

~Watching the Beatles on the Ed Sullivan Show.

~Drinking Tang

~Air Travel was easy, actually fun and everybody smoked.

~How about getting slapped really hard right in the face in public for being stupid.

      Try doing that one now..... And I deserved every one I got. 

 ~Drive In Movies

~ a Gallon of gas and a loaf of bread cost the same like  $0.30 cents

I have to stop here.

#borninfiftynine

A-Jay

 

 

[MN Fisher]

25 minutes ago, A-Jay said:

Times were different.

May or may not mean better.

The racism was brutal.

 

I remember some obscure things like:

~Watching the Beatles on the Ed Sullivan Show.

~Drinking Tang

~Air Travel was easy, actually fun and everybody smoked.

~How about getting slapped really hard right in the face in public for being stupid.

      Try doing that one now..... And I deserved every one I got. 

 ~Drive In Movies

~ a Gallon of gas and a loaf of bread cost the same like  $0.30 cents

I have to stop here.

#borninfiftynine

A-Jay

Yes - the 'good old days'.

 

Got my first crush back then too - Nichelle Nichols - when I saw an Episode of Star Trek in 1966 and got hooked

 

#alsobornin59

[Dwight Hottle]

I remember todays safety issues did not exist. 

A new corvette cost less than $3000. 

Milk & ice were delivered to your front door.

Your mom didn't drive. 

Most married women didn't work outside the home. 

You never pumped your own gas. 

If you were lucky you had an ice box in the kitchen

People lived in rooming houses & the bathroom was down the hall.

You heated with coal.

Party telephone lines were common. 

The national athem was played before the network signed off. 

[Columbia Craw]

What’s a mall?

McDonalds ?  Never heard of it.

A and W served at the window.

Johnny Unitas.

Sandy Colfax.

[MN Fisher]

7 minutes ago, Columbia Craw said:

A and W served at the window.

We still have that. When A&W started closing them, the manager of the one near me bought it off them and re-opened as the 'Minnetonka Drive-In'. Still service at your car, still A&W Root Beer on tap.

[Jigfishn10]

Rotary dial phones.

You opened a can of Hawaiian Punch with a church key.

Regular steering in cars...man, it seemed like you turned the wheel forever.

Sneakers were tennis shoes.

Street hockey...if you were from the north.

You had to be in the house when the street lights came on.

You made your own Halloween outfit to trick or treat.

Freeways.

[Mike L]

*Bozo the clown

*Picking up a girl for a date and her  father answers the door

*My girlfriend sitting in the middle of the bench seat while I drive 
*Riding in my ‘62 Catalina with the windows down in the winter 

*Motown
*Fights in the hallways of my high school 

*Crossing Guards
*Have to be home when the street lights came on

*Playing 16” softball in the alley behind my house (it’s a Chicago thing)

*Drag racing at each stop light

*Black leather jackets (another Chicago thing)

*Hamms, Old Style and Schlitz 

*Hemi engines  (real ones, not today's)

 

 

 

Mike

[gunsinger]

What about having to go out side and turn the antenna till your dad said reception was better?  Or having to stand by the TV holding the rabbit ears?  Or using a hanger for an antenna?

 

Or being able to go down to the store and buy your dad a pack of smoke?  And you'd get the candy cigarettes so you could be cool.  Rollin' up in your sleeve.

 

Shakey's Pizza when I lived in the Omaha/Council Bluffs area with the player piano and watching them make the pizza with your nose pressed up to the glass.

 

Pumping water from the well with a hand pump.

 

Being able to stay out and play till the street lights came on without fear of some pervert snatching you up.

 

Using your imagination to play.

 

Oh, and crossing the prairie on a covered wagon.... (Okay, that one's a slight exaggeration) ?

[gim]

I honestly do not remember most of what you guys have posted already.  I must be significantly younger.

I remember when I was a kid growing up and Super Mario Brothers or Zelda on Nintendo was THE game to play.

Now its a global enterprise and you are playing Call of Duty and Fortnite against people on the other side of the planet.

I do remember not having a mobile phone though.  That didn't come around for most people until I got to college!

[MN Fisher]

7 minutes ago, gimruis said:

I remember when I was a kid growing up and Super Mario Brothers or Zelda on Nintendo was THE game to play.

I remember dad bringing home a game that we had to hook up to the old B&W TV...never had to hook a game up to something before...new, exciting, addictive.

 

Pong!

[Columbia Craw]

I remember riding the bus down town with my brother and going to Woolworths for fries and a soda before the 25 cent noon movies and then walking through the GI surplus store.  I can still smell the oiled plank floor and canvas.

Oh, I was nine years old.

[Mobasser]

Craw, I remember all of these things. Born in 1957, my grandkids can't believe how it was in the 1960s. We too had one blk/ wht TV, with rabbit ears, and tin foil to get a better reception. First vehicle was a 67 Chevy truck, colomn 3 speed, straight 6cyl engine. My older brother worked at a Griffs burger place. No joke hamburger 50 cents, fries, 25 cents, soda, 25 cents. And they only had one size of soda, not like now. It was a great time to be a kid.

[Jigfishn10]

Last weekend I was getting gas and then went in the store to buy a bottle of water. An older gent ran in to pay cash for gas and asked to buy 20 gallons. 
 

The last time I heard gas bought that way was when I was a gas station attendant in high school.

[Mobasser]

My second car a 64 Ford Falcon. A four door, looked like a grandma car. But, it had a 289 small block. My brother helped me soup it up with Holley 4barrel, Hurst 4 sped shifter, 411 rear end, and traction bars, which cost 30 dollars each. What a sleeper. My dad didn't approve...

[jimmyjoe]

   Man, you guys are youngsters! 

 

   WD-40 was an Allis-Chalmers.

   What street lights?

   What street?

   What TV?

   Dad shaved oak for a tedder brace.

   Mom made lye soap in a three-legged iron pot.

   Crosley Icy-balls ....... tarnished, but still worked.

   Two windmills, one generator, one light bulb and a Philco radio.

   Bull snakes in the cellar.

   Reel-cage mowers.

   Sharpening compound for the reel-cage mowers.

   One-man crosscut saws. They were called "man-killers".

   Fishermen left their boats pulled up on the bank with their equipment in them, and nothing was ever touched.

  

   There were more.          jj

  

  

[Mobasser]

1 hour ago, Mike L said:

*Bozo the clown

*Picking up a girl for a date and her  father answers the door

*My girlfriend sitting in the middle of the bench seat while I drive 
*Riding in my ‘62 Catalina with the windows down in the winter 

*Motown
*Fights in the hallways of my high school 

*Crossing Guards
*Have to be home when the street lights came on

*Playing 16” softball in the alley behind my house (it’s a Chicago thing)

*Drag racing at each stop light

*Black leather jackets (another Chicago thing)

*Hamms, Old Style and Schlitz 

*Hemi engines  (real ones, not today's)

 

 

 

Mike

I picked up a girl from a nearby town for a date. An Italian girl. Her dad answered the door smoking a huge cigar, staring at me. Looked like a mob guy. He said" what time you gonna have her home"?  I was going to say midnight, but, knew this was the wrong answer. So I said " ten thirty sir". He said" come in". I've been married to that girl for 39 yrs now.

[Mike L]

I remember something like that !!

 

But I think I said…”Whenever you want”

 

 

 

 

Mike

[Spankey]

Born in '59. There is nothing going on these days that I would trade my growing up for. Didn't have a real lot growing up. Had what I needed I guess. We participated in many sports. Always a baseball game going on, us against us or us against them. Pond hockey all winter, was more Ice back in those days. If I remember correctly we were always doing something. Many days life was a lot like the movie "Stand By Me". Very similar in ways. On the fishing side I was exposed to trout fishing pretty early on. A farmer I worked for. trout fishing was a passion he had, he truly taught me how to fish. The passion for trout has stayed with me. Folks use to take me fishing when I was younger than that but they had no real interest in it. I've always been sort of the black sheep. I never missed a beat over the years when it comes to trout fishing. I can fish stocked, wild and native trout locally for the most part. My smallie river has wild trout in it. I got hooked on Smallmout bass on a local trout fish adventure with guys I grew up with. They would trout fish but were not into it like I was. I showed them another creek that had good trout fishing in it and that day i stumbled across a stretch with some nice smallies in it. Spring of '76 hooked me on smallies. That was the game changer. Shortly after that I found out bigger smallies were in the river. A river rat I became.

[Spankey]

52 minutes ago, Columbia Craw said:

I remember riding the bus down town with my brother and going to Woolworths for fries and a soda before the 25 cent noon movies and then walking through the GI surplus store.  I can still smell the oiled plank floor and canvas.

Oh, I was nine years old.

I use to love the army navy store and the hardware store. Fishing stuff was at the hardward.

[Hammer 4]

Born in 1948.

 

Here in so. cali, we had simple things like the Good Humor ice cream truck that drove around neighborhoods. We also had the Helms bakery truck, great donuts, especially the jelly filled donuts.

You could walk to the out lying of homes and pick figs, pomegranates ect. to snack on. 

[Smalliefan2]

Cars w/o power steering, no power brakes, three on the tree, manual locks, setting the push buttons for your five favorite stations.

Walking to school, 10 of 12 years, rode bus first two.

Kodak brownie cameras

Putting plastic disc in your 45"s

Transistor radio's

Gas, 25 cents  per gallon. Sunoco 260 was 30 cents.

Whole family eating dinner at the same time every night.

Sunday football, two games, that's all.

Pay phones

Bikes with balloon tires

Kennedy assassination

Sputnik

Pre war coupe's at the race track

Bell ringers playing football

[Hammer 4]

I recall when reg. gas was 18 cents per gal....ahh, the good ole days.