I'm So Old I Can Remember...

[gsfish]

Resurrecting an old thread.


I'm so old I can remember...

When Bob posted on Yahoo's Vanliving Group

Lots of cars had 6volt systems

When there were no satellites much less astronauts

50hp was a HUGE outboard motor

No cars came standard with seatbelts

Minimum wage was $1.60 an hour

Home loans were 12%ish when I bought my house

CD rates as high as 18%

Dress codes in school

Guy

 

[Camper]

Gas was 23 cents a gallon

Outhouse

A soft drink was 5 cents

Crank telephones

Party line with nine neighbors 

No automatic transmissions

A service station guy checked your oil and cleaned your windshield while another guy pumped your gas.

 

[desert_sailing]

Drive through liquor stores.

Wendy's and the Cold war.


Cool resurrection of a thread... I look forward to some memories.

Would be great if you could add a poll of ages with this to see any trends.

 

[jacqueg]

the Ipana, Pepsodent, Mission Pack, and Nestle's jingles
Kukla Fran and Ollie
the Cisco Kid
Alfalfa and Darla
Engineer Bill
Party lines
poodle skirts and 50-yard slips
sock hops
Jack Benny
Fibber McGee and Molly

 

[Camper]

FIVE hamburgers for $1 - milk shake and large fries for an extra quarter.

Movie - drink - popcorn all for $1

 

[maki2]

Watching on TV the nomination process and later the election night for Dwight D Eisenhower's last term., 1956.

It was not all that long before that when my parents got their first TV. Of course it was black and white. Always adjusting it to stop the picture from rolling and to get rid of static. Of course not a very lage TV. It was a post war baby boom household of 5 kids so a TV was a real luxury purchase. At 5 years old I was just beginning to be old enough to be able to form some clear long term memories such as that one. Why Ibremember seeing those events more clearly than a kids show I can't say. I just do.

 

[bullfrog]

My neighbor got the first tv (black and white) around and a few months later bought a piece of plastic that went on the screen that was tinted blue at the top and green at the bottom to mimic sky and grass. Was great for westerns and cartoons! Used to watch until they played the national anthem and signed off! Stood at the little train station in our town and watched the mechanics lube the funeral train’s wheels during the stop with Eisenhower’s casket and widow onboard. Rang the bell of the last steam engine the last time used by the C&O before they scrapped it. Sat in the back row of a drive in movie in a big green coal truck staring at a bulldogs *** all night.

 

[user 423]

Watching on TV a guy in a turban playing a piano and an organ at the same time.

When there were actual statesmen in the U.S.

Paying 2 cents for a half-pint of milk at school lunchtime.

 

[Camper]

Sitting up with the dead.... all night at their home until the funeral. No fun.

 

[Freelander]

I remember when we only 2 channels on TV.

 

[WanderingRose]

When you wanted to make a telephone call, you lifted the receiver and an operator asked “what number, please?”. She then connected you.

At the gas station, an attendant would ask what you wanted, fill your tank and check the oil, adding a quart if it was low.

Our family doctor, a General Practitioner, seeing patients in the office in the mornings and making house calls with his black bag in the afternoon.

He took out my tonsils and set a leg broken while sledding when I was 11, the latter complete with a pin inside one bone that is still there to this day.

He saw you in his office, at home and if you were hospitalized. One doctor, for all things.

When JFK was assassinated, it being announced over the loudspeaker at my high school.

 

[Matlock]

Movie, lg popcorn and a bottle of coke for 20¢.
Catch'n hell from Dad cause I charged $2.04 worth of Regular Gas at the Shell station. 12 gallons at 17¢ per, gas price wars in a small town with 3 stations.
Loading, unloading, stacking slab wood from the local sawmill for the fireplace that burnt non-stop for 6 months a year. $2 a pickup load.

Pretty much same experience mentioned above, Dr. made house calls, took my tonsils out at his house and was my dads long time hunting buddy. At age 6 I got to drive Doc's new Packard sitting on his lap.
Sunday morning 1950's TV show with Don Ameche as host. Our 10" TV was topped with several rabbit ears, maybe 3 or 4, and dad was positive they all made a difference. Either way, nobody was allowed to touch them.
First drive-in I remember, White Castle, around 1947, hamburgers were 12¢ and a coke was 5¢, Milk shakes hadn't been marketed yet and no additional charge for burger toppings.

 

[Freelander]

...When JFK was assassinated, it being announced over the loudspeaker at my high school.

You must be a bit older than me, I remember JFK's funeral, but I may have been 1st grade then.

 

[maki2]

I remeber sitting in government class in the 8th grade when the announcement was made that JFK had been shot.
This was very trauatic to the whole school as in mass, the whole students and teachers we walked to a location nearby to see him in the cavalcade not even 24 hours before.. So of course that is a memory that is firmly planted in my mind.

Of course I also remember watching the news about the Russians sending the first living being into space, a mixed breed dog named Laika. She took her ride on November 3 1957. Lots of significant first space events in my childhood including going outside watching the early satellites pass by on clear nights.

 

[MrNoodly]

I'm so old I remember... um... uh..................... I forgot what we're talking about.

 

[maki2]

I bet sometimes you even forget where you are going and why, Not that it makes a lot of difference in a nomadic lifestyle in a van because your home is always with you when you are driving in it.

 

[user 423]

...I also remember watching the news about the Russians sending the first living being into space, a mixed breed dog named Laika. She took her ride on November 3 1957.

My aunt and uncle got a new puppy at that time and named her Sputnik after the first Russian satellite that was sent into orbit a month earlier.

She was just 'Sputty' to us kids.

 

[Sofisintown]

I'm so old, I'm afraid to be seen wearing bunny slippers.

 

[vanbrat]

I'm so old I remember playing solitare with real cards.

 

[crofter]

Time before TV -we had a radio
The outhouse experience, with the door open
Riding horses to do all the ranch work
Party line
Swimming pool was a stock dam, with mud
Log cabin & seperate bath house
Cold water from a pump
Cooking with a wood stove
REA  changed all this, but some still do not have REA

Rant:
We have tremendous access to the new technologies & for solar solutions right now and should implement the solar solutions for our daily lives as much as possible, especially for mobile living.  Also the option for light gas powered or solar electric transportation. I cut my costs a lot when I switched from horses to ATV for the ranch work. For dwellers, having a street legal ATV as a toad would be just as cost saving.  -crofter

REA is rural electrification program