Those Born 1930 to 1970! (Makes you wonder how we Survived)

[Wiley50]

I found this on a small topical board I have started posting at.
I'm not standing up for all of the stuff in it.
Just thought it might make for interesting discussion here.
Have at!


Those Born 1930 to 1970!

TO ALL THE KIDS WHO SURVIVED the 1930's 40's, 50's, 60's and 70's !!

First, we survived being born to mothers who smoked and/or drank while they were pregnant.
They took aspirin, ate blue cheese dressing, tuna from a can, and didn't get tested for diabetes.

Then after that trauma, we were put to sleep on our tummies in baby cribs covered with bright colored lead-based paints.

We had no childproof lids on medicine bottles, doors or cabinets and when we rode our bikes, we had no helmets, not to mention, the risks we took hitchhiking.

As infants & children, we would ride in cars with no car seats, booster seats, seat belts or air bags.

Riding in the back of a pick up on a warm day was always a special treat.

We drank water from the garden hose and NOT from a bottle.

We shared one soft drink with four friends, from one bottle and NO ONE actually died from this.

We ate cupcakes, white bread and real butter and drank koolade made with sugar, but we weren't overweight because, WE WERE ALWAYS OUTSIDE PLAYING or WORKING !

We would leave home in the morning and play all day, as long as we were back when the streetlights came on.

No one was able to reach us all day.
And we were O.K.

We would spend hours building our go-carts out of scraps and then ride down the hill, only to find out we forgot the brakes. After running into the bushes a few times, we learned to solve the problem.

We did not have Playstations, Nintendo's, X-boxes, no video games at all, no 150 channels on cable, no video movies or DVD's, no surround-sound or CD's, no cell phones, no personal computers, no Internet or chat rooms.......WE HAD FRIENDS and we went outside and found them!

We fell out of trees, got cut, broke bones and teeth and there were no lawsuits from these accidents.

We ate worms and mud pies made from dirt, and the worms did not live in us forever.

We were given BB guns for our 10th birthdays,
made up games with sticks and tennis balls and, although we were told it would happen, we did not put out very many eyes.

We rode bikes or walked to a friend's house and knocked on the door or rang the bell, or just walked in and talked to them!

Little League had tryouts and not everyone made the team. Those who didn't had to learn to deal with disappointment. Imagine that!!

The idea of a parent bailing us out if we broke the law was unheard of.
They actually sided with the law!

These generations have produced some of the best risk-takers, problem solvers and inventors ever!
The past 50 years have been an explosion of innovation and new ideas.

We had freedom, failure, success and responsibility, and we learned
HOW TO DEAL WITH IT ALL!
If YOU are one of them . . . CONGRATULATIONS!

Kind of makes you want to run through the house with scissors, doesn't it?!

[knowbody0]

1. thanks for the smiles, Wiley!

most of us were born "blue" from the drugs they gave mum to keep her quiet during childbirth and still have strange indents from the forceps used to pry us out of the canal. good times!

[manic expression]

2. I've seen this before

a.) Do you think kids now don't get cut from teams or eat mud or play with sticks? Of course they do.

b.) Kids today didn't raise themselves. Look at who raised them instead of criticizing the kids.

[bluesbassman]

16. Hey, lighten up Manic.

The OP is just highlighting the different times we live in. Heck, my dad use to give me grief because I got to watch TV when I was a kid and all he had was books and a radio.

As for your points:

a.) You've never heard of Rec Ball? There are thousands of leagues in every different sport where all a kid has to do is show up and they get to play the whole game. And you're right, kids do still eat mudpies, the difference is a lot of parents freak when it happens now - not so much "back in the day".

b.) Where exactly in the OP are the kids of today being criticized? On the contrary, I see it as a lament to the missed opportunities our kids are face today.

Today's kids will turn out just like us. They'll just have hover-crafts and holodecks to compare what their kids get to play with versus the "simple" Gameboys and XBoxes they had to make do with!

[Withywindle]

3. What's wrong with blue cheese dressing?

I never heard of that one!


I remember all of that. But then there's this:

We did not have Playstations, Nintendo's, X-boxes, no video games at all, no 150 channels on cable, no video movies or DVD's, no surround-sound or CD's, no cell phones, no personal computers, no Internet or chat rooms.......WE HAD FRIENDS and we went outside and found them!

Some of us still managed to be antisocial couch potatoes nonetheless...there were these things called "books," see...;)

[Tess49]

171. I'm wondering about the blue cheese dressing myself.

[Ilsa]

195. Pregnant women and persons with immune system problems

can't eat it, soft cheeses, or alot of deli meats because of the risk for Listeria.

[MannyGoldstein]

4. This is So Freakin' Great

I always think about this stuff when I'm playing with my 7-year-old boy. By the time I was his age, I had broken two bones! He's crazier than I was, but nothing broken yet, thanks to ample padding on every activity.

There's also the whole fireworks issue. When I was growing up in NY, firecrackers were all over the place - nobody thought twice about setting off an M-80 in their back yard. Nowadays, at least here in America's Safest City (Newton, MA), I never ever hear fireworks going off in back yards - I'd love to shoot some off with my kid, but I'm sure we'd get busted. Then again, a kid I knew blew off two fingers with a cherry bomb, so maybe it is for the better...

[TriMetFan]

5. I remember those day's.

Just hanging out with friends. Riding our bikes, building forts and just having good clean fun. We are trying to give that same way of life to our boy's.

[DBoon]

6. You forgot the really dangerous science toys we had

and



I had both of these!!!

[Skip Intro]

9. I had a chemistry set -

I was like 7 or 8, with a box full of chemicals. I never relaized how crazy that was.

[Union Thug]

23. I don't know how many times my fingers got bit by the verti-bird...and then..

we learned that we could take this plastic gun, the one where you slid a little car into what looked like a bullet casing and fire it across the floor (I think they were called "ricochet racers"), ALSO accepted a few strategically constructed Lego "bullets" that we could fire like a pistol and strike targets (little brothers and sisters) from down the hall.

We also thought it was cool to use our bb guns to launch bottle rockets at eachother...

and anyone that ever had a set of 'clackers' explode on them knows what it's like to get showered in glass shrapnel...

Good times!

[maveric]

104. I had a "Thing maker" for Creepy Crawlers.

A small hot plate with metal molds (that get hot), that you fill with "plasti-goop" and bake into the creepy crawler or your choice. I cant tell you how many times I burned myself on that cool toy. But I survived.

[maveric]

105. We would play with gasoline and matches.

Swimming pool chlorine makes a beautiful white flame too.
We had to find something to do in the Boston Suburbs...

[mongo]

116. Or have someone on the back of a bicycle

pouring a line of gas down the middle of the street, to light up.

I was lucky, I had a friend whose dad was a chemical engineer, and he let his son build black powder guns starting in 7th grade, so we always had acess to black powder.

My would take model rocket engines, pry the cap off and tape them to test tubes filled with gunpowder. Some makeshift fins and a luancher and we were ready to go.

[Maraya1969]

165. OH we had one of them! That was a lot of fun.

[Poiuyt]

129. I had that same book!

I wonder if it's still up in the attic?

[DBoon]

156. it's worth a lot on eBay

It was pulled after a few years - some of the experiments were thought to be really dangerous (like making H2 out of Zn and HCl)

[poiuytsister]

162. Your book

is at my house. Do you want it back?

[Poiuyt]

164. Hey big sis - Welcome to DU!

[saracat]

7. Great post! I wasn't athletic but I played outside all day! We made up games.

We searched for treasure or captured spies with government secrets! We dived for sucken treasure in the lake and somehow no one drowned.Odd, I now live where there are thousands of pools and the state says they must be fences as so many children drown every year.I often think about our lake and how impossible it would be to "fence' and how parents both watched their children and taught the kids responsibility.I guess that doesn't happen much today!

[GreenZoneLT]

8. And if you were a boy in the South

You got a shotgun or deer rifle sometime around your 12th birthday, and nobody but animals ever got shot by it.

[MannyGoldstein]

10. Mercury Thermometers!

And we played with the mercury balls when they, um, accidentally broke.

Heck, that probably provided more mercury to our tissues than 3000 vaccinations and a mouthful of amalgam filling!

[sweetheart]

35. mercury was cool

I remember having a huge silver blob of it, the size of a nickel rolling
around in the palm of my hand(s), and how cool it was on my skin.

[Ilsa]

199. Yikes, I still have one I need to get ride of. nt

[Der Blaue Engel]

11. Yes, things were so much better then

when no one interfered with parents no matter what they did to their children.

Why, go back a bit further, and children were even allowed to make a living without anyone butting in.

There's a reason it's called "progress." Not everything new is bad.

[maggiegault]

125. I Can Smile...

...at the original post and agree with a lot of it, primarily about today's kids being overindulged, pampered little brats with a mindboggling sense of self-importance and entitlement.

Then again, my mother was (is) a raging alcoholic who beat the s**t out of her three kids on a daily basis. This was in the 1970s/early 80s. There were many people who knew, because my mother is a drunk and doesn't care who hears her tirades and violence. In fact, she enjoyed the spectacle she made of herself. But no one said anything, no one did anything, and no one intervened: not neighbors, not family, not friends, not school officials, no one. Yet they all saw the bruises.

[alarimer]

159. Kids are excessively coddled these days

But I think that is because people are so much more litigious these days. They sue schools over EVERYTHING so in some cases the ridiculous rules are just to cover themselves from potentially expensive lawsuits.

I think it is very sad that I do not see kids playing in the neighborhood anymore. They are either indoors playing video games (an activity that I think is okay in moderation) or they are so regimented with so many different activities that there is no room for free play anymore.

Kids (and everyone else) are losing touch with the world around them. Exploring the great outdoors is a thing of the past it seems. But if kids do not learn about nature, how can they become environmentally responsible adults?

[William769]

I'm probably going to get flamed for this but what the hell.

I trust the parents of those era's a hell of a lot more than I do of the one's of recent times.

[Donnachaidh]

13. I agree with you

I've got my flame-proof undies on :evilgrin:

[Patchuli]

24. I'll third that opine!!

Flame-shields up... :nuke:

[uppityperson]

25. Golly gee, you don't trust people like me? Trust my parents more?

oh well. Oh yes, we learned how to use apostrophes correctly also.

[William769]

83. Short answer. No.

[question everything]

34. Our parents did not try to be our friends

to wear our clothes, listen to our music, pretending to be one of us. They knew that their role was to set boundaries, to teach us right from wrong (and to provide us a target to rebel). They did not try to be PC but informed us what was an acceptable behavior while living under their roof.

They also understood that one of their role was to raise us to be independent, to go out to the world and to be responsible adults.

While still toddlers, they kept us in playpans for our safety and no one thought that we were being harmed for life.

[uppityperson]

40. Not always. My parents beat me with a stick and told me to behave

they told me to not talk back, to go along, to not have sex unless you were willing to marry the person, to accept invitations always, to listen and not talk, that disagreeing meant you didn't love someone, to always respect authority.

[bicentennial_baby]

176. i hope you're kidding...

but if not.... :hug:

[uppityperson]

190. No jokes. The "good old days" had some bad points.

No time is all bad or all good. Societies change, things change, hearing about how the "good old days" were sooooo wonderful and nowdays are soooo bad in comparison I find annoying. Thanks for the hug, took a while to get past all of it, even that which was considered "normal" back then in the area I was raised.

[tenshi816]

183. If I weren't an only child,

I'd swear we grew up in the same family.

[Donnachaidh]

12. we had m80's, firecrackers and sparklers

and actually still have all our fingers NOW. Of course, we had parents that actually showed us how to handle the things safely first.

[Union Thug]

27. We used to make "bullet bombs"...

So, we would collect the empty brass from my dad's .270 win, knock out the primers and fill the casing with black powder. Then we would bend the end of the casing over so that the powder wouldn't escape. Brilliant children, we thought it was a good idea to pull the fuse from a firecracker and poke it in the small hole where the primer would ignite the gunpowder. We were carefull though...and twisted a couple of firecracker fuses together to get that extra inch of running time.

Finally, we would set the damned things down on a fence post light the fuse and run like hell. We only took shrapnel once and learned to duck behind corners, trees, etc.

I don't know how we survived.

[elehhhhna]

84. LOL My hubs had a pal who made plastic explosives in high school

He was later questioned by the FBI when they were searching for the Unabomber.

Here's to you, Topper, you nut, wherever you are. Those crazy stories about you have kept me laughing for 20-plus years.

[mongo]

117. We used to do a similar thing

except we would fill a .22 casing with powder, pound another into it, then throw them in a campfire.

[Union Thug]

177. Aha!...the added element of burning coal to accompany the brass!!!

How did we survive childhood?

Let's not even start with learning to ride a motorcycle...

[Union Thug]

29. Oh yeah..sparklers... Shot from a bb gun, they really made a gathering of family..

members scatter... :-)

[lizerdbits]

133. I miss fireworks

You can hardly have anything now. And like you I have all my fingers because we were instructed to use them by our parents. Some places you can't even have those snakes, the black disks that you light and they snake around while leaving the black stain on the sidewalk. Please!

[Ilsa]

197. I saw a five year old at the plastic surgeon's office.

He had nearly had his hand blown off, but the surgeon was able to save it. I wouldn't trust a kid that young to handle a firecracker safely, even with instruction from a parent. Let's face it, some parents are idiots. I bet your parents were smart enough to wait until you were a little older.

[NNN0LHI]

14. We fell out of trees...

Was thinking about this very thing just the other day while walking the dog. Hundreds of mature trees lining the perimeter of this subdivision. And not one tree house. Not one set of wood slats to be used as ladders hammered into the tree trunks to allow quick trips to the top or for building a small lookout platform or fort. This place is filthy with kids too. They must all be in the house playing video games these days?

Not sure if it is for better or worse, but it is definitely different from my days growing up. I used to have a nail pouch and a claw hammer with me at all times. I guarantee I would have been to the top of every tree out here when I was a kid. I would have fell out of some too.

Don

Edit: Born in '55

[TahitiNut]

19. Yep. Treehouses were everywhere. We had a crabapple tree ...

... too small for a treehouse but just fine for climbing, scratches and all. I left more blood in that tree than I've left in CBC's since then.

My cousins and I had a rad treehouse on their land in the country ... about 25' off the ground, we could only get to it by nailing scraps of lumber to the side of the tree for a makeshift ladder - a ladder that repeatedly lost 'rungs' under our feet as we fell - only to replace 'em and climb up again.

[lonestarnot]

20. Or climbed them and rode them back upright.

[cwydro]

92. My sis and I had an awesome treehouse

and a thick rope with knots in it to descend. Oh man, I still can feel the rope burn.

[NashVegas]

123. We Had a Tree House in a HUGH Pine

And Mom always kept a bottle of LestOil for us to wash the pitch off our hands.

[Why Syzygy]

15. A survivor ..

and with a kid in the same age range you give.

Some of this is true, and some not. We had Nintendo.
I almost want to dissect this piece. But too tired.

I'll say a couple of things. The babies did not sleep on lead based paint.
Maybe what this writer did not mention is that many babies of the 50's were put to bed with paragoric. Alcohol and opium. yummy!

There is nothing wrong with butter. God made it. Is is good. No celluliete on this body. No clogs. All good. Butter . good. While I'm mentioning it, 'margirine', the sub has a lose hydrogen atom that will raise hell with your natural body. Which god also made. So 2=2. Eat natural stuff.

I ate cement until I was past hs. It has a nice chalkly, crunchy flavor.

No kid of mine ever had koolaid or very much sugar! His fav was raw salad. Cannot believe you are downing butter, but koolaide is okay. Get some chemistry instruction.

[cwydro]

142. I remember Paragoric

and damn, it cured whatever ailed you. Mom used to give it to us with a spoonful of sugar, lol.

And I'm with you about the butter.

[spacelady]

169. Don't talk to me about paregoric, 'cuz I am very upset about it not being

available anymore! It would calm an upset tummy right now with no side effects! Of course, veterinarians can prescribe it easily for our pets!

[cwydro]

186. I know, I wish it was still available too

Pets can take it?

[TahitiNut]

17. When I was 4-7, we lived in a new GI Bill subdivision of ASPHALT-sided houses.

The entire neighborhood was under construction and the siding was being cut and nailed to the houses. Fireproof! Durable! We played in all the newly-framed houses and 'sailed' flat scraps of siding against the walls - target practice for young arms.

No asbestosis yet. :shrug:

[FredStembottom]

18. It was neighborhoods with a parent in each home all day....

that made this possible.

Back about 35 years ago, when women were first becoming "liberated", I had hopes that it all meant that there would still be someone home in all those houses - just that about 50% of them would be husbands at home during the day.

I had dark, dark despair thinking it might mean no grownups at home during the day.

But Reagan economics (forcing the need for 2 breadwinners in each house) combined with "women's lib" to make it exactly my worst fear.

This was a bad outcome!

[Erika]

43. Glad it was finally put on Reagan

He hurt the average home intolerably.

[Hippo_Tron]

48. I don't see a problem with two working parents if the kids are school aged

If the kids are in school for 8 to 3 I don't see the point of a parent staying home. Then again, I've always had two working parents so that's all I've ever known. Maybe I'm missing some perspective here.

[FredStembottom]

109. It has most to do with the summer months

And the after-school alone gap so many kids have. It is during these times that the trouble starts.

In the old days the network of at-home all day parents (it was Moms, of course) all knew each other in social circles that are gone now. These constant eyes and ears that knew which kids they were seeing - and who to report back to! - made entire neighborhoods into Hillary's famous villages. They all watched the kids.

[maggiegault]

128. Not Necessarily True

My mother was passed out in a puddle of her own whisky-scented sick at least 50% of the time. She was a "stay at home" mother, yet somehow her children did all of the housework and childrearing. I'm the oldest of three, and I have no children of my own. The reason? I already raised my sister and brother.

Born in 1970, grew up in rural Indiana on a "court" in a nice subdivision.

[FredStembottom]

173. Of course!

I am strictly speaking "in the aggregate" - as they say.

Any one particular family could have had any number of problems.

[spacelady]

170. There is the perspective of parents working at different times of the day

That is my experience & that was back in the 60's. I grew up in a small midwestern town & the OP message is one that I experienced, if you have ever seen the movie "Dazed & Confused", it was very realistic to what my teenage years were like. Alas, todays teens will never experience that sort of freedom. And that movie illustrated the beginning of the end with the drug testing for sports - it has all gone downhill from there - thanks Ronnie & Nancy!

[Hippo_Tron]

180. Funny, I just watched that movie tonight

Makes me wish I had grown up in the 70's. Not that we don't have fun now, everything is just so much more uptight. No free love anymore, either, AIDS kinda ended that fad.

[Union Thug]

21. My brother and I (ages about 12 and 8) used to take out the .22s

and go shooting in woods without supervision. This was circa 1976.

[roamer65]

114. Yeah, I hear ya. I used to take my dad's .22 pistol out and target shoot...

without supervision. Ride mini-bikes up and down our country back roads ,etc.

[Union Thug]

179. Different world, man.

My grandfather saw me looking at a jar full of parts for a colt 1911 that he had disassembled in his basement. He told me that if I could put it together, I could have it.

Needless to say, that was enough to motivate me and after some trial and error, I got that gun put together and he honored his agreement. I was 12 years old and had a .45 automatic in my dresser. And my parents were fine with it.

[uppityperson]

22. Here is mine, my remarks in parenthesis ( see)

First, we survived being born to mothers who smoked and/or drank while they were pregnant. (Mine took DES and so far so good)
They took aspirin, ate blue cheese dressing, tuna from a can, and didn't get tested for diabetes. (and some had problems BECAUSE they didn't get tested for diabetes and got exclampsia)

Then after that trauma, we were put to sleep on our tummies in baby cribs covered with bright colored lead-based paints. (sleeping in a crib with lead based paint isn't bad, it is when that paint chips off or gets chewed on that is bad, leading to problems which is why they don't use it anymore thank goodness)

We had no childproof lids on medicine bottles, doors or cabinets and when we rode our bikes, we had no helmets, not to mention, the risks we took hitchhiking. (sib had stitches from bike accident, I slit my wrist on a fence once by accident, only had 1 scary hitchhiking incident in which I got away before I got raped)

As infants & children, we would ride in cars with no car seats, booster seats, seat belts or air bags. (another sib spent time in ER after a car accident)

Riding in the back of a pick up on a warm day was always a special treat. (I had 2 friends die when the pickup they were riding in rolled)

We drank water from the garden hose and NOT from a bottle. (still don't drink from bottles but glad to not be drinking out of leaded hoses anymore)

We shared one soft drink with four friends, from one bottle and NO ONE actually died from this. (no, we just all got sick with measles, german measles, chickenpox, mono, but many people did die from these childhood diseases)

We ate cupcakes, white bread and real butter and drank koolade made with sugar, but we weren't overweight because, WE WERE ALWAYS OUTSIDE PLAYING or WORKING ! (nothing wrong with butter or real sugar, just need to limit amounts and, you know what? I had a couple OBESE childhood friends)

We would leave home in the morning and play all day, as long as we were back when the streetlights came on. (so long as we were within calling distance)

No one was able to reach us all day. (except by phone at school or friends house)
And we were O.K.

We would spend hours building our go-carts out of scraps and then ride down the hill, only to find out we forgot the brakes. After running into the bushes a few times, we learned to solve the problem. (and got casts on our broken limbs)

We did not have Playstations, Nintendo's, X-boxes, no video games at all, no 150 channels on cable, no video movies or DVD's, no surround-sound or CD's, no cell phones, no personal computers, no Internet or chat rooms.......WE HAD FRIENDS and we went outside and found them! (or we stayed home and emo-moped in our rooms. And felt really sad when friends commited suicide because we didn't know they felt that bad)(glad he shot himself in the bathroom as it made it easier to clean up)

We fell out of trees, got cut, broke bones and teeth and there were no lawsuits from these accidents. (why would I sue someone for falling out a tree even now? Who does this even now? I mean, suing a doctor or a place for negligence is fine, but falling out of a tree?)

We ate worms and mud pies made from dirt, and the worms did not live in us forever. (No way did we, at least not me, except in my imagination)

We were given BB guns for our 10th birthdays,
made up games with sticks and tennis balls and, although we were told it would happen, we did not put out very many eyes. (I wanted a BB gun but never got one. UPjr played with lots of sticks and got a bb gun though)

We rode bikes or walked to a friend's house and knocked on the door or rang the bell, or just walked in and talked to them! (wow, imagine that, going to a friends house and knocking? oops, just had to take a break here because 3 teens showed up in my office looking for UPjr, didn't even knock though my dog growled)

Little League had tryouts and not everyone made the team. Those who didn't had to learn to deal with disappointment. Imagine that!! (many of us never tried out for "the team" and those of us who didn't make it, or the cheerleading squad, I'll admit I tried out, were crushed, then looked down at the jocks and the cheerleading sluts)

The idea of a parent bailing us out if we broke the law was unheard of.
They actually sided with the law! (some did, some didn't, same as always)

These generations have produced some of the best risk-takers, problem solvers and inventors ever!
The past 50 years have been an explosion of innovation and new ideas. (what is a "best risk taker" and why is this something to be proud of? Yes, technology has boomed, far outweighing humanities ability to deal with it, like nukes)

We had freedom, failure, success and responsibility, and we learned
HOW TO DEAL WITH IT ALL! (some turned to alcohol, some just hung out, waiting, for something, to, happen)
If YOU are one of them . . . CONGRATULATIONS!

Kind of makes you want to run through the house with scissors, doesn't it?! (no, I'd trip and poke myself since I am a middle aged person)

[dionysus]

185. what a lame buzz-kill

thanks

[uppityperson]

191. you are welcome and thanks for appreciating my sharing stories of my life

[Kelly Rupert]

26. Given the degree by which life expectancy has risen in the last fifty years,

the correct answer to the rhetorical question is "y'all really didn't do that great a job of surviving it."

[uppityperson]

28. Or, those that survived did while many others didn't.

[Kelly Rupert]

31. Six of one, half dozen of the other.

[SmokingJacket]

102. I knew tons of dead kids in the seventies.

I don't think my own kids know any.

[Blue_In_AK]

30. In fact, they used to tell pregnant and nursing mothers

to drink beer to make rich milk. They told me that even in 1972 when I was pregnant with my first, although since I don't like beer, I never did it. (I did other things, though, that all pregnant mothers are cautioned against, with no ill effects.)

[Porcupine]

32. Emergency room visits, having sex with the priest..

:sarcasm:
Yeah, those were the good old days. Not all of it was good. I think we need to pick and choose from the good and bad just like we do today.

[elehhhhna]

85. polio. that's what I miss the most.

[bmbmd]

124. And SIDS from putting kids face down.

and patent ductus arteriosus from aspirin usage. And Bob Lehman's glass eye from that time the M-80 went off in his hand. And my wife's uncle who was still-born at a whopping eleven pounds because of undiagnosed diabetes. And plumbism from all those kids actually eating those lead chips. Those were the days, alright.

[elehhhhna]

150. let us not forget severe pre-enclampsia.

oh, and undiagnosed "gay cancer" (AIDS)

[lizerdbits]

138. They now have a chicken pox vaccine too

I was born in 74 most of other mentioned diseases I was vaccinated for before I even remember. My nephew might not get to scratch himself until he bleeds from chicken pox and then have his towels tied around his hands to try to make him stop. Poor kid! I think they have some for H. influenzae so he's not getting pneumonia. I guess he'll have to hear the stories from my parents about siblings dying and be sad he missed it.

[elehhhhna]

149. welcome, lizardbits! That C-pox vaccine is sorta iffy, imo.

When one gets a mild case in childhood, one is still succeptable to another bout later. There are some fears that the vac-response mimics a very mild case. My poor bud Mark got 'em for the second time in the 90's, when he was about 30, and it was HORRIBLE. Really.

Stay away from poxy children.

[Ilsa]

198. Yep, dying in childbirth was a real party for everyone also! nt

[NNN0LHI]

33. Anyone else ever have dirt clod wars?

The teams consisted of anywhere from one to dozens of kids on each side.

The weapons and battleground consisted of dirt clods made of recently dumped piles of clay and dirt hardened in the sun.

The object was to hit the guy(s) on the opposing side with a dirt clod. The dirt clods that missed would whistle pretty good as they came whizzing by my ear as I remember.

This wasn't my favorite sport. I kept my head down a lot.

Don

[Donnachaidh]

82. or mudsliding after a long rain period?

We used to do that in Junior High. There was a hill in back of the school that became ideal for that oozy, slippery muck that turned a kid into instant claymation characters LOL!

[elehhhhna]

87. rock-filled snowballs, hockey w/o mouth guards...

...bloody patches of snow and ice up and down the street. "Hey! That's where Ernie's front teeth got knocked out!"

good times, good times.

[GreenZoneLT]

89. We used rocks

Rocks are easier to find than dirt clods in East Tennessee.

[bikebloke]

108. Plenty of dirt clod battles

Also, crab apple wars when they were in season. A skill that later came in handy while I was working in the Negev desert. A couple times we had dog fights on tractors, using tomatoes as ammo.

[Maraya1969]

168. I remember having horse pucky fights, (that would be with dried horse shit)

And when I broke my arm falling off my horse the doctor just said that if I fell off again I'd break it up further toward my shoulder. So I rode with my broken arm in a cast in a sling.

[ninkasi]

36. I was born in 1943

and grew up in Houston. During the summers, since none of us had air conditioning, our mothers all took naps in the afternoon. They got up very, very early, in order to get things done before the heat set in. The main requirement for kids who had outgrown naps was to not disturb our mother's, and grandmother's, naps on summer afternoons.

Otherwise, we were pretty much left to ourselves, since any misbehavior would be punished by whichever neighborhood adult happened to catch us in the act. I can still remember my mother nagging at me to go outside and play in the fresh air, and not stay inside with my nose stuck in a book all of the time. Can you imagine a mother trying to stop her daughter from reading now?

I do remember that I caught mumps, measles, and chickenpox, and that some kids I knew survived whooping cough or scarlet fever. Some survived polio, and one had to wear leg braces, but escaped having to live in an iron lung. There are good times and bad in every era. I know, because my mother certainly told us often enough about the hardships of growing up during the depression.

All in all, though, I think that today's children have much more pressure to achieve being placed on them, and once they learn to read, and are aware enough to take in the news, they surely have much more serious problems facing them than we ever did. The ones I see the most, my grandchildren, and great-nephews, cope much better than I believe I could have. I agree that we had a lot to deal with, but compared to nuclear war and global warming, I think we had the better bargain.

[NashVegas]

127. The Pressure to Achieve, Without the Freedom to Screw-Up

Doesn't seem like a very good trade-off.

[LittleClarkie]

37. And to think there are those who would discount those people

and say we need "something new" like politics was like Christmas, and as long as the new politician doesn't have an scuff marks yet, he's better than what we have now.

[sweetheart]

38. pop can pull tabs cut feet

.. but with the right tab, with 2 slits in the ring,
break off the tear-shaped bit, and use it like a spring to shoot
the ring for very long distances... back when a coke was a can *and* a toy.

The same generation had those 'unsantitary' cloth diapers;
moon-sticks astronaut food of gosh knows that origin;
skateboards with clay wheels (still got the scars);
and wooden skis, and bindings that sometimes did not release breaking legs.

... or remember real drunk drivers? As a kid, i remember drunk driving
like nothing i've every seen today. Then, a car would be wandering all over
the road and everyone would get the hell out of the way... not a blood alcohol
think but something wholly more obvious.

[Hardrada]

51. So many times I remember driving with my Dad or G'pa

and they would slow way down because some car in front was yawing back and forth on the road and they'd say "Oh, so and so is drunk again." Or, if they did not not recognize the car, they'd say something like, "Looks like that guy's had a snootful." It was just a fact of life. The last really drunk person I saw driving was about 1978 or 79.

[pnwmom]

39. And how many of us today would NOT be alive if it weren't for

antibiotics, emergency rooms, cancer treatments, etc.

that weren't available in the golden days.

Sorry, but the 40's and 50's are overrated, IMO.

[uppityperson]

41. indeed. Some had a simpler childhood, but many did not.

I was raised with the myth that a family was biological father, mother, children living together when in reality this was not the majority of families. Antibiotics, immunizations, more awareness and openness helps more people remain healthily alive.

[pnwmom]

45. When my baby sister was dying, in the halycon 50's,

there was no emergency room to take her to. You had to wait for a doctor to admit your sick child to a hospital, and the doctor who was filling in for our doctor didn't take my mother's concerns seriously. (My sister had a high fever and convulsions.) Of course, no one ever sued a doctor back in those days. It's hard for me to feel that means we were better off.

Yeah, and that mythic family image was hard on my family, too. We only looked like the stereotypical family -- and at an enormous cost to parents and children. All that faking is hard on everybody.

[Mind_your_head]

53. There were no paramedics back in that day either......

You would have been sent bleeding on a cot in a large station wagon if you got in an accident or a heart attack (common then). Everyone assumed that everyone else acted "in good faith" back in those days....usually they did, sometimes (rarely?) they didn't. That's how it was.

I'm so glad that we've evolved, but let's work to "keep the best" of this progress and 'put down'/recognize the "down-side" of it all....b/c surely there is a down-side.

I'm sorry about your sis.

Peace,
M_Y_H

[pnwmom]

55. Thanks, M_Y_H.

And you're right, of course. "Progress" certainly has its downside. There aren't any simple solutions.

[Mind_your_head]

42. Thanks for posting this Wiley!

I remember taking long 'bike-hikes' with my friends when I was only 10-12 or so....we'd pack our own lunch and then head out to 'parts unknown'. We'd ride 1-2-3 towns over ~ not knowing where we were at all! But we HAD to figure out our way back, which we always did, even though we had to suffer the 'panic' of unfamiliarity of the different areas...which we eventually came to know somewhat. There would be hell to pay if we weren't back by dinnertime (a little speech from my dad starting with "I'm so relieved that you're back safe & sound....with that said, "you have no right to worry the heck out of us, irresponsible, blah, blah, blah...LOL) Through it all, we had tons of fun and learned so much!

We never could understand one "fringy" friend of our group who usually wouldn't go with us on these jaunts b/c she HAD to be back to watch "Dark Shadows" at 3:00 pm every weekday...How do I remember the soap opera "Dark Shadows" and that it was shown at 3:00 pm (Chicago time)? B/c we all thought she was an ass for missing all of the great things we were doing in 'real life' because of a teevee show. I sometimes (not often though) wonder how 'life' turned out for her.....

Peace and thanks for reminding me of those 'good times'
M_Y_H

[u4ic]

44. A cousin and a friend

both died from motorcycle accidents in the mid 70's. Both not wearing a helmet. I'd like to see some statistics that seat belt usage had no effect on mortality. (sounds freeperish to me)

They failed to mention that abuse wasn't talked about. If you were a child, or a adult experiencing it, there was no one you could turn to for help.

And what about thalidomide?

Mercury (in tuna) wasn't as big as an issue as it is now.

There are some things I miss about 'those days', but we've made a lot of advancements as well.

[pnwmom]

50. Thalidomide is a perfect example.

Both as an example of our gaining a greater understanding about preventing birth defects, and as an example of when our legal system actually worked.

We only had a handful of thalidomide cases in the U.S. before the manufacturer pulled the plug on the drug. Why? Because our punitive damage awards were so high. Meanwhile, in Europe and England where the awards were tiny by comparison, there were many more victims. So when we talk about limiting lawsuits or punitive damages, we should think through all the consequences.

Mercury actually became a huge issue in Asia some decades ago, with ghastly birth defects.

And you just made me think about lead poisoning, too. I don't think any of us want to go back to the days when no one was aware of those dangers, either.

[unblock]

67. did you know that thalidomide is back on the market?

as a treatment for leprosy!

http://www.fda.gov/cder/news/thalinfo/default.htm

naturally there are huge warnings about birth defects....

[pnwmom]

96. Yes, and they're testing it for some uses in cancer, too

because it is effective at stopping cell growth.

That's okay with me, because both patients and doctors are aware of the risk. But in the 60's, thalidomide was being marketed specifically as a safe product for pregnant women, even after the manufacturer became aware of the risks.

[Bridget Burke]

122. Thalidomide is part of some chemo regimens...

But almost all of the chemo drugs are strongly "contraindicated" for pregnant ladies. Pregnancy tests & contraception are required.

Doctor Frances Oldham Kelsey was the FDA scientist who blocked thalidomide approval in the USA. Now that the approval process has been "streamlined," her reservations would be regarded as "obstructionism." Don't anger the drug companies!

[pnwmom]

148. It's scary, isn't it?

She was a hero. There's no telling how many families she saved.

[Hong Kong Cavalier]

46. Lead poisioning, Reye's Syndrome, Fetal Alcohol Syndrome, low birth weight, SIDS...

What's not to like?

It's funny how this piece makes everything seem so hunky-dory in "the good old days" but leaves out...
The Depression, the Red Scare and McCarthyism, the Cuban Missile Crisis, the Berlin Wall, the Civil Rights Movement, the assassinations of the Rev. MLK, JFK, and Bobbie Kennedy, Vietnam, Watergate, and a whole lot other stuff that made the time mentioned in the subject more than just "the good ol' days".

It was people like John F Kennedy, who stood before America and said we'd put a man on the moon before the decade was out that inspired the greatest thinkers, not the fluff piece above.
It was people like Martin Luther King, who stood before America and said we would no longer accept the racism that runs through this country, that inspired people not the fluff piece above.

Notice that this piece (I know you didn't write it, Wiley50. I've seen this before) mentions that those generations "have produced some of the best risk-takers, problem solvers and inventors ever! The past 50 years have been an explosion of innovation and new ideas."

In what I would consider the largest instance of irony I've seen in a while, those same "risk-takers, problem solvers, and inventors" discovered the cause of Reye's Syndrome, discovered what Fetal Alcohol Syndrome was, found out that eating lead-based paint was bad for your baby, and invented Cable Television, the Internet, DVDs, PlayStations, XBoxes, airbags for cars, and High Fructose Corn Syrup.

Heck, a good number of them became lawyers. (Doesn't this piece give a faint whiff of anti-lawyer bias?)
So, in a sense, this generation is completely responsible for all the things that this piece criticizes, because this generation invented all of those things that this piece puts down.

I'm not saying it's not a nice little piece of nostalgia. But the real world is a much, much more vibrant picture than that "Leave it to Beaver" past this piece is trying to portray.

[Mind_your_head]

49. Things can be used for good or for evil....

For example, a knife can be used to cut your bread or your meat or it can be used to stab your neighbor. The knife isn't bad. It's handler used it for a good purpose or a bad one.

I believe that the author (who is not the OP) is wanting to say....let's keep the "good stuff" and throw away/keep the "bad parts" at bay.

The author is pointing out (supported by a LOT of respondants) that there was a LOT to be said for that post WWII era ~ it wasn't perfect ~ but "Let's keep the 'good stuff'"

Peace,
M_Y_H

[Hong Kong Cavalier]

52. Meh.

I think the author of this piece is trying to dredge up a bunch of nostalgia, also hit against lawyers and safety regulations that are in place now because of "this generation" (note the comments in the fluff piece about drinking and smoking while pregnant, lead-based paints, tuna fish, and seatbelts.)

Anecdotal evidence here: the only people that send this piece to me (I get it about once every few months) are right-wingers.
None, and I mean none of my liberal friends think this essay is worth the electrons that were used to transmit it.

And if you really want, I could dig in the archives for another thread with this very same essay, and show the exact opposite effect.
This is a conservative hit-piece that does nothing but attempt to paint over the last fifty years with a shiny coat of varnish and call it gold.

I don't give a rat's ass if the entire board of DU supports this fluff piece. I think it's crap.

[oblivious]

59. I'm glad to see someone gets it.

[Hong Kong Cavalier]

94. And I'm glad to see that I'm not alone in my opinion about this essay

:hi:

[fishnfla]

62. Right wing revisionist bullshit all the way, good call

let me guess kids used to play with guns and chew on razor blades too

[XanaDUer]

78. I get this about once every six months from an idiot

at work who is a freep. Other stupid things she does to clog up the recipients' inboxes are requests for prayers, bogus warnings about urban legends, doggerel about angels, and sexist jokes about how much smarter women are than men, etc.

Belch.

[Hong Kong Cavalier]

134. I have a "friend" who sent me this months ago...

After that one, he sent me a "humor" piece about why "men are just better than women". (Supposedly it picked on men's stereotypes)
I guess he thought it was funny, but I told him to stop sending me this woman-hating crap.

Haven't heard from him since.

[uppityperson]

143. Me too, it is and me too.

[gollygee]

147. I agree

I get this from freeper relatives. It's about "personal responsibility" which translated means that corporations have NO responsibilities.

[minkyboodle]

175. I've gotten it from a freep type myself

it reeks of freeperism IMO.

[Ilsa]

200. Babs Bush drinking during pregnancy probably gave us the W we all

know and love today. :sarcasm:

[aquart]

47. Teachers didn't give a damn about my self-esteem, either.

[symbolman]

54. Yep

THOSE WERE THE DAYS MY FRIEND :)

I so enjoyed all this, I've been reminiscing about the 70's and had forgotten about being a KID, all the kids on the block playing RED ROVER, and I just went back there, and the big field where we played is ALL MCMANSIONS now.. sickening..

So there were BAD things then, so what, the GOOD outwieghed the bad, and let me tell you, people were a LOT goddam NICER to each other too. If you were a Republican or Democrat it made NO DIFFERENCE. No one really ATTACKED people for those beliefs, they'd just pop another beer and play volleyball or horseshoes.

Everyone NOW is SO invested in their own egos that they ATTACK, Attack, Attack, all the time.

Snarky wasn't so well used to protect fragile egos then, unless you were a DORK. :)

Remember, the DORKS are still dorks, but the GEEKS took OVER :)

[pnwmom]

56. Everybody wasn't nicer to each other back then.

Tell that to the people in the civil rights movement. Or to gays and lesbians. Or to the kids on the block getting beaten (with society's full approval) by their parents behind closed doors.

[NV1962]

57. Meh, nothing wrong with a tad of nostalgia for those of us who strangely survived...

Looking back, hell yeah, it's been a crazy ride.

Every age collects a different set of scraps; different, yet similar in so many ways...

And the most important ageless coincidence is that life is damn short.

I'm not unhappy with my scrapbook at all, but I'm sure as hell glad that things aren't the same anymore.

Life's too short to live in nostalgia... But it's fun to have a throwback party, very occasionally.

[Luminous Animal]

58. Reactionary piece of crap

Oh sure, let's bring back lead paint. And smoking drunk pregnant women. And tuna in a can or otherwise wasn't a problem until the oceans reached a critical poison point brought to you by stinkin' pollutin' corporations. Same with diabetes, cynically brought to you by Kellogs, Nestles, Campbells, and Sara Lee.

And the thing about babies sleeping on their tummies? Well, the "experts" told women to put their babies on their tummies and continue to turn them onto their tummies even when the babies prefered to sleep otherwise. Perhaps babies would thrive best left to their own devices.

And yes, WE (that is those who are alive) indeed survived without helmets, seat belts, airbags, etc. Thousands of others died without using them. Isn't it grand that we can thumb our noses in their dead faces and that we beat the odds?

I don't know one kid's family that sued because the kid fell out of a tree. Do you?

I don't know one kid that doesn't HAVE FRIENDS. Do you?

I grew up in Michigan, Ohio, and Delaware and Little League NEVER had tryouts. For sure some kids rarely got to play but Little Leaque was open to every kid. That was the beauty of it.

As to much of the rest... I don't know what kind of kids you are aquainted with but the kids that I know ride bikes, hike in the woods, roller skate, climb trees, go to museums, make movies, and they travel on their own all over the city (San Francisco) and visit each other.

And finally... parents siding with the law? What a fucking joke. Indeed, if one was white and middle class, the law was certainly on your side because the law was never going to consider arresting your kid let alone keeping him or her for even one night in jail.



Post script: If you have children and you agree with the OP's message, then you've really fucked up as parents.

[oblivious]

60. No kidding!

[Mind_your_head]

61. Huh????? Your last line......

Post script: If you have children and you agree with the OP's message, then you've really fucked up as parents.

Thank you for that authoritative and INSIGHTFUL comment.....*cough* :eyes:

[Swamp Rat]

64. Too much lead paint

:D

[nini]

136. Hey.. if we want to reminiscence then let us

We are all fully aware life wasn't perfect. Life is never perfect at any given time. But this list reminds us of growing up and the dumb stuff we did.

Can't you just take it at that and let us laugh about stuff? :eyes:

This especially pisses me off: "And finally... parents siding with the law? What a fucking joke. Indeed, if one was white and middle class, the law was certainly on your side because the law was never going to consider arresting your kid let alone keeping him or her for even one night in jail."

Here's a new flash for you.. My dad was a LAPD cop and had to arrest the son of a friend of his for stealing the car. Guess what? He arrested the white/middle class kid who was the son of a friend because that's what he was supposed to do. Not all white kids got away with shit. AND if you think that mentality was just back then you are mistaken.

And thank you for telling us we fucked up as parents! Guess I'll go kill myself now because I had a kid and think this OP was funny because it brought back some memories.

[cwydro]

140. Thank you nini

I like remembering the bad old days. And I knew a few white middle class kids who got busted too.:evilgrin:

[Swamp Rat]

63. Ha! I lucked out.

My mom quit smoking before she got pregnant... all the rest applies and then some, though I never ate dirt on purpose. :D

[Vidar]

65. Thanks for the deserved chuckle, Wiley.

[Buck Rabbit]

66. Hiding under my desk saved me from nuclear annilation in the 60s.

They don't make school desks like those anymore.

[Philosoraptor]

68. I survived polio, a head on collision, & a heart attack

I survived the crazy drug years, no small feat, and I survived a fall off a stone spillway. I survived a kidney infection at birth, I survived Nixon and reagan, to this day, I survive, all without dr. phil.

[Swamp Rat]

69. but we haven't yet finished the Bushler years

:scared:

[Philosoraptor]

70. Damn you! I was just startin' to feel lucky

[Swamp Rat]

71. So far you are...

we ARE lucky to be alive... to think about all those M-80s and REAL guns, and even MUCH worse stuff we kids played with... :scared:

[Philosoraptor]

72. my folks let me climb railroad tressles all day over a river

and when i wasn't doing that i was exploring caves on bluffs 200 feet up, and then come home at night all beat up and happy.

[Swamp Rat]

73. all beat up and happy

:rofl: YES!!! :D

I remember train-jumping at the Mississippi Riverbend to Audubon Park, and to the French Quarter, then jumping on the back end of the streetcars to catch a ride home late at night... occasionally getting chased by the conductor and/or the police. :evilgrin:

[Catfight]

74. Our yards always looked like crap because we played in them, now

you drive around and all you see is perfect lawns with overweight kids standing on them. The next generation is going to have some serious issues, I think they'll be the FatZ Gen.

[Arkansas Granny]

75. Great post and I remember it well. Unfortunately, some of the

people responding to this didn't read your opening statement.

"I found this on a small topical board I have started posting at.
I'm not standing up for all of the stuff in it.
Just thought it might make for interesting discussion here.
Have at!"

I think most people tend to wax nostalgic when reminiscing about their childhood. My parents grew up during the depression, but most of their childhood stories were about the fun times they had and not the deprivation that they suffered. When I tell my children and grandchildren about my childhood I omit the parts about the polio epidemics, the drills at school for atomic bomb attacks, etc. It's a lot more fun to remember the good times.

[Berry Cool]

76. To be fair...

My mother didn't smoke or drink when she was pregnant.

I probably wasn't always outside, and I knew overweight kids.

I never ate worms or mud pies.

I never had a BB gun.

And my nieces have plenty of friends, despite all their modern technological advantages.

And I often consider myself lucky that at age four, I actually once rode from Ohio to Florida and back on the "hump" in the middle of the front seat of a Cadillac and didn't get killed.

Sometimes I think of the kids who DIDN'T survive their childhoods because they did stuff like that. But of course, no one reads about them, because they all died a long time ago.

Do I believe kids need freedom, failure, success and responsibility, and to learn how to deal with it? Yes. But it's not impossible to raise them with those things today and yet at the same time be sensitive to the dangers of the world.

Just think...someday, some adults will be writing stuff like "When we were kids, we had computers hooked up to the Internet that were RIGHT IN OUR BEDROOMS...and no parent was watching what we did on them or what sites we visited...AND WE SURVIVED!" or "Our cell phones had 'off' buttons and sometimes we used them when we were out with our friends...AND WE SURVIVED!"

[XanaDUer]

77. Is bleu cheese dressing dangerous?

What is up with bleu cheese dressing?

[laundry_queen]

101. IIRC

Bleu cheese is a soft cheese which means it may contain listeria which can be harmful to pregnant women.

[XanaDUer]

154. Okay, thanks.

I'm still eating it, though! :evilgrin:

[Jamastiene]

79. There was no such thing as ADD either.

Kids with that were just called little brats who needed their asses whooped. Also, we walked to school barefooted in the snow, uphill, both ways... Yeah, it was different when we were in school, but at least we didn't have to dodge bullets and wear ugly ass silly looking uniforms like little fascist bots.

[Vinca]

80. What a great post.

It reminds me why I'm glad to be the age I am. Remember trick or treating by yourself? Until long after dark? If you had a flat tire on your bike 5 miles from home you didn't pull out your cell phone, you turned the thing around and pushed it all the way back. There were wild games of kickball during recess and when you were picked last you dealt with it. My hyperactive little brother would have been stuffed with pills in today's world. Gram always said he had ants in his pants and sent him outdoors to play in his Zorro costume. Ah, memories.

[NashVegas]

130. LMAO

"Gram always said he had ants in his pants and sent him outdoors to play in his Zorro costume. Ah, memories."

Thanks for the image.

[zbdent]

81. Ask the person who sent you this if he or she would like to go back to

the medical knowledge of the times, the lack of cell phones, the emergency life-flight measures, etc. of the times that they'd like to grow up with, also ... and the wages of those times ...

This has been a RW POS for some time ... and on that "These generations have produced yadda yadda yadda " ... as I understand it, the most amazing runs of innovation are done during a time of world conflict ... like how they discovered "contacts" ... from how pilots who had their canopies shot up had stuff pierce their eyes and not be irritated ... or how a large chunk of today's medical knowledge was derived from the torture in the concentration camps ...

[Jennicut]

86. Some things were better, some were worse

For instance, putting babies on their backs has cut down on SIDS significantly. Having kids in care seats has cut their death rates in accidents. I am grateful I was tested for diabetes when I was pregnant as I ended up having gestational diabetes and I was induced early so my daughter was not too big. But all this technology does drive me nuts. I JUST got my computer a few months ago after living 6 years without one from when I moved out of my parents house. I JUST got a cell phone (only a tracfone) a year ago. I was born in 1975 and I remember playing outside until it was dark out and our parents had to yell at us to come inside. We played Atari and later Nitendo but not all day long. You just overall felt safer in your neighborhood. My girls are only 1 and 2 but when they get older I worry about them riding their bikes and playing until its dark out. I don't want to let them out of my sight. So we know more today but I think every generation that grows up feels they lost some innocence along the way.

[hayu_lol]

91. For those of us who survived those times(sarcasm)...

we did have freedom that kids today don't have. We had to figure out that if we had a flat tire, to carry a small tire patch kit. It was always problems and solutions.

The adult world and the world of kids was separate. Yes, bad things happened then, but we learned and we coped.

Seems like what the newer generations do is pick things apart and whine.

Those of us who lived back then...have for the most part really good memories of the differences between then and now. We got chuckles out of this item...and the rest of you 'newbies' tried to pick it apart.

Kids came home from school and had a snack...then took off to play. We made up our own games, and always managed to get back home before the streetlights came on. It was great. No one kidnapped us or shot at us or tried to run over us. Different times.

[halobeam]

119. Our kids get the short end of the stick.

Yeah, we all had loss of some innocence, true. So will our kids. The irreparable harm to our kids lives are their loss of REAL freedom. I remember trying to "get lost" in the next town, bicycle riding with my friend..we were nine and ten. No cell phones, etc. Home at dark, etc. I LOVED those times. Life was beautiful, outside was OURS.. the air smelled sweet and we were truly free. I had a very hard time letting my first child "out of sight"... He called when he got to his destination (around the corner), and when he was leaving to come home. I made him do this until he got a cell phone this year. My kid is 15. I have an 11 year old and now I give him my cell phone to use so he can travel further and be a bit more "free" than my first one did. I also didn't show him my fears as easily/often as I did my first... they do feel it. My oldest is not comfortable walking down the block in the dark. He'll be 16 in two weeks. I guess what I'm trying to say is, we need to find a balance between our fears of the reality that things are different now, and the reality that things are different now, but our kids are still kids, and they'll only be children for such a short time.

[ChickMagic]

88. I'm a survivor

Down south of Houston we had a terrible mosquito problem.
We used to run behind the DDT truck because the spray felt
like ice crystals. We were near the Houston ship channel
which was loaded with all kinds of toxins.

When I was at Moody College in Galveston (Pelican Island)
there was a toxic dump. Mosquitoes looked like pterodactyls.
My dark hair turned red.

When I went to buy shoes, they x-rayed my feet to get the
right size. They didn't use lead shielding.

on edit: x-ray

[RC]

153. I lost a sister to leukemia that was blamed on the shoe X-Ray machine.

She was 21 when she died.

[cwydro]

90. Thanks for the memories!

Brings back a lot of smiles. My first bike had no brakes and we lived on top of a hill.:rofl:

My sister and I used to eat raw hamburger...

[Sweet Freedom]

93. This has been around for quite some time

and the first time I saw it, my co-workers were talking about it and discovered that each of us was able to name someone we knew who died from not wearing a helmet or a seat belt or knew a family who lost their child to SIDS, gestational diabetes, etc. We concluded that just because we survived didn't mean everyone other kid did.

[Lugnut]

95. Imagine that!

I made it to 61 and counting.

[LeftishBrit]

97. Nostalgia's all right...

but it's not what it was.

[ElboRuum]

121. Ba-dum, psssssh... n/t.

[treestar]

98. This is more stupid than funny

Plain old not true and what are they advocating.

I was born in that time period but see no reason to congratulate myself for it. It happened. No credit to me.

Really, people born in that era were not such victims unless they got drafted and sent to Vietnam.

[NashVegas]

131. I Think Some People Mistake What It's Advocating

No one's saying, 'let's go back to lead-based paint,' as much as 'loosen up, will ya?'

There are going to be things, in every generation, that people allow or disallow because its fashionable or 'conventional wisdom.' The things that are allowed tend to be the ones we get the most learning experience from.

[Seabiscuit]

99. In the 50's we had bows and arrows, b-b guns and Wham-O! sling shots and

USED them (not on each other, of course).

[slackmaster]

100. In the '60s we had LAWN DARTS!

:nuke:

[One_Life_To_Give]

151. Maybe in Your neighborhood!

Maybe in Your neighborhood! USED them (not on each other, of course).


I recall being on the receiving end of a BB Gun and of more concern a Wrist Rocket.

[donsu]

103. Ok here's my replies

30, 40, 50' most women did not smoke and a large amount did not drink

most mothers knew to empty cans of food as soon as they were opened.

babies sleeping on stomaches is a debatable subject. true, not debated back then. but then not many babies died mysteriously in their cribs.

only stupid parents left medicine or cleaning substances where children could reach them. true we/they rode bikes with no helmets and we roller skated with no protection. (while biking and falling on loose gravel, taught me not to ride on loose gravel and yes my bloody gravel full knee hurt like hell)

no seat belts or protection in cars we were well aware of and knew we drove with the Fates and Muses. stupid parents let their children ride in the bed of pick up trucks.

drinking water from a garden hose was not lethal then as most garden hoses were rubber not plastic.

most children were taught not to share drinking containers, etc. polio was rampant then plus other infections.

true there wasn't much obesity. most all schools had mandatory phys. ed. TV wasn't invented yet for part of that time and after invention it didn't have as many shows for children as it does now.

sexual predators were about then too. most parents demanded to know where their kids where at all times and double checked with other parents.

the rest of the stuff is neither here or there

and no parent with brains lets their children run around with pointed scissors

---------------------------


looking back is one thing. dealing with today is quite another.

[HCE SuiGeneris]

106. Absolutely brilliant!

Made my day! :hippie:

I miss my Slip-N-Slide ! :evilgrin:

[PVnRT]

107. And it's YOUR generation

that has become the Safety Nazis and clamped down on all of that.

[NashVegas]

132. Touche!

haha

[Arugula Latte]

110. I was alllowed to ride a "spooky" (not calm) horse alone in wilderness w/ no helmet.

I would NEVER EVER let my kids do that. Thinking about the close calls I had, I shudder. I could easily be dead or paralyzed.

This nostalgia for "simpler" times I can sort of understand, but I think the emphasis on safety has far more benefits than negatives. Many kids are NOT maimed (or dead) because of, for example, bike helmets. My son's best friend was hit while riding a bike (the car pulled into the bike lane -- definitely the driver's fault). The boy is fine, but if he had not been wearing a helmet, he definitely would NOT have been fine.

[bikebloke]

111. Nostalgia

We used to play in the woods, climbing trees and making forts. Played in the creek, catching crayfish. Caught box turtles in the woods. Organized our own games. Even invented games. Skateboards were made from an old roller skate nailed onto a plank.

Once we're into the next great depression, today's kids will hopefully learn to adapt to simplier living.

[raccoon]

112. This is good, but I would add some.

Nobody cared about whether our school was good or not, we just went to the one that was closest.

And some of them were shitty. THose I went to were.

Parents did not worry about spending "quality time" with us.
Nor were they concerned about our self-esteem.

[blues90]

113. I survived

I can add a few things to this list .

besides doing all the above we used to run in the fog sprayed out of a tank truck to rid the insects , I don't know what was in it but it could'nt be good .

My friends from my neighborhood and I used to play by the railroad tracks and walk the 2 miles to town in the dead of chicago jan winter at 10 year old unsupervised at night . And ride our bikes with no protection what so ever .

[fishnfla]

115. Born in 1964. List of violent gun violence I experienced in the 70's

dad's business partner blew his head off, shotgun suicide
best friends brother shot by neighbor kid while playing with loaded weapon
brother's high school buddy, see #1
neighbor murdered wife's lover, shotgun in crotch on our front lawn
family friend shot in face, kids with guns again

not too many survivors in that bunch. mostly hospital, funeral parlors, lawsuits and trials

I'm wondering why the levels of cancer, especially rare forms in younger people, are rising in this country. I'd bet everyone on this forum knows more than one person that has died of cancer at a young age. Was there none of that back then? Could it be that lead, cigarettes or mercury, I dunno...cause cancer?

Then again, whats up with diabetes? why is there such an epidemic among adults born in those decades?

and why is heart disease so prominant of a killer in the US? All these happy bike-riding, tree-climbing generations turned into such lard-asses?

Sure they survived their childhood, but to what effect?

[LeftishBrit]

118. To nitpick slightly, there's actually quite a difference between being born in 1930 and being born

in 1970; and those of us born a bit closer to the latter have heard a lot of nostalgia from those born closer to the former.

Things ain't what they used to be - and they probably never were! But yes, we did get the chance to play outdoors more than kids seem to nowadays.

I realized I was getting to be one of the Older Generation when I heard some of my students reminiscing sentimentally about how They Just Don't Make Computer Games Like They Did in the 80s.

Now the BIG question is how did we ever survive without computers - and without the Internets!

[ElboRuum]

120. Seen this before. This is a RW hit piece.

The target audiences for this are conservative Baby Boomers. Basically, this piece foments contempt for lawyers, government regulation of industry for reasons of safety, and younger generations. It also lionizes exclusionism, dismisses the value of progress, technological or otherwise, and stands up for unrelenting and impermissive social order. Most importantly it dismisses every negative happenstance of the past 50 years...

Of course it's true when the person reading it sees, "you are one of them". If you can read it, you obviously managed to luck out. I wonder how many didn't?

[Bridget Burke]

126. This ancient piece of glurge is still circulating?

Google shows more than 13,000 hits for "we survived being born to mothers who smoked"..

www.google.com/search?q=%22we+survived+being+born+to+mothers+who+smoked+%22&hl=en&lr=&start=0&sa=N

How can anyone think this is "interesting"?

[Kelly Rupert]

141. Especially considering how the child mortality rates

have significantly dropped since the 1960s. I mean, come on guys. You might have survived that. However, there were a great deal of children who did not.

My father lost a brother, a sister, and both parents to a car wreck in which nobody wore seatbelts. They did not "survive" despite a lack of safety precautions. Such occurances in which people did not survive are the very reason we have those precautions, in fact.

[diane in sf]

135. So, what's wrong with blue cheese dressing???? (eom)

[hyphenate]

137. Ah--youth and childhood!

Born in 1956, in Boston neighborhood. Ate mud and dirt. Didn't make me ill. Nowadays, the thought is repulsive--you "learn" that doing such things are/were not healthy. Had no problems dissecting earthworms, and trying to dig a hole to China.

Found a refrigerator box, hauled it up to the railroad tracks (active ones, not the kind that were abandoned) with some friends , made a fort of it.

Walked down the side of the tracks about a mile where we came off the tracks, and went to my aunt and cousins. No one reported us as missing, no one put out an Amber alert. I was the oldest--at 7.

Used to do good deeds--I used to go to the store for a few of the elderly people, a store that was about 8 blocks away. By myself. One day I went shopping and the bag broke, and something glass fell and shattered. Cut me bad on the right shin to the point where I was bleeding all over the place. No, my mother did not file a lawsuit or go hysterical. I had to have it stitched, but that was it.

I remember my brother and I used to actually stick our fingers into light sockets to get a shock, mostly because we were curious. And there was always the clock or radio I enjoyed taking apart. (I should have been a mechanical engineer!)

Real holly and berries at Christmas time.

Mogen David wine (blech!) Even at 11, I was allowed to drink it. I learned quickly that I hated wine!

Riding bikes we ourselves built and repaired. I was 12 at the time.

Saw the birth of my sister when I was five in the house. I was not traumatized.

Thank you for letting me remember some things I'd nearly forgotten. :)

[momophile]

139. born in '72 and that nailed my childhood nt

[uppityperson]

144. links to previous DU postings of this anti-health and safety nostalgia stuff in last yr

Nov 2006 http://www.democraticunderground.com/discuss/duboard.php?az=show_topic&forum=364&topic_id=2668708
July 2006 http://www.democraticunderground.com/discuss/duboard.php?az=show_topic&forum=364&topic_id=1694127

[IndyOp]

145. FREEPER ALERT! FREEPER ALERT! FREEPER ALERT!

To be clear - I don't mean that the DU'er who posted this is a freeper - because they aren't. I mean the topic of this email is FREEPER APPROVED.

While it sounds like a reminiscence of a by gone era -- and I was born in 1965 and have some of these same memories -- it is not just memories of a simpler time.

This email is a freeper-approved treatise for why GOVERNMENT IS BAD - why the court system that allows citizens hurt by corporations to demand redress is bad.

Think about it.

The bygone days: When paint companies put lead in their paints because they could make a bigger profit, even though they knew that lead was toxic. (They did not always know, but they did for some time before laws/regulations made them remove it).

The bygone days when we fell out of trees, got cut, broke bones and teeth and there were no lawsuits from these accidents. NO LAWSUITS? Thank god. Clearly no corporations deserve to be sued. Corporations should have free reign to sell whatever and not be responsible for any damage they do.

THIS is really disgusting, "As infants & children, we would ride in cars with no car seats, booster seats, seat belts or air bags." My local State Rep had to fight for YEARS to get a law passed requiring booster seats for toddlers. Her biggest foes? Corporations? No! Soccer moms who didn't want to the take the time required to buckle their kids in. No seat belts & airbags - those WERE the good ol' days when companies could make an extra $100 profit at the expense of OUR lives.

There must be balance in all things. Lawsuits are be good, neutral or bad - it depends on how they are used - like a knife.

The "personal responsibility" meme is bullshit. Not because personal responsibility is not necessary -- but because it is not sufficient. You must be responsible for yourself and the other's whose lives you impact. Or you could be libertarian - I've got mine, fuck you!

Some of the rest of the stuff - shared sodas, games with sticks, no Nintendo and Playstation I am all for. Watch out! Embedded in some pleasant memmories is a philosophy that is irresponsible, anti-communitarian, and anti-democratic.

:(

[tavalon]

146. Brings back memories

OTOH, there were a lot of kids who died because they didn't have a carseat and many who were brain damaged because they gnawed on the lead paint and many more kids died of SIDS back in those days (of course, we don't really have any idea if the back to sleep is the reason for the decrease) and so on.

[muriel_volestrangler]

152. Trends in United States infant mortality

In 1988 a total of 38,910 deaths of infants under 1
year of age were registered in the United States,
compared with 110,873 in 1960. The 1988 infant mortality
rate of 10.0 infant deaths per 1,000 live births, or
about 1 percent of all births, was the lowest final rate
ever recorded for the United States. This represents a
great improvement over infant mortality in the early
part of this century. Although precise data are not
available for 1900, it is estimated that at least 10
percent of all infants born in the United States at that
time died within the first year of life (19).

Statistics on infant mortality for the United States
as a whole are available from the national vital
statistics system beginning in 1933, when the infant
mortality rate was 58.1 (figure 1), slightly more than
half that in 1900. The rapid reduction in infant mortality
continued through the 1930’s and 1940’s, the rate
declining by an average of 4.0 percent per year from
1933 to 1950, The rate of decline slowed markedly to
1.0 percent per year for the period 1950 to 1964. In
1964 the infant mortality rate was 24.8, only slightly
lower than the rate of 29.2 recorded in 1950. Thereafter, until
the early 1980’s infant mortality declined rapidly, by an average
of 4.5 percent per year, from 24.7 in 1965 to 11.9 in 1981.
From 1981 to 1988 the rate of decline again slowed markedly
to average 2.5 percent per year.

http://www.cdc.gov/nchs/data/series/sr_20/sr20_020acc.pdf

By 1983, infant mortality had been cut to a fifth of the rate it was in 1933. What did the Romans do for us, anyway?

[Manifestor_of_Light]

155. C-sections have accomplished a lot of that

Nowadays C-sections are done before the mother is exhausted and stressed out in labor for two or three days, if the doctor has good sense.

And good prenatal care, diagnosis of diabetes, and other pregnancy related diseases has helped also.

I would have died if I had not had a c-section (I'm small and have really narrow hips) and it scares the hell out of me when some radical home-birth advocate insists that EVERY WOMAN can deliver vaginally and without any drugs.

Childbirth is not a contest. I had a 8 pound healthy kid that was jammed in my uterus diagonally and I had to stop working at six months because I could barely sit up. I couldn't work, I couldn't breathe, I could barely walk. I'm thankful for good surgeons and modern medicine. I knew I was gonna have a C=section because my doctor was smart enough to figure it out before I went into labor.

All these women who rant about "childbirth is a natural process" forget that in the bad old days before they found out about antiseptics and C-sections, one third of all women died either in childbirth from a stuck kid or from childbed fever (infection of the uterus because of dirty hands by the doctor delivering the baby).

Nowadays they can save kids with hyaline membrane disease (immature lungs) and at least delay delivery somewhat until the lungs mature.

They can keep the bad old days, and their lack of medical knowledge, as far as I am concerned.

And my mother smoked like a chimney. Who knows what that did. I know I have scar tissue in my lungs from her second hand smoke when I was a kid.

[lolly]

167. Yeah, the "wasn't it great when moms could smoke" hit me too.

My mom smoked when she was pregnant with us and all through our childhood.

I had severe athsma and constant bouts of bronchitus. Spent a lot of time in a hospital in an oxygen tent when I was a child. Gee, I sure feel sorry for kids today who have busybodies telling parents that they shouldn't smoke around kids.

Another response hit home with me:

There were wild games of kickball during recess and when you were picked last you dealt with it.

Yeah, we dealt with it. By learning to hate PE and hate the bullies who were allowed to humiliate us and smack us with a hard ball--bonus if you knock the glasses off! har-de-f-ing-har! Good thing those teachers back in them good ol' days didn't put a stop to all this good wholesome fun! I look at bullies and racists like George "maccaca" Allen and wonder if they didn't first learn that it was a GOOD thing to beat up people in these games.

I sure feel sorry for my kids, who have to go through the misery of a PE class that emphasizes individual effort, fitness, and improvement instead of rewarding pea-brained bullies for beating up on the kids who needed real help in physical fitness the most.

[Lena inRI]

157. Growing up in Chicago 1950s made this line stand out. . .

"We would leave home in the morning and play all day, as long as we were back when the streetlights came on. No one was able to reach us all day. And we were O.K."

Near Narragansett and Harlem Avenues, the whole neighborhood of kids would play Ringaleveo. . .teams would take turns hiding from each other down dark alleys, across RR tracks, behind factories. . .and if my team never got tagged, we'd yell,

RINGALEVEO--FREE--FREE--FREE

And that was it-- no prize! Many a summer night, we'd hate to go home when the Moms started calling out. . .dragging toward the kitchen to drink straight from milk bottles because we were so thirsty from running/hiding all over the neighborhood.

Now, the teams were made up of all ages. . .like packs of wolves we were! And for Halloween, same situation as we carried pillowcases far and wide, crossing those ever-foreboding RR tracks to see which group could collect the most candy . . .sometimes I'd run back home to get another pillowcase we were so productive!

So what the hell happened since the 50s to hear nothing but news about predatory pedophiles or seeing parents having to go trick or treating with their kids and checking all apples for razor blades?

The one who can answer this question gets the $64,000 prize. . .remember that TV quiz show?

BTW, thanks so much Wiley . . .for the memories!



:shrug: :shrug: :shrug: :shrug: :shrug:

[Bill McBlueState]

160. your annoying green text raises an interesting question

Are there more pedophiles and people who put razor blades in apples than there used to be? Or have these people always been with us, but fifty years ago they were free to go about their business without pesky news crews getting in their faces all the time?

[Kelly Rupert]

166. What happened is that y'all encouraged the media to show

nothing but made-up "scandals" like those.

[rambler_american]

158. I'm so old....

When I was a kid and mom took us to buy shoes we would try on a pair of shoes and then put our feet into a fluoroscope to see if they fit properly. We could wiggle our toes and watch our bones move. It was kinda fun, but good googley moogley how much radiation were we exposed to?
I also remember a demonstration at an RCA defense plant where a guy cooked a hot dog on a stick in microwaves. No shields for him or for us (we were a few feet away.) :crazy:

So, yeah, I wonder how we survived.

[K8-EEE]

161. I Hate Nostalgia; Selective, Romanticized, Not How I Remember

Well let's see I was born 1960---when I was little Bobby Kennedy was shot and my parents were tuned into all the Manson murder news (those murders happened just down the road from us)

I ran around the neighborhood and was home for dinner like it says here, but I got in two near-rape situations, one with a neighbor friend's brother and another a perverted dad, and since nobody talked about anything like that I ended up hiding from the whole neighborhood scene for a long time and becoming a really shy girl when I had been outgoing before.

One thing is if you broke a bone -- it didn't put your parents in the poorhouse like it does now.

I'm really not too proud of my generation, as we produced the mess we are in now. These cheery bunch of "risk-takers" described here led us to this current global crisis which they ignore. I'm putting all my faith into the kids of this current generation, and I really think they are more capable, less selfish, and smarter than us.

[goforit]

163. My god!!!....This was my life! It amazes me.

[Wrinkle_In_Time]

172. Those Born 1630 to 1670! (Makes you wonder how we Survived)

TO ALL THE KIDS WHO SURVIVED the 1630's 40's, 50's, 60's and 70's !!!!!eleventy

First, we survived being born to mothers who died during childbirth (or at least 2 out of 10 of us did). They took opium, ate live rats, and didn't get tested for cholera.

Then after that trauma, we were put to sleep in straw.

We had no medicine bottles, doors or cabinets and when we walked, we had no helmets, not to mention, the risks we took skipping.

As infants & children, we would run under carts with only one horse.

Riding in the back of a cart full of dead people was always a special treat.

We drank water from the street and only 80% of us died.

We ate dead rats, but we weren't overweight because, WE WERE ALWAYS OUTSIDE PLAYING or WORKING !

We would leave home in the morning and work 25 hours down the mill and pay owner for privilege.

We did not have food, health-care, fresh water, no medicine, no safety standards, no safeguards over tainted food. WE HAD FRIENDS and we went outside and propped them up with sticks!

We fell out of trees, got cut, broke bones and teeth and there were no lawsuits from these accidents. In fact, we died.

We ate worms and mud pies made from dirt, and the worms did not live in us forever. Neither did we.

We had freedom, failure, success and responsibility, and we learned
HOW TO DEAL WITH IT ALL!
If YOU are one of them . . . CONGRATULATIONS!

Kind of makes you want to run through the house with scissors, doesn't it?!

/FFS.
//Why is this right-wing P.O.S. being posted on D.U.?

[Mad_Dem_X]

189. LOL!

Great response. I would also add: Going to the toilet and then wiping with your hand because there was no toilet paper or running water, and then eating with the same hand.

[LeftishBrit]

193. I'm sure people were indeed saying stuff like that at the end of the 17th century!

I'm somehow reminded of a primary school child's composition about changes in health care in the last 300 years. This class of 8-and 9-year-olds had a lot of work put up on the bulletin board, and had written a lot of notes and essays, with some interesting illustrations, about how doctors have better treatments today; advances in immunizations and medicines; improvements in hygiene and sanitation (there were some lively descriptions of the limitations of toilets in the Olden Days); etc.

One child decided to present the changes succinctly in the form of a chart, which as far as I remember went as follows:


1700: Doctors didn't know much 2000: Doctors know more.

1700: No vaccinations 2000: Vaccinations

1700: Not many good medicines 2000: Good medicines

1700: No good drains 2000: Good drains

1700: No roller blades 2000: Roller blades

1700: No skateboards 2000: Skateboards

1700: No Beany Babies 2000: Beany Babies

[thatsrightimirish]

174. Yes!

And you all voted for Presidents Reagen, Bush one, and Bush two! My generation is oh so grateful :hi:

[Tactical Progressive]

178. So don't wear your seat belts, nostalgia clowns

And don't let your kids wear them either. Cut them out of your car. And make sure to remove your airbags too. Smoke cigarettes with them when they're twelve. Teach them to ride motorcycles without a helmet, nostalgia boys. And since you think no video games is so good for child development, get rid of 95% of your TV channels, too. It'll be good for you - get out and see your friends like your kids. Go for it.

Live life like a real man did in the 'good old days', not like some pampered, modern 'pc' worry-wart.

What a bunch of right-wing bullshit. Sure, I like to reminisce like anybody, and this little piece rang cute to me, OK, but I don't ever tip over into the phony perspective of how great it was. It was what it was for the times. If they could have had 200 channels on TV and airbags in their cars, they would have done it. They did do it. That's why we have these changes.

Unfortunately, this kind of stuff isn't created just to be cute. It's right-wing crap made to promulgate their anti-progressive mindset in just-regular-guy garb. Recognize 'I'm OK, fuck you' when you see it. Everybody else that has a problem is a whiner and too bad. That applies to today, where they couldn't give a shit about Katrina victims, or fifty million people who can't afford medical care, or the immoral inequities of wealth distribution. No more than they give a shit about about people who used to die in accidents that seat-belts and airbags make totally survivable, or didn't survive the any of the vagaries of life back then that we, probably mostly through pure luck, did. Why don't they give a shit? Because those vagaries didn't take them out, that's why. Simple when you understand the mindset.

Yeah, I had my own .22 when I was a teen and my friends and I used to go out in the woods with rifles by ourselves before we could even drive. Well gee, maybe all teens should be allowed to pack. Would you like that? Would you feel safe? Would you feel safe for your children?

This survivor arrogance is the same as winner arrogance. The same mentality, just in a different context. I didn't get fucked then, or I'm not getting fucked now, so tough for those who were or are.

I'm glad that there are helmet laws, seatbelt laws, airbag laws, video games and all the rest. Only an idiot isn't.

[hayu_lol]

181. For some of us, this was fun stuff...

In the 30s, we had the world we had. There still were no immunization against most of the childhood diseases. So many of us got sick. Some of us managed to get quarantine signs by our front doors. Our friends, in such circumstances would come by and stand by our windows and we could talk. We used public plunges until polio cropped up...and then we did no more public swimming until polio quit showing up.

At 10, my friends and I would ride 17 miles each way to the beach. We could have ridden the red cars for a nickel, but it was more fun riding.

It was not a perfect world. It was the world we had. Just as the rest of you who arrived later accepted whatever your world was.

Oh yeah, there were no antibiotics back then either. If you got sick, sometimes you got really sick and took months to recover. That wasn't a good thing, but iodine and gauze and adhesive tape were cheap and plentiful.

Those of us from the 30s and early 40s made the most of what we had to work with. There were campaigns to get people to stop spitting to end or control TB. The modern generations seem to have made a habit of spitting again...and TB is on the rise.

But the fun stuff is held indelibly in our minds. For those who share that(dirt clod fights--fun, we went into empty lots and pulled up weeds with dirt clods at the base)this piece was a chuckle, nothing more. For those who want to go back further, I suggest reading The Story Of A Bad Boy by Thomas Bailey Aldritch...back to the turn of the previous century.

Yeah, we remember the bad too. Lost and injured friends. But that was our world. It was different.

[windbreeze]

187. Thank you!!

I was born in 41...and as I sat here reading all these uptight posts in response, and freeper alert posts...I wondered, what the hell is there to get so upset over...I didn't see the original post as anti anything...but perhaps I am not looking close enough...???

We played in piles of leaves, an old cardboard box could keep us entertained for days, we played together...in the dirt. or in the snow all day...sure there were illnesses..we rode w/o seat belts, and I loved the smell of my dad's cigarettes...we had our feet fluoroscoped when we bought shoes, that's how they found my crooked bones from a rheumatoid arthritis bout(and yes, the Doctor still made house visits. and the public health officer did post quarantine notices outside our doors, when required. and there were community nurses who came to the house, and gave required shots when you were ill)...we did trick or treat alone in the dark, and no one had to look for razor blades.....there was bad, there was good..and..until I was 13 we didn't have a TV...people didn't talk about sex like they do now, and I don't recall that there were many of my teen aged friends getting pregnant(none, actually)...

Calm down, take a chill pill...nostalgia IS fun for some of us, and this thread has brought me lots of right out loud laughs...no not all times were good, not everything was always right, life was NOT always easier, but back then, (even now) it seemed to be less complicated...sure grown ups worked hard to make ends meet, parents DID stay together for the kids, but hey, what the hell IS marriage anyway, if NOT a commitment to one another, AND the kids?...kids did know they weren't adults, and did not try to act like they were, they did learn responsibility for themselves a whole lot faster than they do now, and I don't believe that was that a bad thing...

Sure we had childhood illnesses...and I had them all, measles several times, chickenpox, mumps, rheumatoid arthritis, scarlet fever, whooping cough and my cousin had polio...we had a friend born with a heart defect...only one of us who went through most of that, died...and she lived to be 32...(the one with the heart defect)...but then we didn't have to worry about live polio virus given to children giving older people polio, we didn't have mercury in vaccinations causing autism, ADD/ADHD, or fluoride in our water....and now, all these years later, we hear about tuberculosis making a come back, whooping cough, the neighbor's little one had scarlet fever just a couple weeks ago...so see, sometimes the progression is temporary...we didn't have e-coli...but I dare say, every generation has faced things like food poisoning, although we never worried about it, like people do today....even though refrigeration is standard now,(we had an ice box in our kitchen) and there are all sorts of protective (gov't required, but not necessarily enforced) food handling laws on the books, that weren't there when I was a kid..

People are SO damned thrilled to have the gov't demand we keep ourselves safe(yet who does the most complaining about the cost of medicare and SS)...by....wearing helmets, seatbelts, not drinking or smoking, laying your baby on it's back or whatever....so my question is...what the hell happened to being responsible for your own actions? when and why did we decide to allow the gov't to make rules and force us to follow them??? (and yet we bitch about how Bush is destroying the Constitution)....is it so hard for us to figure out, that this all started when the gov't became aware that we were depending on them to keep us safe from our own stupid or personally unsafe actions??That we WERE perfectly willing to trust them to make OUR decisions for us?? That we were WILLING to let them force us into doing what they demanded...

Sorry...but I DO remember my childhood (crabapples and all)with a special fondness...and I still wish there was a way to let my g.kids visit those simpler times..
windbreeze

[XanaDUer]

182. Good post.

:thumbsup:

[Ilsa]

201. Thank you! You've convinced me to bookmark this one for

future use. My first response is reactionary, and then I toned down my first response to be more gracious, but I agree with Progress, especially along the lines of safety and medical advances. But yes, it is a freaking stroke of luck that some of us have survived.

[treestar]

184. Makes you an even bigger hero if you were born before 1930

The fact that you survived childhood without a bacterial disease killing you means you are even stronger than people born today. All sorts of things are easily treated by a pediatrician nowadays that killed children early in the century.

There was even less protection of every kind.

In fact anyone who made it into adulthood in the 19th century is heroic by this standard.

[theboss]

188. While I certainly don't want lead paint and Fetal Alchohol Syndrome as acceptable options....

I do think that there is an underlying thought here that is probably true of each generation's view of the last.

And I am a victim of it as well. I am in my mid-30s. A cousin of mine is in his teens. And I view him and each and everyone of his friends as absolute wimps. And he's a football player.

I don't think my friends or I were Robert Mitchum, but I do think that we are slowing eradicating something that I will call "manhood" for lack of a better word.

I have a lot of bizarre theories spring off of this concept. One is that everyone carries guns now because no one knows how to fist-fight anymore.

But that's the reactionary in me. The liberal in me thinks that everyone in the 50s was nuts. Here is my favorite example: Football coaches denied players water during practice in the 50s and 60s. This was common, accepted practice. "Water made you weak."

My question: How did anyone survive high school football in 1955?

[Ilsa]

196. Interesting post. Have you read or watched The Junction Boys?

Very interesting book recounting the summer Bear Bryant had come to Texas A&M College way-back-when. He almost killed some footbal players working them in the heat. HE pretty much destroyed them physically based on all of the old rationales that are now considered ridiculous, and they could barely field a team that season. One of the "boys" is related to my neighbor. The book was made into a tv movie a couple of years ago.

[Ms_Dem_Meanor]

192. You certainly are right!

It's a wonder that alot of us weren't taken away from our parents. In that case, it's a wonder that they weren't taken away from theirs!:-)

[Ilsa]

194. Yeah, there were lots of kids that died before the new safety regulations etc.

The reason they are here now is that graveyards have the names of little kids not restrained in car seats. Other kids died or were brain damaged from lead paints, etc. Aspirin? Turns out it caused Reyes Syndrome in kids and probably wouldn't be OTC if it were introduced now. Yes, it is a miracle many of us survived.

"First, we survived being born to mothers who smoked and/or drank while they were pregnant." -- Survived with lower IQ's? Asthma? Not all kids survived if they died from respitatory problems.

I really hate it when the authors (I know it isn't you because I've seen it before) of these emails assume everyone is around to agree with them. They aren't.

I think plenty of rich kids got bailed out by daddy. And it is too bad that alot of folks don't have the advantages of creative play that we have now.

Not everything half a century ago was better. I was born in 1958, BTW.

Edited to change my ungracious tone.