Back in the Day

I always love to read the Beloit College "Mindset List".

Take a look at the Class of 2011 list... this year's college freshman class.

http://www.beloit.edu/~pubaff/mindset/2011.php

I actually used the list when orienting new teachers to the district... to help them understand that their students had a different mindset than their own.. due to differences in experiences growing up.

As a "Baby Boomer" cousin, here’s a few things we experienced, or didn’t experience... as we grew up in the 60's:

Yes, we had TV. We had exactly 4 TV channels! We watched the CBS, NBC, ABC affiliates, along with our beloved Channel 4, the independent local channel... home of the Stooges, Dick the Bruiser, the Indiana Pacers and IU Basketball. All of these stations went off the air late at night.

TV had two colors... black and white... until we were teenagers.

Cable TV... fahgeddaboutit... no ESPN, no CNN, no FOX, nada. Cable hadn’t been invented yet.

There were no school libraries in elementary schools. The PE teacher was also the music teacher and the art teacher at College Corner Elementary.

There were no microwave ovens. "Eating Out" was a very big deal.

There were no desktop or laptop computers. Bill Gates and Steve Jobs were our age, remember? I saw my first computer (terminals, not PC’s) in the Indiana University Library in 1974. You had to be a computer science student to use them. I taught at a new school in Okeechobee and they were excited about the new electronic typewriters in the Business classes. Corrections were made with white-out... in other words, you painted over mistakes with white paint and typed over the spot.

Phones were rented from the phone company... and there was only one phone company in the country... Ma Bell (AT&T). Cell phones came along in the 90's.

We rode the school bus every day to school (cousins in town walked). For me personally, that included all four years of high school. Kids with cars were the exception.

We rode our bikes blocks from home as young children and miles from home during our early teenage years. We didn’t scare ourselves to death until much later when cable news came along.

There were no convenience stores. No 7-11, No Handy Store, no Village Pantry.

Gasoline was always pumped by an attendant while you sat in the car. Self-service was considered too dangerous and it came along to cut costs when the 70's energy crisis came along.

Gasoline had lead in it. It made engines run better, but it was poisonous. Oops!

There were no Mexican-American kids in our school or town. The great Hispanic influx didn’t happen until the 90's.

"Ethnic Food" meant Italian. We had a Chinese restaurant in Chesterfield when we were teens. No tacos, enchiladas or burritos for us as kids. We ate meat and potatoes.

The "interstate" was built when we were kids, but wasn't used all that much. It was located too far from town. Eventually, town moved to the interstate. My first day behind the wheel in Driver Ed was spent on I-69, because the instructor knew we wouldn’t have anything to run into out there.

The Reds played at Crosley Field until they built Riverfront Stadium for the Big Red Machine. We saw Willie Mays and Willie McCovey and Juan Marichal play against the Reds when we were kids. Then we saw Pete Rose (before he became an idiot), Johnny Bench and many others when the Reds ruled the world. Then they blew up the new Riverfront Stadium. Go figure.

We had AM transistor radios as kids. FM radio didn't arrive until we were teens. Our first component (as opposed to a cabinet style) stereos came along about the same time as FM Radio.

Music was on vinyl records and there were singles (45 rpm) and albums (33 rpm). Your older brother (or sister in Cary’s case) owned all of the good records and the rest of us "borrowed" them when the true owners weren’t home! CD’s weren’t invented until the 80's. Internet downloading? Did you read the part about no computers?

There were no significant numbers of foreign cars when we grew up. There were a few VW’s. No Hondas or Toyotas though. It wasn’t just because we were a GM family either. Folks owned GM, Ford and Chrysler cars. American Motors (AMC) and Studebaker were two of the last competitors to fold when we were kids.

The Indiana Pacers, formed when we were teens, were in the ABA, not the NBA. The coach didn’t give up his day job even after winning a couple of championships. He sold class rings to high school students (which is one of the most lucrative jobs in the world, by the way) during the day and coached the Pacers at night.

Chicago didn't have a pro basketball team when we were kids. Cincinnati did... and Oscar Robertson played for the Royals.

High School athletes, except maybe the wrestlers, didn't lift weights. There were no weight rooms in high schools.

Jeans were allowed (for boys), but we were discouraged from wearing them in school. Girls were allowed to wear pants in high school... a new thing.... if they were part of an ensemble called a pants-suit.

"Paddling" was the main disciplinary tool in school. It was often done just outside the classroom door so everyone else would hear (and learn from the experience).

Hockey and soccer were never played in school or youth leagues. There were also no youth football leagues. Soccer and hockey were not shown on TV. Pro baseball and basketball (except the Pacers) were shown once per week on a Saturday or Sunday. Sunday football on TV consisted of one game, usually the Chicago Bears.

We had two cars, but that didn’t mean that we used them that much. One was for Dad to get to work. The other sat in the driveway most of the time. A real treat was "going for a drive", which often meant going to the dairy to get an ice cream cone.

Halloween was one of our favorite times of the year (this may be limited to Jay, Todd and me). We threw field corn at cars and against windows of houses. We "soaped" car and house windows. We threw the occasional rotten tomato. And we told stories about other things that we didn’t actually do... some scarier and some funnier. In other words, Halloween fun consisted of stuff that would put you into juvenile detention... or get you shot... in today’s world. Trick or Treat had a more ominous meaning back in the day.

We were the first generation to grow up with druggies... although we generally talked the game, rather than participated in it. Drugs meant pot. Then as now, alcohol was the big problem. At my post-season football team party, I spent some time with Teri before heading to the party, and arrived after half of the team had passed out.