Things that are foreign to your kids, that were normal for you...

[Babsy]

all the school grades in different rows in a single room school, with the best seat behind the coal stove in the centre of the room! Warm in the winter and hidden a bit from the teacher's eyes. (I lucked into this seat one year - a good year!)

an actual school bell that you were sometimes allowed by the teacher to ring from the porch when recess was over.

New Easter bonnets and Christmas corsages every year.

8 tracks. Reel to reel home movies. "Rabbit ears" antennae on the TV for reception. Black and white TV.

 

[Lumpy1106]

Riding your bike to school. Yeah, I know, kids still do that - my brother was in 2'nd grade and I was in kindergarten when we did it though.

 

[tvguy]

For that matter, physical maps! I lived in LA in the late 90s/early 2000s and everyone had this big spiral-bound map of the city. Thomas Guides.

Still use them. Google maps are useless if you don't know the spelling of a street name. The Thomas brothers street index is a godsend so you can browse names until you find the name you need.

 

[Tangled Pink]

No internet. Sunday morning TV choices were Blondie or the Three Stooges. It was a good week if it was Blondie.

Playing in the woods without our parents really knowing where we were. Not huge woods but there was a small river at the end of the street and a creek behind our house.

-We played in the woods too! It was at the end of our subdivision. It was really creepy when it started to get dark out and we had to try to find our way back home. There was also a creek that was miles long. You'd wonder what happened back there since sometimes we'd find articles of clothing and shoes scattered along the way but never would have crossed our minds beyond what could be.

-Every night after dinner the neighbor ladies would grab their lawn chairs and sit at each other's houses. If one of the moms sat out in the driveway, the others would go in their garages and get their chairs and head on over and chat til it got dark. My mom still meets with these ladies once a month (not on the driveways of course ). That never happens here! There is no longer that kind of socializing which is really sad.

-You could hear the neighborhood dads whistling outside on the front porch for their kids to come home for dinner.

-When the porch lights came on it was time to stop playing outside and come home.

 

[leebee]

16 (?) years ago I had to do some paperwork in my lab on a Saturday, so I took DD (11 at the time) with me. I went to the department office to make a photocopy, when she pointed to a stand beside the copier and said, "I know what THAT is- I've seen a picture. It's a typewriter!!" Cracked me up!

 

[TLSnell1981]

Bless your heart. "1960s car seat with steering wheel".

https://www.pinterest.com/pin/563864815818474447/

Wow! What an unexpected remark.

BTW Didn't say they didn't exist although not really safe.

 

[TLSnell1981]

Still use them. Google maps are useless if you don't know the spelling of a street name. The Thomas brothers street index is a godsend so you can browse names until you find the name you need.

Reading a map is a lost art especially in a foreign language. Made the trip a bit more fun. A few memorable road trips come to mind...

 

[JoanneAZ]

Mimeographs with the purplish blue ink, I can still remember how they smelled.

 

[wilbret]

I remember wanting to know scores of baseball games on the west coast. We did not have a satellite dish or cable and only got CBS, NBC and ABC. West coast scores were not in the next day's morning paper, so you had to wait an extra day. My Grandmas subscribed to the evening edition of the paper, so I would call her sometimes for scores.

Crazy to think about now as scores are now at your fingertips in real time. And you can watch any game you want.

Oh man, I loved looking at box scores.

and that reminds me. We had a morning and evening paper!

 

[wilbret]

Wow! What an unexpected remark.

BTW Didn't say they didn't exist although not really safe.

Lol. It’s not worth it. Did you know they had car phones in the 60s? Everybody had em!

 

[TLSnell1981]

Lol. It’s not worth it. Did you know they had car phones in the 60s? Everybody had em!

I had friend lose her infant son just before car seats were mandatory. The seat he was in wasn't safe. It's was so sad.

 

[pigletliz]

Mimeographs with the purplish blue ink, I can still remember how they smelled.

I remember it being a badge of honor when the teacher let you go to the office to make copies!

 

[GusGus77]

Was watching Annie ever really a national event like the Wizard of Oz? I have to question that...wait.... just to be sure, we’re talking about the 1982 Annie, right?

Well, I was born in the 70s, so it was an awesome movie for me in the 80s and I had to watch it every year!

 

[nursejackie]

Going outside to play all day with your friends. Riding off on your bike and only coming home when hungry. Only having fizzy drinks when the pop man had been on a Friday. Having to use a dial phone to contact friends. I grew up in the 1970's and feel incredibly lucky when I look back.

 

[kaytieeldr]

Car seats weren't mandatory until 1985

i don't recall claiming they were? Or even just that the mandated type did or didn't exist when? Just that there were car seats, like what I described, as far back as mid-century.

Wow! What an unexpected remark.

BTW Didn't say they didn't exist although not really safe.

Never, ever claimed safety. Merely existence of an item commonly known as a car seat. Photograph provided because clearly description was insufficient.

 

[StageTek]

Remember going over to your friends house to listen to records?

That is foreign to kids today.

Someone would get the latest fill-in-the-blank record and a bunch of us would go over to their house after school and listen to it over and over. Reading the liner notes and the pictures on the back of the sleeve. I remember working up the nerve to ask the girl I liked if she wanted to come over to my house after school to listen to that new Bowie record.

 

[wilbret]

I had friend lose her infant son just before car seats we made mandatory. The seat he was in wasn't safe. It's was so sad.

That's awful. It's a miracle more didn't perish, even a hard stop could have been fatal.

 

[wilbret]

i don't recall claiming they were? Or even just that the mandated type did or didn't exist when? Just that there were car seats, like what I described, as far back as mid-century.

Never, ever claimed safety. Merely existence of an item commonly known as a car seat. Photograph provided because clearly description was insufficient.

So what did you do as a kid, that your kids don't do today?

 

[wilbret]

Going outside to play all day with your friends. Riding off on your bike and only coming home when hungry. Only having fizzy drinks when the pop man had been on a Friday. Having to use a dial phone to contact friends. I grew up in the 1970's and feel incredibly lucky when I look back.

Glass bottles with a return. I remember the tire shop had a vending machine, and drinks tasted soooo good. I think you had to leave a nickel in a jar if you took the bottle with you. If you brought it back, you could get your nickel.

 

[TLSnell1981]

i don't recall claiming they were? Or even just that the mandated type did or didn't exist when? Just that there were car seats, like what I described, as far back as mid-century.

Never, ever claimed safety. Merely existence of an item commonly known as a car seat. Photograph provided because clearly description was insufficient.

It was your "Bless your hear" that threw me. Didn't get why the snark was necessary. My reaction was purely from my experience with..never mind it's really not worth it.