I Remember When…
May 16th, 2007 by Cheryl
-
1. A postage stamp cost 3 cents.
2. A Hershey bar cost 5 cents.
3. Gas was 20 cents per gallon.
4. My phone number had only 4 digits. Telephones were big heavy black things with a rotary dial, sometimes challenging to use due to our party line. How strange to think of now! Sometimes it would take hours to make/receive a phone call because the bored housewife would be yakking on our shared phone line. I secretly listened in a time or two, but then I was the one who was bored. The conversation was all about grownup stuff.
5. The Visa card was introduced.
6. President Kennedy was assassinated. That day is Kodak freeze-framed in my mind.
7. The mall was built. Until then, downtown was where the stores were, where the action was, where the community was. The monolithic bank was there–have you ever seen a counter check? I actually used one the first year I was married. The Post Office was very large; my footsteps always echoed like something out of a Hitchcock movie. All large buildings doubled as fallout shelters. (That’s a whole ‘nuther memory! Do any of you remember atomic bomb drills at school?) The Woolworth and McCrory’s were great big dime stores that had soda fountains. I used to pick a balloon from the ceiling and pop it to find the little white slip of paper inside that indicated how much I had to pay for my banana split. They just don’t make them like that any more. After the mall was built, downtown died. It wasn’t fun to go there any more. In fact, it was downright sad. “Urban Renewal” was the government’s newest program. How it benefited my city, I never did understand.
8. Cars didn’t have seatbelts.
9. Time seemed to stand still. Santa Claus would never come. My birthday would never come. Somehow I always managed to make it to that expected event just shy of losing all patience. Now Father Time seems to run right past me.
10. The Beatles blazed onto the scene. A bunch of us neighborhood kids rode our bikes all over creation together. (That was many years before the Amber Alert was needed.) We all had portable AM transistor radios that hung from our bike handlebars. Tuning them all to the same station, we enjoyed “stereo.” Who could forget “She’s Got a Ticket to Ride” and “It’s Been a Hard Day’s Night”? What about “She Loves You Yeah, Yeah, Yeah”? “Michelle”? “I Saw Her Standing There”? “Yellow Submarine”? We were Beatles experts, a veritable choir as we sang our way around the ‘hood. We raced to a fire one day, and a lady I had never seen asked me where my radio was! And then there was Mick (”I Can’t Get No Satisfaction”), and The Box Tops (”Give Me a Ticket for an Aeroplane” - some day I’ll post the lyrics I wrote to that tune), and The Monkees, and…..music used to be so much fun!
11. The Ford Mustang was introduced. How everyone drooled over that car! And the Camaro — ooh la la! We just don’t see that kind of excitement these days over new cars. They all look the same any more. DH and I actually owned a vintage 1968 Camaro once. Sweet car! Looked just like this one.
12. Prayer was allowed in school. When I was in first grade (in the olden days before there was public kindergarten), the teacher and the entire class prayed together before lunch. Out loud. I remember the very, very sad day we could no longer do that. I did not understand how the government could just decide I couldn’t pray any more. It scared me, and it made no sense. The school made us watch films about atomic bombs, often made us practice bomb drills, scrambling under our desks with our arms over our heads, then told us we can’t PRAY? Get real! This was during the cold war where every other word was Russia or Cuba. Buildings around the community were marked with the symbol indicating their secondary use as fallout shelters, reminding us to be prepared to die. And our government removed prayer from school all because of one woman? My government’s involvement in my personal life scared me as much as those yellow and black symbols.
13. America’s seams were about to burst over the issues of busing, religion, abortion, drugs, racism, flag burning, war, and free love. The issues haven’t changed much, have they?
The purpose of the meme is to get to know everyone who participates a little bit better every Thursday. Visiting fellow Thirteeners is encouraged! If you participate, leave the link to your Thirteen in others comments. It’s easy, and fun! Be sure to update your Thirteen with links that are left for you, as well! I will link to everyone who participates and leaves a link to their 13 things. Trackbacks, pings, comment links accepted!
View More Thursday Thirteen Participants
I remember almost all of these, too! Not prayer in school, but maybe we’re in different parts of the country. I used to love, love, love riding bikes with the neighbor kids, from the moment we were done with dinner until dusk. Sometimes our bikes were horses, sometimes motorcycles. It was a wonderful time.
I remember many of those things, too. I remember when the little milk cartons we’d get with lunch at school were 3 cents.
Barbara, how could I have forgotten about the milk cartons? Thanks for that reminder!
I am more able to say I remember when Bon Jovi had big hair, but hey I enjoyed this list too!
I remember ALL these; I think I’m a bit older than you, though.
wow, you are so lucky to remember all that! i feel like it’s a big deal that i can remember when gas cost less than a dollar, or when princess diana died. you’ve got a lot of history there!
my list is posted if you care to visit!
Did you really have a Camero? Cool! Charles and I had a ‘68 Chevy Super Sport. Thought the ‘72 Olds Cutlass was the best. Never did get to have one though.
Good memories.
I really enjoyed this post - I am not old enough to remember all of them, but they made me smile. I gave you a little link love at my TT!
Thanks, Tea Mouse, for the “Love Link”! I appreciate it. Yes, we really did have a Camaro, Karen. You should have seen me drive it. I sat loooooow. It did not have power steering which was a grave problem for a 98-pound weakling. Lara, it WAS a big deal when Princess Diana died. My husband woke me up to tell me, and I stayed up most of the rest of the night waiting for some word of her condition. I was a huge fan of Diana! Thanks to all of you for reading my verbose memories!
Cheryl,
I loved your Thursday Thirteen this week! Great job!! Did you grow up in Denton because some of those memories sound familiar to me, too! Are you talking about the old First State Bank building downtown? And the old post office seemed SO huge to me when I was little as well. And the soda fountain? I remember being little bitty and my mother and father taking me there. I think it was downtown? But, I also remember one where the upstairs part of the building was the soda fountain and the downstairs was the five and dime. Was this the same place?
Gosh, that brings back old memories. I lived in Denton for 30 years before my husband and I moved. I miss Denton.
Thanks, Cindy, for your kind words. I actually grew up in Arkansas. But, I think that’s one of the neat things about “the olden days.” Most downtown areas and main streets seemed to be the same. We were living Americana, Norman Rockwell style!