When I was a kid

[goofygirl]

o.m.g. i feel so old-most of the posted memories are things i remember as a young adult (talking senior year and several years into college )-so fess up people and let's put it into perspective-


the bi-centenial (aka known as 1976)- is it something you know of because your parents told you about it? is it something you briefly talked about in elementary school? or-is it something your highschool or college class used as a basis for their theme that year? other option-is it something you celebrated unwillingly as a full blown adult by virtue of every product in the u.s. carrying some marketing tie in?

I remember 1976. I was a child, and thought bicenntennial quarters were special.

Today those same quarters are worth...well, 25 cents, LOL!

 

[OK!]

- all us girls collected Smurfs and Strawberry Shortcake dolls (the FIRST time they came out) and later, the California Raisin figurines Hardee's gave out
- we loved rainbows, unicorns, and anything pink and/or purple, and stuck stickers featuring all of these on our Trapper Keepers
- my brother and I couldn't understand why they interrupted Scooby Doo one afternoon to show footage of the attempted assassination of Ronald Reagan
- it was SO COOL to go to Pantera's Pizza after swim meets and play Ms. Pac Man, Dig Dug, Donkey Kong, et. al. till we ran out of quarters...those we didn't spend on games, we pumped into the jukebox (I distinctly remember playing "I Love Rock 'n' Roll" there)
- I had a mad crush on Michael Jackson and the day he was burned filming the Pepsi commercial, my best friend and I paced the floor nervously until the afternoon paper came out with an update on his condition
- I also had mad crushes on John from CHiPs, the professor from Gilligan's Island, and Roger Taylor from Duran Duran

 

[OK!]

I remember 1976. I was a child, and thought bicenntennial quarters were special.

Today those same quarters are worth...well, 25 cents, LOL!

I verrrrrrrrrrrrry vaguely remember the bicentennial, but nothing really concrete about it; I was 3. When my grandmother passed away, we found that she'd kept 4 or 5 rolls of bicentennial quarters each for my brother and me...they were all brand new in the wrapper.

 

[Lisa loves Pooh]

Kids could buy cigs for their parents..with a note. (not sure if it was legal, but we had a neighborhood store that allowed this)

Kids could buy candy cigs.

The cool new gaming system was Atari.

Disney had paper straws.

Disney sold transportation tickets.

We went to school to learn...not to learn to take a test.

I had a record player that played 45s. I had a "purple" Purple Rain record.

There was no AIDs...at least until I was a middle-aged kid.

Gas was less than $1 a gallon.

Cars were ugly and boxy and BIG.

They still sold "regular" gas.

There was no cable. (Cue Jeff Foxworthy--"and when the president's on, your night is shot! THE PRESIDENT'S ON....HE'S ON EVERY CHANELLLLLLLLLL).

And when there was, there was no Disney channel.

and when there was Disney channel...I would work out to the Mousercize program.

There was no such thing (formally) as baby-proofing or child-proofing.

 

[Lisa loves Pooh]

The teacher made "dittos" with purple ink on a mimeograph machine...remember that smell?

Totally remember that!!!!

Also---watching films on a movie projector with all that clicking. So hypnotic and made for a great lullaby for sleepy time sometimes.

 

[SalandJeff]

What a fun thread!

Only 1 house in the neighborhood had color TV, so we would all go there on Monday nights to watch the Monkees.
Going to the drive in in our pjs with Mom & Dad in the station wagon.
Playing Kick the Can
All the moms didn't work
Staying out to play long after dark in the summer
The good humor man
My mom crying and crying the day JFK was shot
Watching Gunsmoke with my dad
Saturday morning cartoons (and only Saturday morning)

Life was so much safer (and easier)

 

[jennyf917]

Jem was "truly outrageous", I collected My Little Ponies (and their estate), stonewashed jeans (especially the ones that zipped at the ankle) were IT and you had to pay for the Disney Channel.

 

[RNMOM]

Wow the memories here.

I was 22 for the Bicentenial and in my second year working as an RN. A real live adult. I actually thought I was overpaid making $5.95 an hour.

I remember getting a Barbie doll for Christmas the second year she was out.

I got a Chatty Cathy doll for Christmas the year before that, I believe.

I remember the whole family would watch TV together in the evenings and my brother and I had to lie on the floor cause the chairs were taken. We loved the Flinstones, Gunsmoke, Ponderosa and many more.

I remember when Cool Whip came on the market.

I remember soft margarine making it's debut and you'd think it was gold.

I remember getting our first ziploc bags and washing them and hanging them to dry.

I remember getting liquid dish soap instead of powdered.

I remember getting milk in heavy glass bottles..then paper cartons.

I remember bathing with Ivory soap. Love that smell.

I remember watching the Nixon/Kennedy debates and Gore Vidal and William F. Buckley.

I remember doing something mean when I was about 9 to another kid and a different kids' mom coming out of her house and given me heck and making me apologize. She was right to do that and I ended up being friends with the girl.

I remember being able to go through the trash behind stores and getting cardboard boxes, wood scraps and making forts and go carts. They would even give us wheels and parts sometimes.

I remember sharing a pair of rollerskates, with the key, by each of us wearing one skate and hanging on to each other.

I remember wanting PF flyers so bad and not getting them because they were boy's shoes.

I remember starching and ironing clothes for my mother.

I remember my mother using a ringer washing machine.

I remember lunch tokens. Red for meals and green for milk.

I remember being in second grade when Alaska and Hawaii became states.

I remember watching John Glen's space flight in school and the moon walk when I was in Jr. High.

I remember vividly the Kennedy assination and the week after being out of school for the funeral and how sad everyone was, especially my parents.

I remember lots of things that seem so much better than now but I also wouldn't want to go back.

 

[It's A Happy Day]

A camcorder consister of an extremely bright, blinding lightbulb & a huge camera that was the size of a briefcase

Michael Jackson was black AND had his original nose

We tucked our jeans into our socks & white hi-top sneaks

Stretchie pants were IN

Every High School Girl carried a regular size can of aquanet in their bags at school

Darn, Dam*, *hit, *itch were considered blasphemy on TV

Your family had 1 car, 1 TV, and 1 bathroom - Dad always got dibs on all 3!!!

 

[midge3426]

Garbage Men came into the back yard to pick up the garbage.

Walking home from school by myself, at six years old.

Girls could not wear pants to school.

Everyone bought the same style class ring.

Candy Cigarettes

The Merry Mobile Man (this was a local popsicle man--the car was round, red, white and blue, with an awning over the car. The popsicle man did not have to get up to give you an ice cream)

The deaths of Janis Joplin, Jimi Hendrix, and Jim Morrison.

The assassination of President Kennedy.

Record Players and/or Turntables

Horrible eight track tapes.

Watching Shirley Temple Theatre and Tarzan on Saturday afternoons.

Preparing term papers on a typewriter

Spankings at school

Saying yes m'am and no m'am to ALL adults. Saying please and thank you. Being respectful.

My parents renting their telephone.

If you got in trouble at school, you were also punished at home.

Beatle mania.

When Elvis Presley died.

The first moon landing.

 

[Glendamax]

When I was a kid:

The sound of metal skates could be heard in the streets on Christmas morning.

I had a Winnie the Pooh record player.

My favorite nightgown had Holly Hobby on it.

When James Evans died on "Good Times", I thought he was dead for real because of how upset all the adults were.

I was in love with Billy D Williams.

 

[froglady]

Jem was "truly outrageous", I collected My Little Ponies (and their estate), stonewashed jeans (especially the ones that zipped at the ankle) were IT and you had to pay for the Disney Channel.

I remember spending HOURS putting DD's Paradise Estate together on Christmas Eve.

 

[froglady]

I remember the Bicentennial very well, as it was the year I was married (and I was considered an "older" bride at age 25!) I have photos of the Tall Ships sailing into Newport, RI. Friends of ours came up from Philadelphia to see them.

 

[cybrkitn]

I got in trouble if I wore black nail polish., my father had a vcr with a remote controll that was attached with a wire,silver spoons was my favorite tv show. We flew Eastern airlines to Walt Disney world

Yep! We did that too in '85

 

[cybrkitn]

LeSac!! Forgot about that! How about LAND OF THE LOST and the
slestacks"??

I loved watching Land of the Lost! When my brother and I went upstate NY to visit our cousins, all of us would re-enact it and do our own version. We used to do that with a lot of shows we watched growing up.

 

[cybrkitn]

Hula Hoops were all the rage.

Ice cream cones cost 9 cents at the corner store.

We went home for lunch when I was in grammar school.

The girls had to wear dresses or skirts to school and that was a fact for me right through high school.

The rag man came down our street with his horse drawn cart and I lived in a city!

Some of my neighbors still had coal furnaces.

My grandmother had a toilet with the box above the bowl. Just like the kind at POFQ.

We still had gas fixtures that were used for lighting. They had been capped but were still there.

I had friends who had polio.

A special treat was going to Quincy center to ride the escalator. One of my friends broke her arm on it by trying to push the hand rest backwards. It pulled her arm into the machine. Her parents didn't even think about suing the store.

You could still ride the wooden escalator at Washington Street in Boston. It was the last working wooden one. The Smithsonian wanted it but the jerks in Boston had it dismantled before a deal could be struck.

There was NO southeast expressway or Rte 128.

The phone numbers in Quincy, MA started with PR3 and GR2. The letters stood for GRanite and PResidents.

Hurricane Carol was the first time I ever remember being truly afraid.

We had a store in our neighborhood (Kennedy's) that sold only milk, cheese and eggs.

Drug Stores had soda fountains.

Sleeping at my grandmother's house was a special treat. She had a bed with a feather mattress.

I think that Macy's in NYC still has a wooden escalator when you get closer to the last set of floors. At least it did the last time I went a few years ago.

 

[cybrkitn]

Channel 11 was WPIX & the home of the NYY


The back of the wagon had the seats that folded down (aka what those Chrysler vans have now) so 4 kids could sit back there & play a game because I swear that there was a table.

They were called Great Adventure & Riverside not Six Flags GA & Six Flags New England

Channel 11 is still called WPIX (with the CW now added) and I remember when they used to have a game called PIX. A child was picked and called after they sent in their information on an index card. In order for the laser to shoot and hit the spacecraft thing, the child had to say PIX each time.

My grandfather had a green station wagon that did that! We had a brown station wagon that had a third bench seat we called a rumble seat and the second seat behind the drivers could be made into a table

Six Flags in NJ is still called Great Adventure. But I thought the water park was called River Country? It's been so long I don't remember what it was called.

Edited to add: Ok! I just looked and realized this is my 4th post in a row on this thread A lot of you have brought back so many memories from my childhood. Thanks and keep it going!

 

[minniebeth]

Channel 11 is still called WPIX (with the CW now added) and I remember when they used to have a game called PIX. A child was picked and called after they sent in their information on an index card. In order for the laser to shoot and hit the spacecraft thing, the child had to say PIX each time.

My grandfather had a green station wagon that did that! We had a brown station wagon that had a third bench seat we called a rumble seat and the second seat behind the drivers could be made into a table

Six Flags in NJ is still called Great Adventure. But I thought the water park was called River Country? It's been so long I don't remember what it was called.

Edited to add: Ok! I just looked and realized this is my 4th post in a row on this thread A lot of you have brought back so many memories from my childhood. Thanks and keep it going!

Pix, Pix, Pix, Pix, Pix, Pix, my DH still says this from time to time!
We've moved out of the NY Metro area years ago with jobs and it is nice to have a memory tied to "home" occasionally!

 

[OK!]

Just remembered 2 more...

- our first video camera required that you lug along half of the VCR so that the ridiculously large camera could plug into it. The VCR part could be carried in a bag with a shoulder strap and weighed probably 20 pounds because the case & components were actually made of metal, not plastic. We have hours and hours of footage from WDW trips of birds--ducks, seagulls, flaminogoes, whatever--which we only found out later were shot (the hours of footage, not the birds) because my dad was sneakily trying to run the battery down sooner so he could rent a locker and stow the blasted thing and quit lugging it through the park. Poor guy.

- a special treat was spending the night @ my great-aunt's house during the summer and sleeping on the screened-in porch. We never once thought that anyone would bother us out there during the night. Ironically, she lived in Kirkwood, only a couple of blocks from where the 2 missing boys were found last week.

 

[Good Ol Gal]

We flew Eastern airlines to Walt Disney world

I did too, and I got to watch Grease on the way there, and back! I was one excited kid