You Might Not Be A Youngster If:

[harry strasil]

YOU MAY NO LONGER BE A YOUNGSTER if:

When people learn your date of birth, They say "Oh, you were a War Baby.

Your remember going to the train station to see Ike Isenhower on his Whistle Stop Tour and you still have your "I Like Ike" button.

You remember taking the sugar cube polio vaccine in grade school.

You remember when milk was delivered in glass bottles with the paper stopper in the top.

You had milk in school in little pint glass bottles.

You remember when the family car had suicide doors on it.

A computer had buttons you pushed and then pulled a handle on the side to operate it.

The First TV set you ever saw was in black and white and in a store window on display.

You picked the meat cut you wanted and it was wrapped in white butcher paper and it was tied with a string.

Farmers came to town in a high wheeled wagon or buggy pulled by a team of horses and they had on a white shirt and tie with a suit coat and tie and clean Big Overalls.

Your mail addressed to "John Doe's Older Sister " arrived the same day it was mailed to the right address by a carrier walking his route with a big leather bag.

The Police and Sheriffs care had a big Siren on the fender with a Red Light in the End of it.

Soda Pop came in Glass reusable bottles.

Your Mother made most of the family clothes on a Treadle Sewing machine, and she patched them too.

It was considered a terrible thing if a woman went out without a hat and it was considered unlady like if they wore pants.

Children were expected to be seen and not heard and any adult could CORRECT an unruly child and did so.

The monthly family budget was equal to the cost of one tank of gas today.

If you got one toy for Christmas you were considered fortunate.

Working on Sunday was considered a SIN.

Work days were 10 or 12 hour days, 6 days a week.

You walked to school and were considered fortunate if you had a Bicycle.

You had a paper route with a 100 or more customers and were paid 25 cents a day to deliver it.

Your family took a ride in the country on Sunday afternoon to enjoy the scenery.

You lived in town and had a chicken yard in the back yard and a garden.

You looked forward to your weekly bottle of Soda Pop that cost a nickel.

Grandma and Grandpa were cared for at home, and were just part of the family.

Doctors made Housecalls and accepted payment in Eggs or Chickens, etc.

You had a real Ice Box and block ice was delivered daily.

There were Cold Storage plants where your family rented a Freezer Box.

You could go to the DIME STORE and buy most things for a dime. And you ogled the bulk candy behind the glass showcase.

[Bob Noles]

Harry,

Thanks.... I needed that :eek: :D

Happy New Year!

[Tom Stovell]

Thanks for the memories....
For me, I knew the time had come when everyone started calling me 'sir' and asking if I 'needed help getting that to the car?'

Happy New Year.

Tom

[Keith Outten]

Ouch! The truth hurts :)

Blue Laws meant that it was illegal for stores to open on Sunday.

The first "all transistor" radios that lost the signal when you turned a corner.

Ten cent movies, five cent cokes and twenty five cent bus fares across town and back.

High test gasoline at 21 cents per gallon.

You had to make your own skate boards, they didn't exist in stores.

Your familly owned a wringer washing machine, the rollers on top of the machine squezed the water out of the clorhes.

Cars without automatic transmissions, power steering and brakes. Steering wheels were an option. New tires lasted only 3000 miles.

No air conditioning...anywhere :(

[Joseph O'Leary]

You can remember the moon looking all smooth and shiny, before they walked all over it, cut donuts with the moon buggy, made divots playing golf. It now just looks dirty and bumpy.:D

[Maurice Metzger]

With all respect, growing up in my neck of the south, you got called nasty names if you were friendly with folks that didn't share your skin tone. Miss the milk bottles, though...

Plus I didn't even know what a dado plane was!

Waaay off topic, and with no intentions of shooting down anyone's fond memories or being hurtful in any way,

Maurice

[John Bailey]

You remember the cream was at the top of the bottle in whole milk.

You are me!:p

[Andy Hoyt]

When you no longer feel like a big pompous jerk trying to sound older and wiser in years than you really are as you speak to a young lad and call him - son.

[Ken Fitzgerald]

IF: you used an icebox in the summer.....a window box in the winter

Everybody had an outhouse........

The wiperblades on cars were vacuumn driven......the only time they worked was when it wasn't raining. Rain would definitely cause them to fail.

24 hour self service gas pumps in Wyoming took silver dollars..........

You remember the Doctor Pepper commercials ....10-2-4

The Burma shave signs were common road side scenery..........

Your grandparents didn't have an icebox or a refrigerator but used a "springhouse" instead..........

[Frank Chaffee]

Dad worked and Mom stayed home with the kids.

Parents bought a new car after saving money for one cash payment.

The streets in Minneapolis were paved with cobblestones and you remember the streetcar conductor throwing the wheeled electrical connection back up to the overhead cable.

Friends of parents went down south to register voters and got beat up.

Alleys and school playgrounds were covered with cinders from coal fired power plants (Sharp, I can add).

People put the car in the garage that was on the back alley, not accessed from the front street.

We painted our front door brilliant red during the McCarthy hearings.

Frank

But really, Andy Hoyt says it best for all times with this, "When you no longer feel like a big pompous jerk trying to sound older and wiser in years than you really are as you speak to a young lad and call him - son."

Peace for all in this and every year.

[Peter M. Spirito]

Only one TV channel, Channel-8, the polio sugar cube, Paperboy got 2 cents per paper he delivered. Picked strawberrys for 7 cents a basket, Schools HAD school supplies and did not need to beg for books and paper, a car engine was a gonner at 50,000 miles (my s-10 has 170,000 and heading to 200,000) YES they don't make them like they used to, ten-party telephone lines and I bet the under fifty crowd does not have a clue as to what that means.:)

[Don Henthorn Smithville, TX]

Thw first post is what I remember. Much of the rest is recent history to me.(G)

[Andy Hoyt]

...... ten-party telephone lines .....

One long - one short

That was us.

[Frank Chaffee]

Peter and Andy,
When we moved to the country we were one long and two shorts.

Our TV was like Mom’s Singer treadle sewing machine; lift the top of the cabinet to expose the screen. The image was projected straight up and bounced off a mirror on to it.

Frank

[David Fried]

Woolworth was the five and dime and things were five and ten. (Could you image if someone suggested a dollar store! ).

First bandsaw I saw was in the butcher shop. (And you wonder why I show it mucho respect) The floor was covered in sawdust on purpose.

My Dad owned the town hardware store. If you needed something at odd hours you called him at home and he opened the store.

The cop who walked up and down Main Street had a name. Mike.

I swept every store on Main Street for a nickel each and felt rich when I went to the corner store to spend my fortune.

Stores actually closed for Labor Day.

Commuter trains pulled by steam engines. Getting the Sunday paper at the train station when they were delivered.



Of course, I'm not that old. :rolleyes:

Dave Fried

[Frank Chaffee]

Cub Scouts and Boy Scouts!

Sleeping in my tent in the backyard all summer from third grade on.

Packing up my bike and riding way out of the city to camp by a lake. My shelter was a square tarp staked out on three corners to the ground with the fourth strung up to a tree. Now that lake is barely north of I694 and definitely urban.

Frank

[Keith Outten]

Peter,

The house I live in right now had a party line phone when we moved in, private lines weren't available in the area then. I remember it well :)

[Frank Chaffee]

Same in this house Keith, when we moved in.

But now we connect at 26.4Kbs!!!

Frank

[Frank Pellow]

Harry, growing up in Canada as I did, a few things do not apply, but I do remember 18 of the 30 things that are in your list. Thanks for posting it.

[Frank Pellow]

One long - one short

That was us.
It was us too. :)

[Dave Anderson NH]

Ah yes, growing up.

Baling hay for Grover Gerlock at $.15 an hour.

First grade in a 4 room 2 story brick schoolhouse.

Dad feeling rich enough to go out and by our first TV, a DuMont.

Riding my bicycle 7 miles into the city with friends to see a Saturday movie and being able to leave a bicycle unlocked outside the theater.

Kids standing at the school bus stop alone and without parents.

Dad car pooling to work, no one had 2 cars.

Dad working Saturdays for the housing contractor to pay off the downpayment on our first house.

[Frank Pellow]

Boy this is fun.

David, it sounds like we had very similar childhoods. My Dad also owned the town hardweare store. We had two town cops (Maurice and Guy) and I also swept out the store (in my case, I got 10 cents) and I certainly can remember planning how I was going to spend it. The only big difference I can see is that we did not have Woolworth's (the only chain store we had in town was the Hudson's Bay Comapny).

[John Hart]

I delivered milk from a Milk Truck every Wednesday and Saturday morning. Ike the Milkman drove the truck...Rode around town, got the next delivery ready (glass bottles with paper tabs)...Ike would slow down as I waited on the running board...I would jump and run up to the door where the milk box was and replace the empties with full ones...look for notes for special orders and ice cream...run back to the truck...fill orders if necessary...run back to the house. I was paid a dollar.

[Frank Pellow]

I delivered milk from a Milk Truck every Wednesday and Saturday morning. Ike the Milkman drove the truck...Rode around town, got the next delivery ready (glass bottles with paper tabs)...Ike would slow down as I waited on the running board...I would jump and run up to the door where the milk box was and replace the empties with full ones...look for notes for special orders and ice cream...run back to the truck...fill orders if necessary...run back to the house. I was paid a dollar.
You had a truck, how modern! We had a horse.

[Fred Voorhees]

You remember the cream was at the top of the bottle in whole milk.

You are me!:p
I remember being a kid and my brother and I used to stay up at all hours on the weekends to watch television. We stayed up late enough a number of times to hear the local milkman delivering the milk on our porch in the aluminum "milkbox". I remember there were times it was so cold that the next morning, the cream would be pushed out the top of the bottle in a cylinder from it freezing and expanding within the bottle.

[John Bailey]

My dad was a milkman. I remember the milk delivery trucks didn't have a seat, my dad stood up to drive. The brake and clutch were on the floor, but the gas was controled from a lever on the steering column. I went with him as often as I could, never got paid, except for being with my dad. My dad made a nickel for every gallon he delivered. Of course that's when a new car cost $1,000, our house cost $5,000 and gas was 22 cents. Things have changed but it was still a lot of gallons to afford anything.

John

[John Bailey]

You might not be a youngster if you remember sitting home anxiously waiting for the Sears-Roebucks catalogue instead of the Grizzly catalogue.

John

[John Hart]

You had a truck, how modern! We had a horse.

heh heh....Ike delivered Milk all his life. He would always have a story about when he delivered with his horse and the Milk Wagon. I think of him often.

[Keith Outten]

How about this one;

I used to stay up late and listen to WABC in New York City, it was the only station in the country that played Rock and Roll which was considered dirty in those days. I remember that squeaky little radio, my Dad and I built it from a Radio Shack kit.

If we knew then what our radio waves would be carrying today half the world would have had a stroke.

[Andy Hoyt]

Whenever we would visit my grandparent's near the city, my brothers and I would hangout on the front porch and watch the cars. Whoever was the first to see one that was not black got to be the engineer when grandpa let us play with his model train set.

[Ken Fitzgerald]

Living in the Yampa Valley of northwestern Colorado.....You considered yourself lucky if you got to see an entire episode of Gunsmoke or any other tv program.....Obviously no local stations....a lot of what you got in those mountain valleys was skip......the doggone sun would go down....the ionosphere(sp?) would cool down.....change.....the skip angle changed....You never did see the end of those programs....My folks didn't have to worry about kids watching too much tv.....we would rapidly grow tired of watching the gray...static.....snow....on the screen!

[Jerry Clark]

Banks were only open from 10 to 3 and never on Saturday. Always had to stand in a long line on payday. :cool: Of course I remember a lot of the other ones listed.:D

[Peter M. Spirito]

Back in the early 70's which isn't all that far ago I went to Kansas from Florida to work as a IBEW union electrician on a power plant about 70 miles south of Kansas City. I was living in the town of LaCygne Kansas population 900. I was new in town and all of the stores in the area had these "counter checks" at every cash register which were blank checks with nobodys name on them and you wrote your name in as you checked out. Being from Florida I was used to needing 12 forms of ID to pay with a check. This was totally the twilight zone for me. So I go to the local bank to open up a checking account. When I ask to select some checks the two girls look at me like I was crazy. Why pay for checks when the counter checks were everywhere they say. I explained I paid bills from out of state. When I asked for my account number they said there wasn't one. I asked how do you keep track of the accounts. They said by name. I said what if two people have the same name. Again I get the "you are stupid look" and they said "Oh that never happens"........ and that was life in rural Kansas in the 70's:p

[Jerrold Johnson]

I even remember our phone number....it was 172W.........Jerry

[Don Henthorn Smithville, TX]

Learned all about life from the Sears & Roebuck catalog which was found as the "wiping paper" in every two holer in the county (probably in the nation.) If it wasn't in the catalog you didn't need it. The yellow pages were not as slick and worked the best.

[Frank Chaffee]

Ken,
I feel for you if you missed parts of Gunsmoke!

Living in the city I was treated to Maverick, Have Gun Will Travel, Gunsmoke, American Rifleman and Death Valley Days (sponsored by 20 Mule Team Borax), every Saturday night. Then the Wonderful World of Disney on Sunday night. That was all the TV we were allowed to see in the week, but I would not be who I am today if I had missed those shows. [Humor, guys and gals.] I could only target practice standing, kneeling, squatting, and lying in the basement with my slinged Daisy tho. Rimfire was once or twice a year. That is where you had the big advantage!

Once in grade school I got up in the middle of the night and turned on the TV. Must have been sleepwalking. My mom came down and we watched a pioneering heart surgery accidentally broadcast on Mpls. Channel 2 (the University of MN station then).

I saw the last game that the Minneapolis Millers played against the St. Paul Saints in minor league ball before the Twins were established. I can still count off the early Twins lineup.

I played intramural basketball in sixth grade. Our coach was a college kid named Tom Hall. The cheering from the stadium rocked our neighborhood on Saturday afternoons. The Minnesota Gophers won the Rose Bowl. Tom Hall became a Viking when that team was established!

I saw the last game that the Minneapolis Lakers played before moving to Los Angeles. During halftime the Black Watch played bagpipes and the Harlem Globe Trotters did an awesome demo. Wilt Chamberlain was my absolute hero ‘till Michael Jordan started flying.

Paper route: When we moved to the country I walked a mile into town to do my five mile paper route. Walked home, ate breakfast, and walked the mile to town to catch the bus to high school. Actually, I rode my bike when it was not too snowy. Often tunneled thru snow drifts eight to twelve feet deep in those good old days tho.

Milk route: Picked up Grade B milk in 10 gallon cans seven days a week for a cheese factory. The big guy with the CDL pumped the Grade A stuff into his bulk truck. I pulled the cans out of cattle waterers filled with cold water and threw them up onto the bed of the straight truck which was chest high to me.

Then “modern” times began, and it is best for us to do some woodworking for the health of the world.

Peter M. Spirito,
I bet that was a locally owned bank. I am fortunate to be able to bank at one of the very last of those (they were on my paper route too! Paid every week, so I know I can trust them.).

Frank

[Pete Lamberty]

I guess that I'm not as old as some of you. I don't remember some of these things. But I do remember we had to turn on our TV set five minutes before the show started so it could warm up. I remember having to call a guy in southern Indiana and using what they called a "ring down". I had to tell the operator there what number I wanted. This though wasn't really that long ago, mid 70s.

[Michael Stafford]

Unfortunately I remember most of these things as well. Our phone was 2 shorts and a long. We had 8 other families on our party line.

Things I remember:

Not getting out of school because of the heat. We got out of school for snow and ice. No snow removal equipment in the South.

Paddling, received one in the third grade and was never in need of another. Learned my lesson.

Writing school reports with fountain pens. No word processors or Word programs to set margins, check spelling and grammar.

Walking to school. We lived about 1 1/2 miles from school, too close for the bus.

Fluoroscope machines at JCPenney's in the shoe department to see how your new shoes fit. Can you imagine doing that today?

There were still some old gas pumps out in the country that had the glass tank on the top so you could see how much gas you were delivering.

Soft drink ice boxes where the drink bottles were suspended in ice water by the neck of the bottle. Coldest drinks you could ever have. I wonder how many people died from Legionnaire's and Listeria because of that filthy water? Probably not a one. Of course you bought a nickel bag of peanuts and poured them in your drink and the salt helped kill the nasty bugs I guess.

Three forward gears and reverse on the column; I learned to drive that way. Then I had " 4 on the floor" in high school, thought I was hot stuff.

A&P stores, the Great Atlantic and Pacific Co., where everybody shopped in my neck of the woods until Piggly Wiggly came along and then Food Lion took over. I guess A&P has completely disappeared.

Highway Patrol, Wanted Dead or Alive, Davey Crockett, Daniel Boone, Yancey Derringer, the Lone Ranger and who could forget Roy Rogers, were our heroes. Almost forgot Hopalong Cassidy. And a personal favorite was "Cochise" with Michael Ansara in the title role. Another piece of trivia is that he was married to Barbara Eden of "I Dream of Jeanne" fame.

Donna Reed was the first female TV star that I fell in love with.... And every teenager loved Annette, need I say more. That was sex in the olden days.

Our phone number was ST8 5418 where the exchange was STATE.

Before Andy Griffith there was Uncle Milty, Sid Caesar, Imogene Coca, Red Skelton and George and Gracie. I still remember "Rochester". And the most politically incorrect of them all, the "Amos and Andy Show". Can you imagine that being shown today?

Before Johnny Carson there was Jack Paar with Don Knotts, Louis Nye and some other funny guys. Remember the man on the street interviews with Don Knotts?

Great fun reminiscing about the old days....

[John Hart]

Here's a couple of Nickle Pepsi Commercials. You'll have to unzip it.

I have about 300 old time Radio programs as well if anyone wants a copy

[Bart Leetch]

You had a truck, how modern! We had a horse.

:D I'm sure it was a lot more friendly than the truck.:D

TW-2242 party line. Riding around in the early 50's in a 1941 chevy pickup truck 3 on the floor with a little peddle that you pushed to activate the starter, it was the friendliest truck in town the fenders waved at everyone. Most all the cowboy type shows from the early to mid 50"s & Lawrence Welk. Dr. Welby, The Fugitive. The old soft drink cooler in my uncles auto repair shop open the lid on top & the soft drinks were just sitting on the bottom in cold water yep the coldest soft drink you could get with no ice. This was just a chill box colored red with the Coke logo on the outside with nothing to retain the soft drink in the box until you paid the nickle or dime it was the honor system where you just dropped the money in a little locked box on the front of the cooler.

[Rob Russell]

Steering wheels were an option.

Yeah - that would have been a while ago!:D

[Mark Cothren]

I'll chime in with an experience...

We were at a youth function at our church about 2 years ago and one of the kids needed to use the phone. My wife took him to the office in the old building and showed him the phone. He just stood there dumbfounded... Our church building has been there a while. The old office has a rotary dial phone. First time this 14-year old kid had ever seen one and he had no idea how to use it.

On a side note, I just recently found out that I am distantly related to "Festus". Now some of you who know me might not find that hard to believe...;) Ol' cousin Ken (Curtis) is a relative on my grandmother's side... she has a picture of him in an old family album she showed me over the Christmas holiday.

[Frank Chaffee]

Mark,
Of course we remember Festus!
Matt, Kitty, Chester, Doc and Festus.
Thanks all for sharing memories.
Frank

[John Hart]

My wife told me I was related to Festus's Horse. ...Well....part of his horse anyway.:rolleyes:

[Lee DeRaud]

Before Johnny Carson there was Jack Paar with Don Knotts, Louis Nye and some other funny guys.And Steve Allen: funnier than Paar or Carson, although I can never remember whether the order was Allen-Paar-Carson or Paar-Allen-Carson.

(google-google)He had the Tonight show before Paar, but he had his own show afterward...no wonder I'm confused.

[Michael Stafford]

And Steve Allen: funnier than Paar or Carson, although I can never remember whether the order was Allen-Paar-Carson or Paar-Allen-Carson.

(google-google)He had the Tonight show before Paar, but he had his own show afterward...no wonder I'm confused.

You are absolutely right Lee. I remember Steve Allen and his wife, June Allyson if I am correct. Now how is that for pulling one out of the cobwebs?:D

[Lee DeRaud]

You are absolutely right Lee. I remember Steve Allen and his wife, June Allyson if I am correct. Now how is that for pulling one out of the cobwebs?:DClose but no cigar: Jayne Meadows. (Not to be confused with her sister Audrey "Alice Kramden" Meadows.)

[Frank Chaffee]

John Hart:
"My wife told me I was related to Festus's Horse. ...Well....part of his horse anyway."

Thank you for sharing, Mr. Hartbreaker.

Does your wife also know why Festus’ mule is named Ruth?

Sorry guy I couldn’t resist. You have to admit you left yourself so wide open there.

Frank

[John Hart]

Thanks Frank! And all this time, I figured that no one reads my posts!:D

Here's a little collage I put together today when I should have been working

[Frank Chaffee]

Nice collage John.

Somehow I missed the Azimov/Silverberg book Nightfall, tho I’ve read some of each of them. Sounds like an interesting (and unexpected) collaboration.

Frank

[Lee DeRaud]

Somehow I missed the Azimov/Silverberg book Nightfall, tho I’ve read some of each of them. Sounds like an interesting (and unexpected) collaboration.As a long-time (and I mean long-time) fan of the Asimov short story on which this is based, I think I'll pass on this version. A quick scan of the reviews indicates that the plot holds together about as well as the screenplay to "Pitch Black".:eek:

(Side note: I actually liked "Pitch Black", but I had to shut my brain off as soon as they crashed...and there were survivors. Not just survivors, but uninjured survivors. And before anybody asks, yes, I have the exact same problem with "Lost".)

[John Hart]

As a long-time (and I mean long-time) fan of the Asimov short story on which this is based, I think I'll pass on this version. A quick scan of the reviews indicates that the plot holds together about as well as the screenplay to "Pitch Black".:eek:

(Side note: I actually liked "Pitch Black", but I had to shut my brain off as soon as they crashed...and there were survivors. Not just survivors, but uninjured survivors. And before anybody asks, yes, I have the exact same problem with "Lost".)

Lee, I oughta email you and Frank the original Radio Broadcast....Just to see what you two think.

[Frank Chaffee]

Wow John!
I really dig radio drama, old time or modern. I have viewed very little TV since the early 60’s, but have sometimes listened to a lot of radio (stations w/o commercials only).

I started reading sci fi in about the third grade. I realized then that if time travel is ever to be developed then we are already here. But then I was just a kid and didn’t know about the INS. Ah, sweet innocence.

My rural connection is very slow for receiving large files, but if you would email it to my broadband buddy John Miliunas then I could hear it there.

Thanks,
Frank

[John Hart]

Or I can just mail you some CDs. If you PM your address, I'll send you about 500 shows and commercials. Mostly from 1938 to 1954

[Joe Mioux]

How about the corner Rexall drug store that had a real soda fountain. I still remember those cherry cokes!

Along with that, unfortunately, television caused the demise of alot of small town movie theaters. I remember being old enough to walk uptown to the movie theater on Saturdays, but too young to walk up town to the theater on a Friday night.

To continue the movie theme, how many drive-in movie theaters are left? Those were fun as well.

[Frank Pellow]

Growing up in a remote part of Northern Ontario, there are some things I remember that I expect will not be remembered by many others:

The celebration when our town finally got electricity (before then, a few places (very few) had generators).

The celebration when the town got running water and sewers.

(When I was about 12), having a couple of classmates who came to school by dog sled, kept the dogs in a special yard at the school and ran part of their trap-lines on the way home after school.

Hauling wood out of the bush in the winter with a team of horses.

Visiting my grandparents by train because there was no road to their town.

Helping my dad cut ice on the lake for our icehouse.

Another vivid memory that some here may share is waving a flag (in my case a Union Jack) in the VE (Victory in Europe) celebration held in our town. I knew than that I was one of the lucky ones because my dad would be coming back.

[Frank Chaffee]

When I was eight and practicing for my position as little league pitcher, I learned how to remove hard putty from the garage windows, cut glass and use glazers points and fresh putty to repair my targets.

When I was fifteen and thawed water frozen in basement pipes, somewhat unskillfully, I learned to solder said pipes back together.

Frank

[Peter M. Spirito]

parades always had Army trucks and solders marching and everyone cheered.:rolleyes: