This ties it all together.

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jsalcedo

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We Made It!

According to today's regulators and bureaucrats, those of us who
were kids in the 40's, 50's, 60's, 70's or even the early 80's, probably shouldn't have survived.

Our baby cribs were covered with bright colored lead-based paint. We had no childproof lids on medicine bottles, doors or cabinets, and when we rode our bikes, we had no helmets.

Not to mention the risks we took hitchhiking.
As children, we would ride in cars with no seat belts or air bags.
Riding in the back of a pickup truck on a warm day was always a special treat.

We drank water from the garden hose and not from a bottle. Horrors! We ate cupcakes, bread and butter, and drank soda pop with sugar in it, but we were never overweight because we were always outside playing.

We shared one soft drink with four friends, from one bottle, and no one actually died from this.

We would spend hours building our go-carts out of scraps and then rode down the hill, only to find out we forgot the brakes. After running into the bushes a few times, we learned to solve the problem.

We would leave home in the morning and play all day, as long as we were back when the street lights came on.

No one was able to reach us all day. No cell phones. Unthinkable!
We did not have Playstations, Nintendo 64, X-Boxes, no video games at all, no 99 channels on cable, video tape movies, surround sound, personal cell phones, personal computers, or Internet chat rooms. We had friends!

We went outside and found them.

We played dodge ball, and sometimes, the ball would really hurt.

We fell out of trees, got cut and broke bones and teeth, and there were no lawsuits from these accidents. They were accidents. No one was to blame but us.

Remember accidents?

We had fights and punched each other and got black and blue and learned to get over it.

We made up games with sticks and tennis balls and ate worms, and although we were told it would happen, we did not put out very many eyes, nor did the worms live inside us forever.

We rode bikes or walked to a friend's home and knocked on the door,or rang the bell or just walked in and talked to them.

Little League had tryouts and not everyone made the team. Those who didn't had to learn to deal with disappointment.

Some students weren't as smart as others, so they failed a grade and were held back to repeat the same grade. Horrors!

Tests were not adjusted for any reason.

Our actions were our own. Consequences were expected.

The idea of a parent bailing us out if we broke a law was unheard
of. They actually sided with the law. Imagine that!

This generation has produced some of the best risk-takers and
problem solvers and inventors, ever.

The past 50 years have been an explosion of innovation and new
ideas. We had freedom, failure, success and responsibility, and we learned how to deal with it all.!

And you're one of them! Congratulations!

Please pass this on to others who have had the luck to grow up as kids, before lawyers and government regulated our lives, for our own good.
 
We did not have Playstations, Nintendo 64, X-Boxes, no video games at all, no 99 channels on cable, video tape movies, surround sound, personal cell phones, personal computers, or Internet chat rooms.
<sigh> I remember the first TV in the neighborhood. I remember the first dial telephone. I remember the first jet airliner. I remember the first auto without running boards. <sigh:mad:

TC
TFL Survivor
 
When I was a kid, I used to play in this giant oak tree behind my grandparent's house. Periodically, I would plummet to the ground. Grandad would lean out the garage door, and if I was still moving, he would go back to whatever he was doing. Kids are pretty rubbery.

Mom and dad also figured out that a pair of rollerblades and a hockey stick was a much better investment than video games. I never wanted for sports equipment. Be it roller hockey, basketball, football, or baseball, all I had to do was ask, and, if my room was clean and the dogs were fed, I got whatever I wanted. A new video game happened about once every two years. I'm not in any sort of spectacularly athletic shape, but I'm doing a whole lot better than many of the kids I see now. I broke my nose a couple of times, got bruised and scraped up pretty bad (I was lucky enough to escape broken bones), and I've done the skidding on all fours across the gravel bit after falling off my bike several times (helmets save lives! I know!), but I survived, and now I have these neat scars that prove I had a decent childhood.

I don't remember calling my friends very often. It was only a few blocks, and I had a bike, so why bother? Mom and dad were always ok with it. Our Saturday afternoon conversations usually consisted of "Mom/Dad, can I go play..." "Yeah, dinner is at 6." Spending time with your kids is good, but kicking them out of the house with a football on Saturday gives you some time to relax, and they learn how to do that whole social interaction thing.

I really don't understand all the BS we have to put up with now. Supposedly it makes life easier and safer, but I remember childhood as being pretty easy, and I never felt like I was in any kind of danger. Go figure...
 
Leatherneck: Don't feel bad! I'm 33 and didn't get to see any of that stuff. I know its not likely but it feels like there's nothing new coming out to take your breath away now. I wish I could have seen all those "firsts" you saw.
 
I enjoyed that. My grandparents were born in the early 1890s and used to talk about seeing their first car, their first plane, and so forth. It was a long way from the farm to the space age, but they made it.


"We had friends!" Boy, did we ever.

Now I see parents calling other parents to make 'play dates' for their kids to get together. Sad. When did this start?


I'm a kid of the '50s. The world wasn't black and white - only the family photos :)

1950 first Disney TV special One Hour in Wonderland airs on NBC.(JohnBT born, too!)

1955 Mickey Mouse Club, Disney's second TV show is launched.

1955 Disneyland opens. I've never bothered to go. Too many friends I guess and too much to do :)

John
 
heck I remember the day my brother acidently shot me with the 22 in the leg we only had to fill a little paperwork out and the sherriff deputy asking me what happened and going home later that day . if that happened today sheees they would have arrested my grandparents for being irresponsable . my brother admitted to his wrong doing and was not allowed to handle a firearm till he went into the airfarce , and the falls and scrapes from falling off my motorcycle .. today If I give a kid a side glance they would start crying . and don't forget to urn the air on it's a sweltering 75 degrees outside and johnnys got ashma ( had it as a kid and still baled hay & straw .. )
 
I remember rotary pulse-dial phones, and if you had a B&W TV, you really had something. 3 TV stations, 4 if you counted the "Educational TV Channel" [now PBS] that was only on part of the day. No cable tv service, 'computers" were that large room sized cabinet of (Gasp!) vacuum tubes, and you 'input data' using punch cards. Radio broadcasting was AM only.

Bought my first auto-loader shotgun from a high-school buddy, a 20-ga Remington "Sportsman" model. Took it home, walked about 2-1/2 miles. Saw the local PD cruisers go by me several times, didn't even get a second look from the patrol officers. One police car did stop, but I knew the officer...actually PM Watch Commander, a family friend. Talked about shotguns, hunting, etc, and he showed me his new S&W "Combat Masterpiece", took me rest of the way home.
 
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