The Good Old Days?

My sister Kellie recently forwarded to me a list of nostalgic things from “back in the day” that made Charlie and I chuckle and reminisce.

Gee, how things have changed during our lifetimes! Here’s a list of things that I remember from the “Fabulous Fifties”:

• Garbage pails     In-sink garbage disposals were not available yet, so kitchen garbage was put in a pail outside awaiting trash pick-up, said pails becoming incubators for hordes of pulsating maggots
• Gasoline    There were often gas stations on all four corners of an intersection  (where we lived near Los Angeles), offering gas for 23 to 25 cents per gallon, the purchase of which also entitled the driver to full under-the-hood service, window washing, tire pressure maintenance, and Green Stamps (which could be redeemed for goods); premium grades of gas cost an extra nickel per gallon
• Television If your family owned a TV, it may have been one with a small “porthole” screen (like our first) offering Black and White programming courtesy of three television national networks which shut down over night; lots of TV shows, sports, and ads were “live”, resulting in many bloopers; game shows and children’s programming became popular; not every household had a TV, so it was common for TV-less neighbors to be invited over to watch a popular program
• Litter          Streets and highways were commonly strewn with litter, as auto occupants would toss trash out the windows and cigarette smokers would empty ash trays into the street at signals and stop signs
• Childhood diseases    Chicken pox, mumps, measles, whooping cough, and polio were common in this era before vaccination was commonplace; polio was particularly devastating (I knew a kid in elementary school who suffered from it and had ungainly metal leg braces that were quite awkward to manage and caused him great teasing and ostracism from his classmates)
• News          Most people got their news from local and regional newspapers which generally adhered to the “who, what, where, when, and how” straightforward approach, with speculative stuff and opinion only found on the one page OpEd section; TV news “anchormen” (they were all men) were trusted to deliver the facts; most newspapers were delivered to homes by youngsters (my brother and I had a “paper route” when we were young) on bicycles
• Politics       Most people didn’t spend a lot of time thinking about politics, as they were too busy trying to achieve “The American Dream”; the clergy stayed clear of politics in their sermons; the general public trusted the electoral process; elected officials showed more respect toward each other, consequently things “got done” in the halls of power; Democrats controlled Southern politics (the “Solid South”); most national elected officials in the Fifties were military veterans (nowadays the amount is less than 20 percent)
• Door-to-door Peddlers        Neighborhoods were plagued by an army of door-to-door salesmen, who hawked vacuum cleaners, encyclopedias, kitchen accessories, and cosmetics to stay-at-home housewives
• No Supermarkets        Local grocery stores and Mom and Pop markets satisfied most shopping needs, while perishable products (like dairy, bakery goods, and ice cream/popsicles for the kids) were delivered to households by (in our case) Carnation Dairy, Helms Bakery, and the Good Humor man; locally-owned neighborhood hardware stores took care of D.I.Y. parts and equipment needs
• Air Pollution       Every home had an outdoor incinerator that burned trash and contributed to horrendous smog (in the Los Angeles area, at least)
• Women’s Role   Relatively few women worked back then; instead, they had babies, kept the house tidy, took care of the kids, made meals, sewed clothes, and fended off the advances of the door-to-door salesmen; some women (like my mother) sold Avon cosmetics to their neighbor friends to earn a few extra bucks
• Men’s Role         A married guy’s role was to earn a paycheck, take good care of the wife, do “honey do’s” around the home, and discipline the kids; physical punishment for boys, like spanking, was common if not the standard procedure; spousal abuse was probably more common then, as the police (who may have engaged in the same behavior with their wives) typically turned a blind eye to it
• Cars  Almost all cars in America were made in Detroit, Michigan, with an emphasis on increasingly powerful engines, tailfins, and lots of chrome; two-tone paint jobs were popular and all cars had radio antennas; the average cost of a new Chevrolet in 1955 was $3,000, while the average family income was $4.300; two-car families were not common during the early to mid-1950’s (at least in So Calif)
• Paranoia    Lots of bomb shelters were built in backyards as protection (?) against a nuclear holocaust that was regularly predicted due to the “Red Scare” that was hyped by right-wing politicians and “doomsday” scenarios postulated by Liberals
• Hair            Women used a lot of hairspray, “Butch” and “Flat Top” haircuts were popular among youngsters and teenaged boys, adult men used Vaseline hair tonic to slick back their locks, and businessmen often wore fedora hats; toupees were common for balding men
• Toys            Popular kid’s toys included Hula Hoops, Erector sets, marbles, Pogo sticks, jump rope, dolls (Barbie was first sold in 1959), Lincoln Logs, bikes, and skates (including skateboards made in the family garage)
• Professional Sports    Sports stars back then typically had off-season jobs to make ends meet, it was very difficult for players to change teams, and televised sports were few (mostly on weekends) except local boxing, roller derby, and wrestling events; all televised sporting events were “live” (I recall watching the “Friday Night Fights” one evening when the bout ended by knockout after 12 seconds, leaving a gaping hole in the network programming, as the bout was expected to run at least an hour)
• Sin City      The highway from Los Angeles to Las Vegas back in the Fifties was a two-lane asphalt road; auto engine overheating was common on the 300-mile route, which included severalmountain passes over 4,000 feet in elevation; the major Las Vegas casino/hotels were fewer but classier back when the Mob was running things, table games were affordable, food was cheap, kids weren’t allowed in casinos whatsoever, street performers/panhandlers didn’t clog up the walkways on Fremont Street, women didn’t play slot machines dressed in bathing suits, and flyers for “outcall” prostitutes didn’t litter the sidewalks on the Las Vegas Strip
• Amusement Parks (in So Calif)     Knotts Berry Farm sold a lot of fried chicken and berry pies but had no “thrill rides” and was free to enter, Disneyland only cost about $10 for a ticket book, the Marineland of the Pacific oceanarium in Palos Verdes was popular for educational school trips; Six Flags Magic Mountain and Seaworld of San Diego were yet to open
• Sexuality   People were much more modest in those days, only bimbos and desperate actresses flaunted their cleavage in public, homosexuality was “closeted”, and respectable people didn’t talk publicly about sex; Playboy magazine was big, burlesque “peep shows” were popular among perverts, and gay Hollywood stars (like manly man Rock Hudson) took great pains to hide their true sexuality
• Youth Sports      Little League baseball was the predominant youth sport, as there was no organized soccer or Pop Warner football in those days (at least in So Calif) and no organized basketball until high school; Dads volunteered to coach Little League so that they could ensure playing time for their child
• Smoking    It seemed like all adults of that time period smoked a lot, even performers on TV shows; cigarette manufacturers publicly denied any connection between tobacco use and health problems (like lung cancer); cigarettes were very cheap and available everywhere via vending machines; few brands featured “filters” to trap tars and nicotine, and smoking filtered cigarettes was considered un-manly
• Racism       This “ism” was deeply ingrained in American society; it was the “in your face” Jim Crow variety in the Deep South, while it was more of a “behind your back” style in the Northeast, Midwest, and West regions  where real estate “redlining” and discriminatory criminal justice tactics were in vogue
• Unhealthy Food           Nobody knew or cared about carbs or cholesterol in the 1950’s, as hamburgers, fried chicken, French fries, onion rings, bacon, eggs and hashbrowns, pasta, barbequed steaks and ribs, candy, ice cream and milkshakes were popular menu items; no “organic”, gluten free, reduced salt, zero calorie, non G.M.O., or “free range” items were available on any restaurant menu or on grocery shelves
• Telephones         Every home had ONE, which was the old rotary dial type and it was common to be on a “party line”, where other households shared the phone line; there were on-line “operators” who would assist with long-range calls, which were very expensive; and there were pay-to-use phone booths located all over the community, each having a large directory for personal and business (Yellow Pages) calls
• Theaters    Everyone went to the movie theaters (indoor and drive-in) regularly because they were fairly cheap and full-length movies were rare on TV; the entertainment was mostly Westerns, sci fi, horror, “cast of thousands” Biblical epics, and war movies; double-features were common, with a cartoon or documentary short feature between movies so that adults could go load up on popcorn, candy, and drinks at the snack stand; drive-in theatres usually had a playground for kids to play in (in their pajamas!) before the movie started and during intermission
• Gun Violence     Bank robbers, general criminals, and the Mob were responsible for most aggressive gun violence in the Fifties, typically using revolvers; mass shootings of innocents like we often see today, using semi-automatic pistols and military-grade long guns, did not happen back in the “Dragnet” days because those type of weapons were not generally available to the public
• “Drive-Ins”         The Fifties were the period where Americans fell in love with their cars; most large communities had an outdoor/drive-in theater, where parents would take the whole family for an evening of fun and where teens would do naughty things away from the prying eyes of their parents; drive-in fast food restaurants were common, where food would be brought on a tray (which affixed to the driver’s window) often by servers on roller skates
• The White House        The President of the United States for much of the Fifties was non-controversial Dwight D. Eisenhower, an ex-4 Star General hero from World War II who, along with his wife Mamie, looked like everyone’s grandparents; Richard Nixon was V.P. and Allen Dulles was C.I.A. chief, both of them paranoid Communist haters
• Popular Entertainment        Singers, orchestras, and variety acts dominated the stage, screen, and nightclub venues; comedians purveyed “clean” jokes; the most popular TV variety show was the “Ed Sullivan Show”, which featured singers, ventriloquists, jugglers, acrobats, comedians and the like, and was hosted by a stiff, hunchbacked old guy (Sullivan) who had a strange voice; Mr. Sullivan was so “square” that he invited Elvis Presley onto his show but insisted that Elvis would only be photographed from the waist up
• Rock n’ Roll        It was during the Fifties that music designed for young people was invented, blending Negro “blues”/jazz with Southern “hillbilly”/up-tempo sounds to create the beginnings of rock and roll; the big early stars were Elvis Presley, Chuck Berry, Little Richard, Fats Domino, Roy Orbison, Jerry Lee Lewis, and Ricky Nelson; crooners, folk singers, and orchestras rapidly faded out of the picture, at least as far as teenagers were concerned; “American Bandstand”, a music and dance show from Philadelphia, showcased the new artists and provided a venue for young teens to show off their newly-developed dance moves
• Religion     Most families belonged to and attended a local church; the Catholic Church exerted influence on national morals (motion pictures, TV, literature, abortion, etc.) and politics (ironic, in retrospect, as it was later revealed that parish priests were molesting young children and covering up their crimes)
• International Affairs   The United States spent most of the Fifties fighting off “creeping Communism” throughout the world, perpetuating fear of the “Domino Effect” and imminent nuclear war with the U.S.S.R.; our C.I.A. kept busy orchestrating coups in fragile countries, typically “assisting” the locals in replacing one ruthless dictator for another
• Technology         Scientists of the day utilized slide rules to solve math problems; criminologists were totally unaware of D.N.A. and the national fingerprint database (CODIS) was in its infancy; most commercial airliners had “prop” propulsion; microwave oven technology was not yet practical for home use; automobile engine in-efficiency averaged 14.5 miles per gallon; cameras required film which took maybe a week or so to develop; women’s bras were pointed, like Mt. Fujiama; most people used clotheslines to dry washed garments; businesses used carbon paper and teachers used mimeograph to replicate printed information; consumers used Western Union to transfer funds to recipients out of town
• Primary Education      Teachers got a lot of respect back in the Fifties; in elementary public school, classroom disrespect might get one sent to the Principal’s office to receive “swats” (corporal punishment); my buddies in Catholic schools told me that the men and women (nuns) teachers would wreak havoc on miscreant students by hitting them with rulers, throwing erasers at them, pulling hair, pinching their ears, etc.; lesser classroom crimes might end up with the student sitting in a corner with his back to the class (the “Dunce” punishment) and/or being required to write, on the classroom blackboard, “I will not talk in class” a couple of hundred times
• Marriage   Divorce was less common back then, probably because of influence of religion (particularly Catholic) and laws which made divorce difficult and costly; couples worked out problems or came to accommodation within the scope of the marriage; long marriages of 30 to 50 years were not unusual (the average marriage nowadays lasts 8-1/2 years); young adults in love were 2-1/2 times more likely to marry in the Fifties than in today’s America; being an adult and not married back in the day was considered odd/peculiar/suspicious
• Criminal Justice Police were given great latitude in how they handled suspected perpetrators of crime and many officers abused their authority; the “usual suspects” were typically rousted after a crime and coerced confessions were not uncommon (there were no “Miranda rights”); “people of color” were targeted in urban areas; predominantly White juries determined the fates of Black and Brown defendants; capital punishment (death by electric chair, gas chamber, or firing squad) was meted out regularly; chain gangs were common in the Deep South
• Advertising         Virtually all commercial advertising in newspapers, television, and billboards featured Caucasian models; TV game shows were sponsored by household products, as the audience was primary stay-at-home housewives, while evening programming featured lots of cigarette and new car ads; matchbook advertising was very common; prescription medicine advertising, which dominates TV ads today, was virtually non-existent in the Fifties
• Holidays    Christmas and Easter were major family events, as religion was more in vogue back in the day and family “togetherness” was more cherished; everyone shot off fireworks on the Fourth of July, causing many homes to burn down (shake shingles were legal back then in So Calif); Halloween was much more popular and safe then and most kids weren’t chaperoned by parents; Valentine’s Day was big in elementary school, where kids would often give Valentine’s to every classmate; birthdays (in K-6 public school) would often be celebrated by cupcakes for everyone, courtesy of the “Birthday Boy’s/Girl’s” mother
• Suburbanization          Tract homes, freeways, and shopping malls took off during the Eisenhower presidency, beginning a trend that would begin to decimate old “downtown” retail areas in small towns and cities and provide serious challenges to public transit
• Life   The Fifties were when Americans got down to business after the trauma of World War II, raised their children (the Baby Boomers), and pursued the Great American Dream (a steady job, a house “with a white picket fence”, a car, modern kitchen appliances, and a couple of kids); TV shows like “I Love Lucy” and “Ozzie and Harriett”, “Father Knows Best”, “The Honeymooners”, and “Leave It To Beaver” tried to portray the family model of the period; adult alcohol use was prevalent, while marijuana and hard drugs were only used by the lower classes of society; juvenile delinquency included such infractions as cussing, tipping over a porta-potty, trespassing, or minor vandalism/shoplifting; Americans were much more serious and “united” in those days, much less “partisan”, and much more focused on societal progress

Those were the “Good Old Days”, as I recall from my youth.