Calling all older folks

[RobDownSouth]

When your TV broke down (like a tube burned out), a serviceman came to your house to fix it. You would no more take it IN somewhere than you would strap a broken washing machine to the top of your car.

One of my earliest memories was travelling with my Dad to the local drug store when our beloved black-and-white console tv blew a tube. We actually found the correct replacement tube in a revolving kiosk rack (the type that used to hold comic books) and Dad successfully repaired the TV.

Plot twist: Dad was NOT mechanically inclined, I think this was the first and only time he ever fixed something in his life.

We were the last family in the neighborhood to get a color TV, it was the year of the moon landing.

 

[bbx56]

When I was a kid

A Color TV was a luxury, and the color didnt actually follow the person

I loved to read comics and had heard that BATMAN was coming to TV

I begged and begged and begged my parents for a color TV

They finally bought a used one

I was so excited to watch BATMAN on TV.....my Mother prepared a huge feast of steak and fries for me while I watched the show

The show starts, I dig into my steak

THE TV FUCKING DIES!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!


I have been traumatized since then

I still havent seen it



I blame my mental illness on that

Every time I eat a staek, I REMEMBER THAT:

 

[bbx56]

That post is so sweet...

Are you trying to get laid?

of course

so far

all my efforts

have led me to get

what I get from my

wife

AGGRAVATION! and NO FUCKING SEX

 

[bbx56]

LIT has wasted my time for 18 yrs

 

[SpeareChucker]

Batman really sucked.

Johnny Quest and Speed racer was where it was at...

 

[SpeareChucker]

LIT has wasted my time for 18 yrs

It feels the same about you.


Trust me on this one...

 

[bbx56]

It feels the same about you.


Trust me on this one...

waves hello to LONGO!

 

[Bottomlover]

I was born in the very early 50's. I grew up in a new suburban neighborhood in an all white town in NJ that had 230+ houses. Dad was a WWII combat vet.

The neighborhood was almost all skilled blue collar. There were lots of kids, and clothes and toys got passed around as we grew. We didn't have play dates; we just went outside and "called for" our friends by knocking on their doors. Our streets were safe and we had a wooded area ("the woods") at the edge of the development. Everyone had a bicycle, and we got around the neighborhood just fine. As kids, we were always busy with something, even if it was just digging a big hole. We went to school on a school bus. When it snowed, we had to listen for the siren at 7:00 AM. If there was a siren, there was no school.

None of the mothers worked or drove. The milkman brought milk to us, and there was an endless parade of produce, meat, fish, and other vendors in trucks or old school buses. In the summer, 3 different ice cream trucks came every day at different times. On Friday night, a truck with a whip ride came, as did a little 3 wheeled vehicle with a cotton candy machine on the back. Once a week, a knife sharpening guy would come around. Each vendor had a signature bell or horn on his vehicle.

When someone's car broke down, it became a neighborhood project for the dads to fix it. Parts were obtained from a junkyard ("the junky's") where they had to remove parts from junked cars themselves. When someone's TV broke, a few dads would get together to try to diagnose the problem (and have a beer or 2), and they always ended up taking out all of the tubes and going to Walgreens, where there was a tube tester.

On weekends, city dwelling relatives would visit and we'd have cookouts, sometimes including neighbors and their extended families.

There were several Jewish families in the neighborhood, and we often went to events at their synagogue and were invited into their homes for holiday celebrations, as were they into ours.

A day that's burned into my memory is October 24, 1962. My mom was crying as she sent us off to school with instructions to stay there if we had to shelter until she or our dad came for us. The school had a supply of cots, drums of water, food and Geiger counters. She already had a blanket over the kitchen table to shelter under when the bombs started falling.

I had it pretty good. I have no tales of childhood woe. I grew up in an environment of strong traditional families, and it worked well for us. We didn't have a lot of money, and our parents did the best they could with what they worked hard for. I truly believe that their generation is deserving of the Greatest Generation label.

 

[fisherfella]

In the neighbourhoods which I grew up in there was always someone that someone knew that could fix whatever broke down. As a matter of fact this was always the first attempt to remedy our problem. We very rarely ran off to the store and just bought a replacement..

 

[coati]

Don't get me started

...and we LIKED it!

Yup, we shoveled snow until we dropped from a heart attack, dug ditches by hand, walked six miles to get to school, sprayed our urban streets during the summer with DDT while we ran behind the spray truck...

...and we LIKED it!

While you are sitting here, can I tell you in detail about my gall bladder operation?

 

[oggbashan]

...

A day that's burned into my memory is October 24, 1962. My mom was crying as she sent us off to school with instructions to stay there if we had to shelter until she or our dad came for us. The school had a supply of cots, drums of water, food and Geiger counters. She already had a blanket over the kitchen table to shelter under when the bombs started falling.

...

I had just started work in a defence establishment at the beginning of October 1962. When the Cuban missile crisis started I found out my role in the War Plan.

As the most junior officer (with a whole 3 weeks seniority!) I was to stand on top of the tallest building in one of the UK's most obvious targets. I had a plotting table, a telescope and a protractor. I was to measure the height of any nuclear explosions, estimate the distance from me and calculate the size of the bomb. I was to report any bombs to my superiors, five miles away in a nuclear shelter deep under a hill.

Of course that was nonsense. Any nuclear bomb would be aimed at the obvious target - me. While waiting for the bomb to obliterate me I had to keep speaking down an open telephone line to a slightly more senior officer at the entrance to the nuclear bunker. When I stopped speaking he would close the blast doors. They had provided me with a copy of the King James Bible and the complete works of Shakespeare to read from. The officer designated to be by the blast doors told me that if there was a real risk he would already have closed the doors and be on the telephone line from inside.

I never got the order to climb that tower. I was expected to have at least four minutes warning and I could climb it in three...

 

[bbx56]

So I lived in an Italian neighboorhood

Their "club" got a big new color tv before most people even knew what a color tv was.......we thought that was a TV a colored guy stole, making it a color tv

So once I found out about the TV.....I hung out on the outsde looking in watch the METS games, after a few days they felt sorry for me and invited me in

Now THAT was an experience, they all seemed BIG, they all had bulges in places you when I saw The Godfather/GoodFellas etc I realized,

I WAS THERE!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!


Gotta admit, wacthing the Met games in color was awesome

Despite me being a Yankee fan

 

[Aglaopheme]

I loved reading this thread, Candi.

The one story that comes to mind showcasing the difference beetween my munchkins and I wa the time years ago a friend gave each of my girls a Walkman and all of the Jarry Poter books on tape (they still ask permission to listen to them on the weekends.) Middle daughter came into our room quite upset saying they were broken because part of the book was missing. We had neglected to tell her she had to flip the tape over when it had finished rather than just moving on to the next.

 

[Comshaw]

TV in the 50's and early 60's was a PITA for sure. Through that era I only remember black and white. I never watched a color set until the late 60's. Like I said in an earlier post, we lived way the hell and gone back in the toolies. Our TV antenna was mounted on a 20' section of 1 1/2" pipe tied to the side of the house with metal straps. That's so we could go out and turn it to get better reception. We received 3 U.S. stations, 2 poorly. Most of the time they were both snowy, blurry double images, unwatchable, but that didn't keep us from trying. One kid outside turned the antenna, the other inside yelling instructions and fiddling with the vertical and horizontal hold. Sometimes, when we held our mouth right, the solar radiation cooperated and the atmospheric conditions were perfect we'd get an image that was watchable, for a short time anyway.

The third U.S. station was on the border with Canada and broadcast Canadian shows 75% of the time. We also got three Canadian stations, one out of Victoria and two out of Vancouver. All three of those were crystal clear. Hell for the first 10 years of my life I thought hockey was the national sport. I knew more about the rules for it and curling then I did baseball.

The grade school I went to was small, 1st to the 6th grade. My 1st. grade class consisted of 9 kids, the same kids I went all the way through 6th grade with. The school had three teachers, one for 1st/2nd, one for 3rd/4th and one for 5th/6th grades. The year of my 6th grade that combined 5th/6th grade class was 21 kids.

Each one of those teachers read to us every day. We'd put our heads down on the desk, close our eyes and be transported to a different world. In 1st grade it was Mother West Wind stories and the like, in the next two, Charlotte's Web and such. in the last two years we got to listen to (and experience in our imagination) Moby Dick, Treasure Island, White Fang and others like that.

We didn't have a library in the school, but each week a big blue van, the bookmobile, would show up. Damn i loved that truck! We'd get to spend 20 minutes picking out three books to keep and read for the next week. I read the biography of Jack London, many of Ray Bradbury's works as well as Andre Norton among many others. The reading our teachers did and that van are the reason i've always loved books and reading.

It was a culture shock to go from 6th to 7th grade. We were sent into town to go to the junior high school (called middle school now). From a school of around 60-65 kids and a class size of 21, we were put into a class of 40 and a school with 400 kids. That was bad enough, but the bus ride was horrendous. Because of the distance to school, the spread out nature of where we lived and all the stops required, the bus ride was 1 1/2 hours each morning and each afternoon. You know how much trouble a bunch of kids can get into when their cooped up for that long? We did.


Comshaw

 

[bbx56]

Oh, I remember Our TV antenna

Was a big STEEL thing

Always had the neighborhood lunatic hold it

And we gave him directions where and when to turn (that days version of wireless remote)...paid him a few bucks


I remember the first REMOTE to change channels....3 seconds it came out I was at the store to get one

HAD WIRES!!!!!!!!!!!

Every time my kids came in the room, walked into it and if the wires werent pulled, the TV would fall

Until I put up TRAFFIC CONES


True story

 

[PWilton]

I heard a couple people talk about the Lone Ranger and I have to say- I've never seen the show but that movie sucked.

Yes, there were a couple of Hollywood Lone Ranger movies made and they were all lousy. There is a good Wikipedia article about the history of the Lone Ranger idea:

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lone_Ranger

I think the movies failed because the essential format were good guys vs. bad guys in simple, short vignettes, first on the radio, then on TV. I remember having a 'Lone Ranger Atomic Bomb ring' somewhere around 1948; it sparkled when you looked though a small lens.

I think one has to be 'of a certain age' to understand the appeal of the saga.

 

[bbx56]

So I remember in 1974

My Father got a Chevy Impala Station wagon>>>>http://veh-markets.com/uploads/postfotos/1974-chevy-impala-station-wagon-texas-car-1-owner-runs-well-project-car-3.jpg picked it up on a Friday afternoon

Power windows, hot damn, I played with that for an hr, it was so cool

I took it our for a ride Saturday night....I was driving on the Belt Pkwy in Bklyn, not a care in the world.....UNTIL a fucking siren goes one and I get pulled over for speeding

Im so stressed out, i was shaking I acyually thought he could take the car cause I only had a learners permit....I get a tcket....I drive back home.....

We lived n Ocean Parkway, if you know the service road on OP, there are cars on both sides and barely any room for a car to drive thru...even less room for a BIG MOFO like a Chevy Impala Station Wagon....Im driving, shaking and sweating and CRUNCH!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!......I scrapped the RIGHT SIDE OF THE CAR!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!


Fucking shit!!!!!!!!!!!


My Father never noticed till a few days later cause he never went to the right side.....I pulled the WHO ME? act....it worked


Oh, and Monday of that week?

OPEC declares a boycott for oil and gas goes from .23 to .99 and $1.10......and The Chevy was a GAS GUZZLER



Other then that

I HAD FUN

 

[bbx56]

My father had 3 cars in his life

they were all 3 Chevy Impala Station Wagons....GREEN

 

[Comshaw]

Yes, there were a couple of Hollywood Lone Ranger movies made and they were all lousy. There is a good Wikipedia article about the history of the Lone Ranger idea:

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lone_Ranger

I think the movies failed because the essential format were good guys vs. bad guys in simple, short vignettes, first on the radio, then on TV. I remember having a 'Lone Ranger Atomic Bomb ring' somewhere around 1948; it sparkled when you looked though a small lens.

I think one has to be 'of a certain age' to understand the appeal of the saga.

I disagree with that assessment. The basic premise of the Lone Ranger is the same as many of the modern hero's, Hans Solo, Luke Sky Walker, Captain Janeway, Spiderman, Captain Sheridan and on and on. The difference between then and now is that back then the hero had no weaknesses. The Lone Ranger was a total white hat, never wrong, never weak, just a hero. The later batch were portrayed as hero's with human weaknesses.

The first time I noticed that was in Marvel's Spiderman. Stan did a fantastic job of making Peter a hero, but an indecisive emotionally immature high school kid also.

But having weaknesses or none, at the base it was still the same: good guys fighting bad guys and in the end winning. That story line is still popular today.


Comshaw

 

[Polranny]

I disagree with that assessment. The basic premise of the Lone Ranger is the same as many of the modern hero's, Hans Solo, Luke Sky Walker, Captain Janeway, Spiderman, Captain Sheridan and on and on. The difference between then and now is that back then the hero had no weaknesses. The Lone Ranger was a total white hat, never wrong, never weak, just a hero. The later batch were portrayed as hero's with human weaknesses.

The first time I noticed that was in Marvel's Spiderman. Stan did a fantastic job of making Peter a hero, but an indecisive emotionally immature high school kid also.

But having weaknesses or none, at the base it was still the same: good guys fighting bad guys and in the end winning. That story line is still popular today.


Comshaw

Good guys, bad guys; white hat, black hat; protagonist, helper, holy trail
All stories basic truths about the human condition and need for validation, identification and allaying of fears

 

[adrina]

Yeah I don't know how "old" I am in relation to the "older" requirement, but many days I feel far older than I am. Heh.

1970.

Random Gen X'erisms. Yeah sure that's a word now.

Payphones. I remember when they went from 10 cents to a quarter. We'd always hit the change button or check the slot - sometimes you got lucky.

I didn't grow up with cable. Hell I only got cable a decade ago. I remember when the UHF channels started. It was all very rebellious. Going from standard broadcast upper dial to the lower UHF one - oh yes, the tv had two dials. My first tv was black and white too.

Speaking of TVs... the original Atari. With the funky hookup Y style metal clips to the screws in the back of the TV. And Atari shoulder from those freaking non ergonomic joysticks.

Microwave oven. We got our first one when I was 5. An Amana Radarange. Sucker was heavier than a mofo. Holy cow. Dad and I could barely carry it when we finally got a new one a couple decades later - they lasted a long time. Now I can carry one by myself. Lighter weight stuff for sure.

Oh my god. Those stupid Sony Walkmans. I wanted one badly. When I finally did get one I thought I was so cool. And well, I could listen to a tape anywhere. Ha, now I have several libraries of music on my cell phone.

Grocery stores. I completely forgot. You could smoke cigarettes in grocery stores. Smoking was everywhere. I remember seeing cigarette burn marks and butts on the linoleum floor tile. Can you imagine that now? That wouldn't fly.

Side bit... the local grocery store where I grew up - Fred Meyers - had a little cafe in it. Eve's Diner. Eve was Fred's wife. We used to go there all the time. It was cafeteria style. Mom liked their mashed potatoes. I liked the butterscotch pudding. It had whipped cream and nuts. It was awesome. There is no more Eve's Diner in Freddies... hasn't been for ages. But it was very popular when I was young. They were very busy.

Penny candy. It still existed. You could go to the 7-11 and buy 2 and 3 cent candies. Usually Jolly Rogers, tootsie rolls, bazooka gum etc. We also had a local pharmacy that had a lunch counter and served as a general purpose small store. Even had a post office. You could buy licorice by the piece - not all in plastic. An actual open box of licorice vines where kids would reach in with their grubby hands and take an unwrapped ready to eat piece of candy out and pay for it. And candy bars were 20 cents. I remember when they raised to 25 cents. Outrageous!

Drive through dairy. Huh, forgot all about that. Yeah we'd go to a little drive through dairy and get ice cream - in glass jugs with foil lids and ice cream. You would take the glass milk bottles back to them. They had some really good ice cream too. That was early childhood. I don't think they were around much after the late 70s, early 80s.

Early 80s. Pat Benatar, headbands and leg warmers. Ugh. And way too much eye shadow. Although I did like the stirrup pants. But those were a few years after the Pat craze.

I think looking back that the 70s marked a transitional shift - especially technologically. So many of the transitions from the 50s and 60s were completed by the 70s so that what I saw in that time was more at the tail end of that cycle and ramping up to the aftermath of those changes. And of course the technology.

Interesting thread Candi.

 

[beew]

So I lived in an Italian neighboorhood

Their "club" got a big new color tv before most people even knew what a color tv was.......we thought that was a TV a colored guy stole, making it a color tv

So once I found out about the TV.....I hung out on the outsde looking in watch the METS games, after a few days they felt sorry for me and invited me in

Now THAT was an experience, they all seemed BIG, they all had bulges in places you when I saw The Godfather/GoodFellas etc I realized,

I WAS THERE!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!
Gotta admit, wacthing the Met games in color was awesome
Despite me being a Yankee fan

You're killing me!

btw Jews and Italians - now That was a lively neighborhood.

 

[Gamine67]

Zeros & Ones

When I was about 14 I got my hands on a Sinclair ZX-80 kit with my own money.

The kit cost < $100 and you could save programs (maybe) on a audio cassette and see it on you TV. That was big money for me but I’d never had my hands on an actual computer and that little 8k ram chip was the portal to my future.

FOR I= 1 to 10
PRINT I
NEXT

I just kept doing that over-and-over, it was simply amazing and it did exactly what you told it to do. If you knew how to tell it.

Pretty soon “memory” was an issue and I learned “machine code” to minimize storage. It was great training because I always wrote tight code, something common in people who learned it in the early years.

That little $100 Sinclair should be In the Computer Hall of Fame, like a lot of other people I couldn’t afford a $1800 Apple and my school didn’t have a computer.

That little do-it-yourself kit opened a whole new world. I wish I still had it.

Later I’d have a HP 10 scientific calculator, the big leagues at the time, RPN and just about every function a science nerd could want.

 

[Que]

When I was about 14 I got my hands on a Sinclair ZX-80 kit with my own money.

The kit cost < $100 and you could save programs (maybe) on a audio cassette and see it on you TV. That was big money for me but I’d never had my hands on an actual computer and that little 8k ram chip was the portal to my future.

FOR I= 1 to 10
PRINT I
NEXT

I just kept doing that over-and-over, it was simply amazing and it did exactly what you told it to do. If you knew how to tell it.

Pretty soon “memory” was an issue and I learned “machine code” to minimize storage. It was great training because I always wrote tight code, something common in people who learned it in the early years.

That little $100 Sinclair should be In the Computer Hall of Fame, like a lot of other people I couldn’t afford a $1800 Apple and my school didn’t have a computer.

That little do-it-yourself kit opened a whole new world. I wish I still had it.

Later I’d have a HP 10 scientific calculator, the big leagues at the time, RPN and just about every function a science nerd could want.

I loved that calculator. I doubt I could do reverse polish logic these days, but it delighted me back when.

 

[RobDownSouth]

... I remember having a 'Lone Ranger Atomic Bomb ring' somewhere around 1948; it sparkled when you looked though a small lens...

Dear God, I thought you were kidding.....