Right Off the Rack

[jennifer]

And how about candy bars costing only a nickel?  And going to the movies with one dollar, and with it (especially for Saturday matinees), you got a double-feature, previews, cartoons and a documentary, along with popcorn, soda, candy AND you had change left over.  Remember singing the Winston cigarettes TV commerical jingle?  Wearing Red Ball Jet tennis shoes?  Everyone going over to the home of the first family on the block who purchased a color television?  Fins on Cadillacs?  On summer days, just taking off for the entire day until supper time and your parents were never concerned?  (Your mom was grateful to get you out of her hair anyway.)  Kids still went trick-or-treating on the actual Halloween night, and the streets were crammed full of them?  Christmas decorations didn't go up in stores or on the streets until well after Thanksgiving AND only one Santa came to town for just a couple days, everyone standing in line (unlike SEVERAL now found in the SAME malls)?  Having one of those gigantic, boxy, noisy window-unit air-conditioners meant that you were considered "upper crust" (the rest of us made do with open windows and fans, and no one had central air)?  Singing "Downtown" along with Petula Clarke on the radio?  Parents whispered about some new movie called "The Graduate" because it was considered "dirty"?  "The Flintstones" was a prime-time evening animated sitcom?  Sunday evening ALWAYS meant "Lassie" or "The Wonderful World of Disney", followed by "The Ed Sullivan Show", and then ending with "Bonanza"?

Gerard

Wow what a summary Gerard It brought tears to my eyes! sometimes i long for the Mary Tyler Moore days and want a next door neighbor like Millie LOL
we also used to go up the park and spend all day with
the Recreation person doing crafts and things the town paid for.Forget that nowadays!

jennifer

[Birdie]

Wow, Jennifer I use to go to the park all day in the summer.  The day the gimp lady came was a big day.  One not to be missed.  How about snaps and beans?  We have the game beans called something else now, more politically correct.  I have to laugh my husband was the checker champ of a park in the other section of city I lived in.

Jennifer, it is so funny that our growing up years are almost the same.  Too funny.

Birdie

[Raineypark]

During the 1960's I grew up on a block of 30 suburban houses with roughly 90 other kids.  2 families had 11 kids each and another 2 had 8 apiece.  Average was about 4.

In the summer, the little ones came out the doors at 7am and it was non-stop play all up and down the block till the teenagers reluctantly dragged themselves in at 10 pm.  We played kick-ball, freeze tag, and "Johnny-on-the-Pony" endlessly.  We marked up the entire street with hop-scotch grids and "bases".  We sold one another lemonade, swapped bats and balls and raced each others soap-box cars.

Night time was best.  The bigger kids helped the little kids catch fireflies in mayonaise jars,.....and then terrorized the same little ones with ghost stories.  We played "Man From Uncle", chasing and hiding from one another behind our father's cars, using up countless batteries in our flashlights.

No organized sports in summer, no expensive equipment, and probably best of all, no adult interference in what we were doing....unless we got completely out of hand and then ANY father on the block was licensed to hand out justice.

I wish I could have given my kid THAT childhood.

Rainey

[AllenCollins]

Pat Paulsen! Wow Bob there's a blast from the past! It's funny you mention him, the wife and I were watching an episode of the Monkees the other week where Mr. Paulsen does his politician stint. Great stuff.

B

[Craig_Slocum]

I had a blast from my past while my Mom was here visiting last week. My dad put all of his reels of home movies from the 1960's on video finally. My Mom brought them with her, and I duplicated them. It was great seeing me with my brothers, parents, friends, my old neighborhoods, all the old cars, etc. My daughter got to see what I looked like when I was her age and younger, riding my bike, and playing, also what I looked like when Dark Shadows was on for the first time back then. I was such a little kid! I don't remember that much from the 60's, so it was great seeing those films!

[Thom]

What a great topic!! I loved growing up in the 60's - as kids we played Ghost In The Graveyard in our neighborhood and got to stay out in the summer until 11 or 12! DS was on 1 summer in 1969 at 7pm in the evening because the local ABC affiliate was getting letters from concerned parents over the devil worship the show allegedly promoted! I worked in construction a few years back, in a nice subdivisions in the summer and the streets were deserted. No kids playing, no bike riding, nothing. I guess all the kids were inside on playstation. Even the tennis courts in this high priced subdivision were empty.

[kuanyin]

Gerard, you have an incredible memory. And you are obviously, at least as old as me! What was the show with Johnny Blue?Was that Big Valley? And I loved Top Cat.

The kids all still trick or treat here in my part of Kansas City.

[Minja]

Big Valley..I think the sons of Victoria Barkley were Jerad, Heath and Nick and the daughter was Audra.

And HEY...KC, Kuanyin..... can't walk down memory lane without paying respects to our fave kiddie shows..Whizzo and Torey and Old Gus!!!  Not to mention Wonderama!!! Oh, and *shudder* Uncle Ed?

Also, does anyone remember the precurser to Power Rangers, called..Johnny Sokko and his Flying Robot?[/color]

[shadow=purple,left,300]Always, Minja  [/shadow]
Go Speed Racer...Go!!

[Gerard]

I'm trying to remember where Johnny Blue was, Kuanyin.  Was it The Big Valley, or was it High Chapparel?  And I also loved Top Cat!  My mom use to buy me the Gold Key books with Top Cat stories, and I couldn't wait until the daily TV airing of his adventures.  My favorite part was the closing credits where he turned in, using that garbage can as his bedroom, setting the alarm clock, putting on those eye-shades and all that.

Now, does anybody else remember the first season of The Flintstones when it was in black and white?  Of course, we only had a b&w set, so we didn't know the difference.  But the end credits were slightly different.  As Fred pounded on the door screaming for Wilma to let him in, the scene panned back showing all of Bedrock, lights snapping on in the windows of the houses.  When it turned to color, that scene was no longer used.  On rare occasion, the Cartoon Network will run those old b&w episodes for nostalgia sake.

Gerard

[Birdie]

Top Cat, was my favorite too.  Can you remember the names of the other cats in his gang?  Let me give it a whirl,  Bennie the Ball, Chew-co, Soook, Fancy.  Thats what I come up with.

I even had the 45 with the Top Cat theme song.  

Birdie==close friends get to call me T.C.    

[Happybat]

A walk down Memory Lane is always nice-    

Since I moved to the US from Sweden when I was 7, I  missed out on some of the early to mid 60s American culture, but what I did experience still holds a special place in this old heart of mine.

I can't say I have ever liked the acid greens, pinks and generally psychedelic patterns so popular then, but I did have a sheer, full-skirted dress with small pink flowers over black that I loved.  I also remember how Shelley, one of my classmates, sported a high 60s coiff complete with big, honking bow on my 8th birthday.  Then there was the Spirograph set I got and the Minidragons set that came with a small "oven" and bright colored plastic gook to make the little dragon parts out of.  Anyone remember those?  There was also an edible bug "kit".  

And the Smothers Brothers!  I loved them even as a child, although many of the political references must have been a bit over my head.  Amazingly, even my politically conservative father loved watching them.  Mom still owns a couple of Smothers Bros. albums.  

Of course, the nicest 60s memory of all was the birth of my baby brother in 1968.  I still have a photo of him as a tiny tot with a Snoopy for President t-shirt!  I'm happy to say, all grown up, we've become the best of friends.

Oh, I could go on and on!