I miss Tonka

 

Hey i still have a 8-track player in my car. I was born in 58 and i too wish that things were the same as they were then.

 

1975 here.

Remember having to take piano lessons?
Or swimming lessons?

How about an all metal tricycle?
Radio Flyer wagon?
The freedom you gained with your first bike?
The friends you made from riding your first bike?

How about your dad telling you to change the channel by turning the ****?
Or listening to talk radio in the car because your dad didn't like the sound of "popular" music, and you didn't like his kind of music?

Being read a bedtime story? Winnie the Pooh for me.
Flying on an airplane for the first time?

OOOO! I got a good one!

Remember when you first learned to read, it was from a 40 year old book about Dick, Jane and Spot?

 

Mil1ion....your list almost brought a tear to my eye...

I might be only 16, but I can relate to most of your post.

If I could choose...I would go back in a heartbeat

 

I used to walk down 3 blocks carrying my .22 to get to the hills when I was 12. Now all you hear is the junk talk about we have to keep guns out of the children's hands. I used to pay $.33 for gasoline. I remember the first TV on the block. Kids worked after school without a "work permit".

 

I grew up in San Diego during the real eastate boom- we moved there in 1969. My folks bought their first house when I was about five years old- 3 bedroom, 2 bath about 1300 sq feet- for about $17,000!! I haven't been back to that neighborhood for over twenty years, but I hear that the same house is now over $300K!! Mom wonders why she didn't keep it, as it would now be paid off! Anyway, I grew up in the very early days of skateboards and BMX, we would take off on saturday morning and maybe come in for lunch, then stay out until dark. Construction sites make for GREAT riding. The worst that ever happened to us was we got a whippin' for not coming home until it was dark. I still have a few scars from falling, but no psychological scars from it. We also used to play hide and seek in the 'hood after dark- great times!!

 

I started to feel old born in 71 till I read bigjacks post. Hey I remember capt kangaroo though.

 

Tonka toys, I still have them and I was born in 66 and I feel old now reading this. Heck, I still have most of them and my kids played with them too. The other kids thought metal toys were cool too, My oldest and the hubby are having a child and I'm trying to get use to hearing granddad. Ge I'm old. LOL

 

i was born in 65, i had lots of tonka toys made out of good old steel, hell we used to sit on them and race them down the hill by our house, those toys held up, we would get up on a saturday morning or any morning during the summer and get on our bikes and be gone. But always got home in time to see Little house on the prarie, thats when it was still new and on once a week. we would climb the mountians around our california home, go fishing in the river as well as swimming, i had one friend that lived 12 miles away that went to our school, i be at his house 2-3 times a week all day, mom never knew we went that far away, life was different back then, now my kids are not allowed to leave the yard unless i know excatrly where there going and they still go no further then the end of the block. it is sad

 

You young kids.
I remember my Christmas toys being made out of paper because all the metal going to the war effort. The idea then was , pull toghther, we're at war. Now, it's a bunch of gready S.O.b. getting rich on our soldiers. I hate our government..

 

1966 here. Anyone one remember fighting with the other kids in the family to see who would get to crank the homemade ice cream tub?

 

I remember getting into fights and never having to worry about a knife of gun becoming involved.

Having a teacher ask the students in the class if anyone had a knife they could use to open a box and getting it returned to you without getting in trouble.

When hitting a woman got your butt whooped first by anyone who saw it, then by her brother, then by her dad, and finaly by all of her friends.

When guns on school property were either left in the car or office and if they came out of either one it was only for demonstration purpaces in a class.

Mouthing off to a teacher got you a ruler across the knuckles and doing the same to your parrents got your butt whooped by a swith you had to cut your self.

Gym class included archery and you were allowed and even encouraged to bring your own bow.

Hunting season was an excused absence.

Hunters saftey was an elective in school.

Four room school houses (1st through third in one 4th and 5th in another, one for kintergarden and one that functioned as a Gym/lunchroom)

Going to school ment going through 4 different townships for me.

Going uptown was a once a month occurance if you were lucky and it was always a big deal.

Climbing trees was a sport that most of the kids excelled at.

Swimmin in the creek if the fish wern't biting.

Riding a bike over to a friends house ment a 10 or 12 mile ride but was fine as long as you were home by dinner time.

No TV durring dinner. Period.

Knowing every car that drove down the road.

On a first name basis with every single person within 10 miles of home. And knowing that if they offered you a ride it was perfectly safe to get in.

A bb gun was a perfectly good present for your 6th birthday and every boy in the neighbor hood had a 22 by age 8.

Knowing those same people if they caught you doing somthing wrong would be letting your parrents know about if before you managed to bike home.

Walking out the door with a gun in your hands at age 12 didn't even cause your parrents to raise an eyebrow.

BB gun fights. I still have one stuck in my leg.

Getting drunk on a saterday night ment getting your butt whooped no matter how old you were if you got caught, but we did it anyway.

Atari 2600's were the hot new gaming system.

You could still buy leaded gas at the local station. That was full service by the way.

I remember all of this and I am 21. Kinda scary how fast the world changes. Now I usualy carry a pistiol due to death threats I have recived because I make my living logging during the winter. I dont dare get in a fight because I will get sued, tossed in jail, and quite possibly stabbed or shot.

I often wonder what my kids (if I have any) will go through in the future. Somthing tells me they wont have the care free child hood that I grew up with. If my feilds will be bordered by a subdevision. If I will even be allowed to continue farming. If I will be able to give my kids one of my 22's on their eight birthday like my dad did for me.

I miss the good old days, and I would trade in my truck, and every thing I have to go back to being a kid.

 

"Disneyland" (sponsored largely by the MONSANTO corporation...)
Dream of a lifetime was to go there...

The "Mickey Mouse Club" not to mention Frankie and whats her name...

You waited up all night to see the DISNEY show on the weekend, and if the movie was in two parts you wondered what happened all week long.

DRIVE IN THEATERS! (come to think of it) - I saw "BLACKBEARD" by Disney the first time in a drive in, also the original "BATMAN" from the sixties.

DICK VAN DYKE!!!!

BONANZA

GEORGE BURNS, and Gracie....

The HONEYMOONERS...

Johnny Carson, when he had his own hair...

RED SKELTON (!)

All of those headliners were live and real back in the day, and we looked forward to what they would do or say next. Didn't we?

You bought "ETHYL" gas for most cars, a 1958 Olds Delta 88 is my fondest memory. My father owned three Desoto's in his lifetime.

And milk once came in bottles, delivered to the front porch yes. The good stuff was in the brown ones....

Out in the backyard was Mamma's clothes line - an aluminum tree that was used most of the year long, in between the orange trees.

We used to walk to town (Lemon Grove, California) along Broadway street.

And the smell of botanicals was all pervasive back then. Before my sense of smell was ruined by tobacco...

I remember Jack In The Box, before they did away with the clown.

And the ferry across San Diego Harbor - where the parks are now used to be landings.

"STINKER" stations were on the roads. Gas stations that had a skunk as their logo...

And "STUCKEYS" used to sell leather bull-whips.

I have seen two gas crises, and the national speed limit drop to 55 (the "DOUBLE NICKLE") and open up again.

- I must be an old *******, but I don't feel like one...

 

I remember moon landings being all over the black and white tv and my father saying here comes the GAS wars. US Car makes comeing out with junk for car and toyota and datson?? hitting the market with there cars.

 

Grey wolf,
....I lived in Lemon Grove 67-70 went to San Miguel elementary
....I remember when there was only a farm in fashion valley...we'd pass it on the way to the beach, there was always 1 horse standing outside.

I remember all these posts and a bit more:
....Walking to the corner store to buy cigarettes and alcohol for my Mom...when I was 6.
...Having a key to my house pinned to my pants
...watching the JFK's funeral on b/w tv, prolly my earliest memory
...Breaking the glass insert of my thermos bottle in my lunch box
....taking a ride in a Ford rumble seat or riding around in the bed of a pickup truck with the whole little league team and nobody wore a seat belt
...Men and children were NOT allowed into the Delivery room
...A pack of smokes, 2 cups of coffee at Dennys and 2 double features w/popcorn at the new "Century TWIN Cinemas, and still have change left over from my $5 chore allowance
...playing ding dong ditch
...squirt guns needed reloading and looked like the real deal
...buying condoms was a secretive and embarrassing affair
...Adults reprimanded children in public, even strangers
...Jack lalane didnt have wrinkles
...Drinking and driving was a misdeamenor and the cops made sure ya got home safe, unless ya got into an accident...then ya served time or at the least moved out of town due to embarrassement.
...Coffee was always served hot, one brand at a time and ya didnt get to choose which brand
...buying paint and modeling cement for actually building models w/o an I.D.
...we only had a choice of potatoe chips or corn chips or pretzels
...popcorn only came in kernels had ya had to heat em in oil/lard
...the smell of mimeograph test papers in school
...using a encyclopedia to look up information
...life before sponge mops
...getting picked on in school cause I wasnt the same color...by the teachers as well as the kids
...sissy bar, ape hanger handlebars, banana seat...on my bicycle
...my first color tv....1986
...changing my baby brothers diapers...with cloth and pins
...getting the 3r degree from a store clerk because she thought Mad magazine was to risque for a 11 year old.