This brought tears to my eyes with fond memories!

littlerayray

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I also miss how stores used to sell actual home baked goods but now people are worried about the ingredients and lack of trust if only they new what was in all that factory made crap
 

foodfisher

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Indoor plumbing consisted of a hand pump from the cistern for dish washing and bathing in a tub. Chamber pots for night and outhouse for daytime. The Lone Ranger and the Shadow on the radio. Walking the tracks for spilled coal to fuel the potbellied stove for cooking and heating. Not having a quarter for the public pool where you could hear all the kids laughing. Excitedly digging worms out of the compost pile so I could go fishing with Grandpa. Sigh......
 

poconojoe

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Yep, my elementary school let us go out for lunch. I would go to the pizzeria and get 3 slices and a coke for $1.00!
I too knew when the street lights came on, it was time to go home.
We walked around when we went trick or treating for Halloween, we didn't get driven around.
Yeah, we searched for bottles to get money for candy too.
All great memories!
 

poconojoe

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Oh, and we stated the Pledge of Allegiance (to the flag) every morning before school started. And it didn't hurt anyone's feelings!
 

82rude

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Not one kid in public school had a peanut allergy as far as I can remember.One or maybe 2 with asthma ,maybe.Oh, I loved the vanilla mo-joe candies !
 

littlerayray

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Kids didn't have add growing up and weren't sent to school with a pharmacy in their backpack and maybe one or two kuds in your class had glasses
 

Harritwo

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When we got out first TV, we had an antenna up in the air, Got 2 stations. Several years later we got cable, then had 3 channels. Not much better than an antenna but cost money. The cable was the old flat 300 ohm brown stuff.
 

littlerayray

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Yep two channels nothing on when I was in my teens is when satellite TV became available the firstonto or two was great but after that there was still nothing on lol my kids have a hard time believing I grew up with only two stations lol
 

littlerayray

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When I was growing up the doors were left unlocked all the time it wasn't uncommon for us to arrive home and have my parents friends sitting at the table playing cards waiting for us it wasn't till 1998 that my parents started locking the doors cuz of break in I also grew up in the country in a close knit community
 

littlerayray

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At Christmas the rotary club would go door to door with a man dressed as Santa Claus dropping off a little gift to all the children
 

RGrew176

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I was born in 1949 so I was a kid in the 50's and a teenager in the 60's. Those were wonderful days to grow up in. I would not trade those days for anything. I would go back to those days in a heartbeat.
 

MTboatguy

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It is amazing how many conversations my wife and I have had this weekend over this particular topic, sure brings back some great memories.
 

hungupthespikes

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Good memories. We lived on 4th st. SE there was no SW or 5th st on the south side and only 5th NE. We had the old ice box so we had the milkman and the ice man, and yes they still used the horses on some routes. The horses knew the route and would move down the street ahead of the deliveries. The driver was only needed when they switched streets. The horse would look back at the seat to make sure his partner was there and then move on, the driver never touched the reins.

By the time I was 7-8, I inherited the coal furnace job from my brother. The last thing I did before going to bed and I was the first one called in the morning. My brother would literally kick me out of bed if I didn't move fast enough, but then he always did gave me a hand taking the ashes out to the alley behind the house.
When We converted to gas, the coal bin became the game room, but the store had a potbelly stove in the back room so Dad, brother and myself always smelt of coal in the winter.

The best thing was all the parents lived through the great depression and WW2. Victory gardens where still the norm and the "can do attitude" was a positive role for us kids.
 

generator12

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What an excellent thread! I too remember the milk deliveries, the coal bin in the basement (we called it the "cellar") and the days they would deliver a truckload and shovel it onto a chute which bridged from the truck to an opening in the basement wall. I also remember the vacuum truck that could be seen sucking all the soot out of the coal furnaces in the neighborhood. How about the guy with the little cart who came through the neighborhood sharpening knives and scissors?

We played baseball all summer, in vacant lots and at the high school field. I can remember the balls coming apart so badly we had to wrap them with friction tape. A new bat or glove was a gift from heaven.

We would play until after dark and - as somebody mentioned in an earlier post - we would hear the moms standing in the doorways shouting, "David"..."Joey"..."Andy"...etc. and we each responded by heading home. One big difference also was that, with all the neighbors sitting on their front porches and talking about families, recipes, politics, etc., there was no room for predators to come sneaking around. Any stranger who came through had a thousand eyes on him. One guy once touched a kid. Mr. Pacileo, Mr. Mondocki, and Mr. Savilli "detained" him until the police arrived, and their arrival was welcomed by the perpetrator..!

Growing up through the 40's and 50's was the absolute best. I wish there was a way to share the experience with today's kids.
 

southkogs

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... How about the guy with the little cart who came through the neighborhood sharpening knives and scissors?
HA! I haven't thought about that dude in years ... we had a tinker rolling around the "hood" even in the late 70s.
 

thumpar

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I am only 38 but grew up in Okanogan WA on an apple orchard. I spent my summers in Port Angeles salmon fishing with my Grandpa. Some of you guys are older than I am but growing up in a small town is the same as some describe. We had a penny candy store. No locked doors. Everyone knows everyone. I miss those days. If it wasn't for my job I would move back.

ETA: My girlfriend is 26 and didn't get to enjoy all the fun it was to not have a cell phone or email or internet, I have to explain it sometimes. :lol:
 
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sphelps

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I'll be 51 this year . Grew up on the river . Still very little tv was watched . I remember having to crawl up on the roof to move the antenna for my dad all the time .. Surrounded by salt marshes all there was to do was fish , shrimp, or crab .. I would head shrimp for 10 cents a pound for the commercial fisherman down the street and when I was older I also worked on the boats ..
Every Sunday mom would cook fried chicken and mashed taters . We ate while watching Mutual of Omaha's Wild Kingdom .. Always looked forward to that ..
 

MTboatguy

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I ended up with the title of "antenna mover" myself, I could not wait to get a way from home when I was a teen, after going so many places over the last 30 years, some days I can't wait to get home! Go figure, I guess we all live and learn to realize what we really had back in those days.

Our Sunday night consisted of a TV dinner in an aluminum pan and the Wonderful World of Disney on ABC, it was a good time and I fondly remember those days. (Unfortunately, the only channel we could get for a long time was ABC)
 
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