Axiom Home Page Forums General Discussion The Water Cooler I'm so Old, I remember when...

Ah, the Captain is my new hero (I remember my Dad's 47 Chevy).

Was this thread started just to embarrass me?

I remember the coal truck delivering coal to our house and sliding it down the coal chute into the basement. I remember my dad having to stoke the coal burning furnace every day (and cursing at the damned thing just like Darren McGavin in A Christmas Story.

I remember (barely) listening to Fibber McGee and Molly, Jack Benny, Amos and Andy, and The Breakfast Club on radio.

I remember when there was no TV, and when it finally showed up it was all black and white with 3 channels. Many shows were 15 minutes long, and programming only ran from around 4PM to 11PM. The first show I watched on our own TV was Hopalong Cassidy.

I remember a gasoline war when it was 12 cents per gallon.

I remember nickel Coca Cola in small glass bottles. I remember going into my local drug store, sitting at the soda fountain and ordering a chocolate coke (Hersheys chocolate syrup in a glass of coke) which cost 5 cents (all the other kids were getting cherry cokes. I'm, still, a chocoholic)

Comic books were 10 cents.

As a teen, I remember rushing home from school to watch Bandstand with Dick Clark.

In 7th and 8th grades, I remember mandatory Saturday night dance class with Mr. Stevens and Miss Citron. The girls had to wear nice dresses and we wore coats and ties. We learned to jitterbug, waltz, fox trot, mambo, samba, etc.

I remember Friday night dances at the Bayway cabin when we put those dancing lessons to good use. A hundred+ kids squeezed into a relatively small room. In the spring and fall, when it was hot, you had to go outside every ten minutes, just so you could breathe and let the sweat dry a little.

I also remember the thrill of the feel of a lovely young girl held extra close as we danced to Johnny Mathis the last dance of the night when they would lower the lights (yes, we actually put our arms around each other so we touched from shoulder to knee). You couldn't tell which of us was trembling the most.

I remember, on those hot summer nights (before air conditioning) leaving all doors and windows open and unlocked (This was in suburbs of Detroit and Cleveland). We left the keys in the ignition in the cars, too.

It actually was a kinder, gentler time.