Posted on 08/15/2014 9:54:14 AM PDT by Drew68
The way things are going, every kid is going to go to school wearing bubble wrap and a helmet. Back in the 1970s (and earlier), parents didn’t stress about our health and safety as much as they do today. It’s not that they cared less – they just didn’t worry compulsively about it.
Parents of 2014 need to be reminded of how less restricted, less supervised, less obsessively safety-conscious things were… and it was just fine.
1. JARTS: IMPALING ARROWS OF DEATH
Can your mind comprehend a more deadly toy than a weighted spear that kids hurl through the air like a missile? No one ever obeyed the actual manufacturer’s rules, we just flung these damn things everywhere. We threw them. They stuck where they landed. If they happened to land in your skull, well, then you should have moved.
After roughly 6,700 emergency-room visits and the deaths of three children between 1978 and 1988, they finally outlawed Jarts on December 19, 1988. I suppose it needed to be banned, but a part of me is sad that kids today won’t have the battle scars and Jart survival stories we had. Goodbye Jart – you were an impaling arrow of death, but I loved you anyway.
2. LOST AND NOT FOUND: SEAT BELTS
Cars came with seat belts in the 1970s, but no one used them except maybe out of curiosity to see what it was like to wear one. Of course, you’d have to fish them out of the deep crevice of the backseat cushion where they often came to rest, unwanted and ignored.
The only “click” heard in the 1970s automobile was your dad’s Bic lighting up a smoke with the windows rolled up. (cough!)
I should also mention that, not only were there no seat belts, child seats were nowhere to be found. Whether it was the front seat of your mom’s station wagon or her bicycle, chances are, you were entirely untethered.
3. SEMI-LETHAL PLAYGROUNDS OF HOT METAL
Remember when playgrounds were fun? Sure, there was a pretty good chance you’d be scalded by a hot metal slide, or walk away with tetanus, but that’s what memories are made of.
The ground wasn’t coated with soft recycled rubber or sand as most are today – they were asphalt. Remember being hurled from a spinning merry-go-round, then skidding across the gravel at full speed? Good times.
I remember my school playground had a metal ladder “wall” that I swear went up three stories – it didn’t connect to a slide or anything. It was literally a ladder to the sky. I remember fully believing the oxygen was thinner at the top. One false move and I’d have been a flesh colored stain on the asphalt.
According to the New York Times we are making playgrounds so safe that they actually stunt our kids’ development. So, while blood was spilt and concussions were dealt on the playgrounds of the 1970s, we were at least in a developmentally rich environment – and we had the bruises and scabs to prove it.
4. PRECIOUS LITTLE SUN PROTECTION
Back in the 70s, your goal was to get as brown as your skin would permit. Sun BLOCK or sun SCREEN was basically nonexistent. You wanted to AMPLIFY your rays, so women typically lathered on Crisco and baby oil to get that deep baked look.
For the kids, SPF numbers hovered around 2, 4 and 8. The idea that you would spray an SPF of 50 or even 30 wasn’t even an option, except perhaps from medical ointments prescribed for albinos.
5. HELMETS: FOR THOSE WITH MEDICAL CONDITIONS ONLY
Whether you were riding a bike, roller skating, or skateboarding, one thing was for certain: you were not wearing a head protection. You would have been looked at as a sideshow freak by other kids, and parents would assume you had some kind of medical condition.
6. IGNORED AND UNATTENDED ON THE REGULAR
Hey, who’s watching the kid in the stroller? YOU MUST HAVE YOUR EYES ON THE KID AT ALL TIMES OR ELSE HE WILL DIE!
My mother routinely left me alone in the car at a young age while she ran errands. Today, this will literally get you arrested. You see, once upon a time it was okay to leave your kids for long periods without supervision (remember the so-called “latch-key kids” of the 70s?), or let them free roam without constant surveillance. Today, parents won’t let their kids go out to get the mail alone, and any fun with friends has to be scheduled, closely monitored “play dates”.
On summer break or weekends in the 1970s, parents kicked their kids out the front door and didn’t let them back in until the sun went down. “Go play,” were their only words, and you were left to your own devices for hours upon hours. Neighborhoods looked like Lord of the Flies.
7. ROUTINELY ALLOWED TO GET SERIOUSLY HURT
This poor kid is about to get rammed in the nuts by a goat, and the nearby adult isn’t the least bit concerned. In fact, he finds this all incredibly amusing! As hard as this is to believe, but when kids got hurt back then, adults didn’t come running with first-aid kits. More than likely you’d be left alone with your pain, with no alternative but to get over it.
In the 70s, parents watched their offspring fall from trees and fall off bikes with a smile.
8. SECONDHAND SMOKE EVERYWHERE
From airplanes to your family car, it seemed the world of the 70s was shrouded in a haze of cigarette smoke. It wasn’t just the fact that many more people smoked, it was the absolute 100% lack of concern for those that didn’t, including children. Teachers smoked, doctors smoked, your parents smoked…. and they didn’t take it to a secluded smoking area, they did it right in your face.
Please don’t interpret this as condoning it. There’s no question that engulfing your child in a thick carcinogenic cloud isn’t a good idea. I’m just stating facts – this is the world we lived in. It was full of adults who didn’t seem to have anxiety attacks over our safety, and we turned out just fine…. right?
We used to bumper hitch in the winter when the streets were covered in snow. We would get in trouble if we got caught.
I still have mine, a set of the original ones, before they made them plastic. You know, the ones that left bruises on your wrist if you messed up.
Yeah, I was born in 78 so that was the 80s menu. By the 90s the menus were much worse, but then I was in high school with open campus, so we could just go to Burger King or wherever.
I still have scars from when I fell off a skateboard that was being towed behind my brother's bike. He was going really fast, I hit a rock and skidded face down on my elbows and knees. Got major road burns on my arms and legs.
There used to be an old merry go round in the park that my cousins would spin like the devil and we'd jump off hitting rocks, plants, trees, etc., after which we too dizzy to stand up.
You'll never see one of these now -- someone might stub his toe or get dizzy or get going too fast or get his feeling hurt.
One kid in my class climbed over a fence and fell onto concrete breaking both arms.
skitching, right?
Was kid in the 50s, a lot different that the 70s. Also, most of my youth was on military bases, so our freedom without supervision was extensive. On Parris Island I would spend the day at the library and then the gym (same building in those days, it’s a museum now). Ditto for Quantico. As a rule, I was expected to come home for lunch and dinner.
But as much as I agree with the point expressed here, I think most of these are poor illustrations of that point.
At our Elementary school, the P.E. teacher made a whole series of rope swings, climbing ropes, log balance beams, etc. About 1/5 of the students at the school (including the Principal’s son) had their arms or legs in a cast at any one time during the year.
The high diving board at the local pool is now gone. It was a rite of passage for my kids.
My brother, who at the time was a sailor in the Navy, was so proud of his teenage sibling (it's a Navy thing).
Once we got one of those things up to speed and a kid’s shoe got caught and he was dragged in the gravel for at least 4 complete revolutions. Naturally, we all laughed our butts off.
OUCH! The bones in my forearms twinge at the mere sight of those!
When I was 14 a bunch of us were sitting on the porch. One guy had a walking cane and he was hitting wadded up paper “balls” with hit. I stood up just as he took a full swung. Hit me right in the back of the head. Everybody but me laughed. Maybe that’s what’s wrong with me.
Outstanding!
BOL. Our sons kept their big wheels after we moved to our current home in the late 1970's. We didn't find out why until later. They would take them up the hill that started as they went out of our driveway. They went up 350' and 350 yards on the road on a big wheel.
One of them stayed down on the flat of the street and told the other on their walkie talkies, when the road was clear. Then, the one on the big wheel would haul ashes all the way down. Their way of stopping was to run the big wheel into the curb and go head over heels over the big wheel on to a neighbor's yard.
They built ramps like the one in your picture for their dirt bikes on a vacant 40 acres behind the house.
They had an arroyo right across the road for dirt biking, hunting small game and just being out there. Sometimes they bike back in with pup tents and spent the night. That stopped when a mountain lion moved into the area.
I’m from the generation before you- where it was even MORE dangerous.
DH says where he lived in upstate Pennsylvania, the boys would jump off of railroad trestles into the rivers and streams below — I stood on one of those bridges over the summer and looking down at how far it was it scared me to death - same feeling when I looked over the Golden Gate Bridge. I think DH jumped too but didn’t tell me.
He said one of his friends didn’t come up - body was found a mile or so downstream.
That was considered normal behavior in the 60s.
We used to throw .22 shells into the fire and run away.
My H.S. Chemistry teacher smoked in the store room attached to the classroom/lab. He started a fire in there one day, because a burning cigarette fell off the ashtray into a wastebasket filled with paper.
Actually, I know where there are TWO of those within driving distance. Those are the parks we go to.
We had a BIG wasp nest in our barn so we shot hundreds of BBs at it till it fell. Then we took off like scalded dogs!
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