Posted on 12/07/2016 9:09:55 AM PST by Mad Dawgg
If you live or have lived in small town America would you be so kind and tell us about it. (For our purposes towns of less that 10 thousand in population but still have city services like Police and Fire Depts. etc.)
But if you would be so kind post your experiences BEFORE you read any others on here. The reason being is I am interested to know if there are trends in small town America that manifest nationwide and to see if they are something that most of us notice without being pointed out by others.
What I am looking for is the experiences of how your town was when you were a kid, and how the town is now and the differences you notice in day to day life there. Please give approximate dates and for purposes of not revealing too much personal info on the net narrowing it down to a decade should suffice. Also if you do not wish to name your town just note the State and or region.
Thanks in advance for any and all responses and the more you have to tell us the better it will be.
1960-1970. Level Green, PA. Population had to have been less than a grand. Now it’s running over 4K. Had one grocery store, one gas station and a pizza joint. Delivered papers for some spending cash and worked at that grocery store. One set of scout packs/troops. Rode that bike everywhere no matter what hour or what the weather was. Snowed like crazy at times and now I laugh when the neighbors kids get out of school because of cold weather. Used to sit on the wheel well of the school bus and stomp on it till the bus driver had to get out to check the tire chains. Now the place is a bedroom community for the ‘burg. Grandparents passed away and now, after the demolition, they put like six houses. All we had was a kindergarten and an elementary school. If I remember correctly, up hill both ways.
Yes my town struggled with exactly the same things - but happily we've had a rebound attendance at public events lately.
The worst thing for me was that no one showed up for our town's traditional Veterans' Day salute. Well, I and one other lonely soul showed up, but no one else. Our local veterans' organizations no longer had enough members to perform even a short ceremony. But we remedied this, and had great turnout this year.
We have a big parade down Main Street on Labor Day, and on Memorial Day, the cemetery is wall to wall flags. We have a few whacked-out libs around, but we live and let live, and so far don't have any trouble. Kansas is a Republican State and being smack dab in the middle of fly-over country makes us the ultimate idiots to the elitist left. But we are happy, peaceful, accepting of all points of view (unless you have a terrorist bent) and we love God and Country. Pretty much in that order.
To give you an idea of how different we are from those in a big city, our pastor is from Chicago. He had friends visiting one Sunday, and they overheard a conversation we were having about hunting. They asked him "Do you mean they actually shoot animals and eat them?!!!" The way I see people is that they are different - just different. Not better or worse. I think people in the city see people as right and wrong - better and worse. Maybe people in the city all have to think alike or they wouldn't be able to live in such close proximity to each other.
My town, more correctly our town, is one of the tiniest in the USA. It is incorporated and has lost population due to loss of coal.
Though small and with a very, very small population (200), we have our own sanitation and water department. Our town council looks out for the population in general and though there are disagreements regarding specific items, I think most people would not move away due to lack of leadership or any other reason except jobs. I often wonder if we all are introverts, but basically I think we are happy within ourselves and with each other.
We have an incredible Council President who, when there is an altercation between family members for instance, will go and and quell the tantrum. He governs with an even hand and with considerable grace. He is our de facto Chief of Police. Our mayor wants all kinds of nice things for this town, but there is no way to achieve those things unless town members actually participate in the action. Mostly they don’t because they are busy with their own lives...and there are not enough of us for two teams of softball>
Most of the people here are older and have had their haydays. The younger people tend to not stay because we are miles away from any town with work, a minimum of 17 miles which has the closest full time store (Walmart, don’t you know) and Pittsburgh.
We do have a wonderful volunteer fire department ably led by our town council president. All members appear happy to risk their lives for us all. I do honor them.
The roads and verges are clean, the younger children are under control of their parents and the churches have services every Sunday.
I, being one who tends to meditate as I work, find the quietness essential for my well being. Once in a blue moon we might hear anger at night. In 17 years, no gun shots.
And it is beautiful here.
I live in a village of about 200 people.
There is a state route that cuts through the middle of the village but the side streets are nice and quiet.
One grocery/hardware store with everything from groceries and a deli to nuts and bolts, fertilizer garden implements and bulk seeds. But no gas.
There’s a convenience store a half mile outside the village with a lunch counter and gas.
Elementary school and two churches.
We have a parade each July 4th and Christmas.
Usually have some nice vintage cars as well as some vintage farm equipment.
About a fourth of the homes are rental but the renters are nice and neighborly.
When the wife passed away and my finances tumbled, the landlord (it was her childhood home) readily dropped the rent so I could afford to stay here.
Good people.
Mostly white with a good mixture of age groups.
No damned yankees as yet.
There’s a Masons lodge across the street and one of the churches beside that. The church chimes ring about five times daily. I go on the porch to listen to them.
I go to the elementary school to watch the Little League football and baseball.
Place is so quiet you can hear a mouse break wind.
I love my little village.
Waxhaw! I’ve been there. Many of my colleagues have Waxhaw associations - JAARS.
I wouldn’t call Salida a Front Range town however it is beautiful.
I only get down to the tiny town about 2 times a week. That pic is exactly what it looks like!
My family and I lived in the small town of Edgerton (5,000), north of Janesville, WI and south of Madison. It reminded me in some ways of the bigger town I grew up in, with its small non-chain stores, walkability, and decent folks all around (despite being majority Democrat, they live mostly like Republicans).
The police monitored the two main drags and its 25 mph sped limit. The park has a great community swimming pool, though the youths showed off with foul language with no adults willing to do anything about it (I only found out after we moved, the local pool here in Georgia dows not have that problem to my knowledge).
The local police department was a pleasure. The water bill gets dropped off in a special mailbox just for water bills and property taxes, etc.
Kids could ride bikes and take walks with no issues. So can grown ups. Not a lot of local work.
The old tobacco warehouses have been turned into lofts (though some of the vintage advertisements on the side of teh buildings remain, the rare exception to anti-tobacco advertising). The independent car mechanic was close enough to my house that the car could be pushed in, if needed. Neighbors were nice enough, though we never really got to know each other.
Really good local home schoolers groups provided our friends. Even though we were of different faiths (Catholic, Lutheran, Orthodox, etc.) we all wanted compatible things for our children, and had a mostly common understanding of natural law.
I don’t miss 25 below, snow plows that undo my shoveling, but overall a very positive experience. I would recommend Edgerton for people who want to raise a family in Wisconsin and have to work in Madison or Janesville.
Bump for later.
I live in Duvall, WA, I believe we have about 7,600 people living in our town now. We are consistently rated number 1 or 2 on the list of safest cities in the state and in the top 10 best places to live.
Duvall is located on the Snoqualmie River at the base of the Cascade foothills. Main Street aka highway 203 runs through Duvall and links it to all the little towns that run along side the river. Starting at North Bend and working you way north into Monroe, there is a group of little towns that are all exactly 8 miles apart because that’s about how far you could get on horseback before you had to stop and rest. These rest stops eventually became the towns that are there now.
Duvall was incorporated a little over 100 years ago for the soul purpose of opening a saloon. The original church still stands on Main Street as do several very old buildings. It’s a wonderful place to raise children and everyone who lives there looks out for their neighbor. Nothing happens in that town that isn’t immediately known by everyone. LOL!
I grew up in eastern Washington and then lived near Newport Beach, CA for almost 20 years. When I moved to Duvall to house sit for a friend, it took me only a couple of months to decide I would never live anywhere else.
Ping for later
Well you did say: 1 store, 2 churches, volunteer fire department, no post office,no PD. 8>)
I was born in a small town, lived in a couple over the years.
The Louisiana town I was born in, in December 1955, a few miles south of Arkansas and 45 minutes west of Mississippi, was probably under 10,000 when I was born, I don’t really remember. They still had “whites only” signs on public restrooms, restaurants and water fountains, Burma Shave signs on the sides of a number of roads, a cotton gin in town that was always busy, an old clock on one street corner where a bank was located that is still there today.
A typical town square, with the courthouse in the middle, the drug store across the street made a mean coke float. The theater, still there, showed movies, but today it’s only used for plays by a local acting group. I saw “Mary Poppins” and “Evel Knevil” there. Seems like if I remember correctly that was also where I saw a short film featuring Eric Burdon and the Animals.
The park a few blocks up the street had a swimming poll that was run by one of my future in laws, but I learned to swim at a state park up the road about 10 miles. Since we moved a lot I didn’t actually grow up there, I grew up all over Louisiana. Most of the smaller towns were very similar though, everyone knew everyone, all of them grew up there and outsiders were not very welcome. Boy did I know that...
I did live there for a couple of years about 1964 and 65, 4th and 5th grades in different schools. Milkman delivered milk a couple of times a week, still in glass bottles (you can find those in flea markets and antique stores these days, if I had only known). We also got milk with school lunches in half pint glass bottles, cardboard cap stuck inside the top.
Easter egg hunts were usually a family thing, but Halloween was always a community affair, and you could dress up as anything from Superman to the Lone Ranger or an Indian to a ghost and go anywhere in town without adults tagging along, come home with a grocery bag full of candy and be delightfully sick all week...
Christmas was partially a community affair, I was dragged around to sing Christmas Carols, which I hated, but watching for lit up houses was cool on road trips to grandma’s house.
I never got into skateboards, no hills worth bothering with, so a bicycle was the going thing, you could ride around all over town with no worries, and a Daisy BB gun was always close by.
The grocery store was a much different place, almost never crowded except Friday when everyone got paid so we’d go a different time. Most places it was common for the meat department to cut whatever you wanted on the spot, nowhere close to the myriad brands we see today, maybe 8 or so cereals, often oatmeal would come with a drinking glass in the can or a coupon for a plate or whatever, (it wouldn’t fit inside) and Quaker was the only brand I remember. Coffee was still an honest pound, not the 11 ounces you see today, first time I remember milk was less than 50¢ a gallon.
Gas was 19.9¢ a gallon. Unleaded barely existed, only available at Amoco, and was called “white gas”, we’d get it for our Coleman lantern and stove. It had a filter on the hose. Esso, Shell, Texaco and Gulf were the gas stations I remember, and they all had some kid who worked there (my second job) who would come out and fill the tank for you. Check the oil and clean the windshield too. Check air in the tires if you asked.
My grandmother would get me to walk to the store a couple of blocks up the street, with a quarter, still made of silver. Get her a pack of Camels, me a Baby Ruth, and I Damn well better bring her that penny change...the Baby Ruth was a nickel, same as a coke, which I rarely got.
Bonnie and Clyde’s bullet riddled Ford was displayed at the courthouse square for a couple of days, but that was a few years before I was born. They were ambushed about an hour away toward Shreveport.
The town had a paper mill run by International Paper, most everyone in town worked there. That was because IP pretty much ran the town, and every time any other business tried to set up shop there, IP would buy the property. The only way to make enough money to fund a campaign for mayor was to work your way up to top dog at the IP mill...or own a bank...IP ended up owning a lot of property in the area. Georgia Pacific owned a lot too, which they eventually turned into a game preserve...we hunted deer there in the 60’s.
Other small towns I’ve lived in were very similar. Courthouse square, everybody knew everybody (and their business)...One in central Texas near Bryan, where Texas A&M is, was a cool little town. One block each direction from the courthouse in two directions had a few businesses,
a convenience store and a grocery store, a Dairy Queen, that was town. I worked for the Western Auto, busiest store in town, where I fixed chainsaws and ran the auto/repair shop. Mid 80’s but not much had changed, kids could still go out to trick or treat without worries, ride bikes all over town and people would watch for them, but mostly away from the courthouse square area. If your porch light was on, you had candy for the trick or treaters.
Often the local school was everything all in one building, not enough people to warrant different schools for elementary, jr high and high school, or sometimes two, one through 8th grade and one high school.
Churches all over the place, almost everybody was in one of them every sunday. BBQ with neighbors was common, and almost everywhere we moved to a group called the welcome wagon would show up. Being a small town, they knew when someone would move in, and 3 or 4 ladies would show up while you unloaded a truck full of boxes and bring sandwiches, cookies, tea and kool aid. Everyone would visit for an hour or so and off they went, sometimes they would show up again with drinks if it was a hot summer day.
Air conditioning was uncommon, often the houses had 10 or 12 foot ceilings. That gave the heat more room to rise, open the windows and turn on the attic fan and it didn’t seem anywhere near as hot as it does now, or maybe we were more acclimated to it...Windows always had screens to keep bugs out.
Men were men and the sheep were scared...lol...ok not really but I had to throw that one in...
I’m sure there’s more, but that’s all I can remember. A different time for sure, much less stressful than today’s world where kids can’t run loose in town without an adult in sight, parents can’t spank their kids without getting sued and their kids taken by child welfare, even letting your 10 year old kid walk to the playground a block away can get you in trouble.
A much better world I think...I’d trade milk on the doorstep and fun trick or treating for terrorist threats and LGBT lawsuits any day...
I spent my summers in an Oklahoma town so small they had one flashing yellow traffic light. One doctor. One grocery store, drug store. You walked to the post office to get your mail. The church where my parents were married was two blocks away and seated about 50-75 people.
OK after reading through this, I see one big difference several people have mentioned.
Be home before the street lights come on...
No such thing...
My parents were excessively controlling totalitarians. My mother demanded she had to know exactly where I was every minute of every day. If I walked home from school, which I almost always did, and got there 5 minutes late, my ass was whipped. 11th grade in high school I got home 15 minutes late, stopped at a friend’s house briefly, got screamed at when I got home and she absolutely demanded I had to come straight home from school, no stopping for any reason, period.
I finally started just doing what I wanted to, take the ass chewing and carry on. Otherwise I had no life. I think she actually walked to school and timed it, she knew if I was just a couple of minutes late.
She was still doing that when I was 30 and working in the little Texas town repairing chain saws. I didn’t know a soul, finally met a guy I got along with and he said come on over after work and have a beer. I didn’t drink any more, but stopped in for 20 minutes or so to visit. When I got home she was furious, threw a screaming fit, and this is a direct quote...”I don’t give a shit about your friends, we have too much work to do.”
That’s why I’m not a workaholic. A workaholic made my life miserable for many years. I couldn’t play football or baseball with the neighborhood guys, “if you have time to play you have time to work”. And after I told them I’d be there, I found myself pulling weeds in HER flower bed...and she would refuse to let me go tell them I couldn’t make it. Destroyed my reputation everywhere I lived from the time I was about 8 through high school and beyond. If you can’t keep your word, you have no reputation...
I really envy a lot of people who actually had a normal life as kids. I couldn’t do what you people consider everyday normal life. If I just jumped on my bike and took a ride, my ass was whipped. I had to ask permission, that was demanded, and it usually was not given. There was work to do...no such thing as be home when the street lights come on, if I got to go at all I had a specific time to be back. And not 5 minutes later.
5th grade, 1st day or two, the teacher asked what we did during summer vacation...she got kids saying they went to Niagara Falls, Grand Canyon, Yellowstone...I told her I worked in my parents’ tomato patch. She was aghast...I’m sure you did something else? Well, I went swimming one day...
That’s the part I never got to see as a kid, the normal kid part. Literally every minute of every day was under strict supervision, or I just went and did what I wanted to and got in trouble for it. It sucked, but at least I didn’t have to deal with life in a huge metropolis like Houston or New York...I’d probably be in prison right now. Sometimes I’m surprised I’m not anyway...There were a few good times here and there, Christmas morning, trick or treat, thanksgiving dinner at the grandparents’ place...the occasional times I could be off somewhere alone while squirrel or rabbit hunting...usually didn’t even try to hunt, just enjoy a little freedom for a half hour...
I’ve tried to shut out the majority of the bad memories, and don’t remember a whole lot of being a kid, it was mostly something I wanted to forget. I do remember some things, the Burma Shave signs, Mr Whiffle, finding out Santa was a hoax, first time to drive a car...the aunt Jemima building just outside Natchez, Mississippi...I was very disappointed to find out they changed it to a resemblance of a native american woman sometime in the past 30 years...going to a LSU football game, probably 6 years old...there were a few decent times...
I envy some of you people a lot...what was that like? What was it like to be a normal kid? Just a kid without a care in the world...that was an alien concept.
That’s barely the tip of the iceberg, it eventually destroyed everything I ever hoped to dream of...but that’s another story entirely...
But that’s what I remember of small towns. The courthouse square, the old drug store soda fountain and coke floats or cherry cokes, milkman, postman walked a route every day, oh yeah sometimes a hayride in fall, trick or treat (with my mother at the end of the sidewalk)...and the generally more sociable nature of people. Unfortunately I never stayed in one place a full year, I was in Jr High school before I went to the same school twice. Sometimes 2 in one year. So I never got to know the people much, just my family mostly and the people they had known all their lives. Not a person in the world I’ve known all my life except my brothers and sister...
Cities now, different story, even the smaller ones sometimes, nobody bothers to stop and talk a little, not often do you see the local folks standing in the store catching up on the latest gossip, people don’t want to get involved. If we had a flat, someone would almost always stop to see if we needed help. Now they just drive by and don’t even bother to wave. I do miss that kind of thing...
Oh yeah the Milkman and the bottles of milk at school.
I remember one of the rites of passage when you were in the early grades was being able to "flip" the milk bottle cardboard cap a certain distance. Flipping was done by a move akin to snapping one's fingers and you were not allowed to move your arm in the attempt. All the distance must come from the finger flip. ( Flipping involved using your thumb and middle finger as the launch pad and your index finger as the "flipper".) It was serious stuff for a 1st or 2nd grader and if you could not "flip" the required distance by the end of the 2nd grade You would not be allowed to hang with "the guys" from third grade on hahahah.
I also remember the milk man who delivered to our house and the bread man who delivered fresh bread and pastries to our neighborhood several times a week. Those doughnuts were to die for!
I never did the milk cap flipping thing, but I remember folding a sheet of paper into a triangle, someone would hold up two fingers for a goalpost, and you would thump the paper at it for a field goal. The triangle would be placed long side toward you, one point on the table, other hand used to thump it.
I was better at marbles...
This link works with your thread.
http://city-journal.org/html/lost-structures-civility-14794.html
I live in a town of 3k and work next town over with about 5K population. Best understanding of my town?
When the ice storm of 98 came through and we had two solid days of ice and snow, my plowman came through each day with his chainsaw and cut through the twenty or so trees that fell each of those two nights on my quarter mile long drive way.
Then neighbors hiked in with fresh water for baby formula, Had 4 children under 9 and one was four months old. Twice a day the fire department guys would show up in big trucks with big tires to check in, bring water, and offer to take the children and me to the town supper or shelter.
We were watched. The town knew that there was a woman alone with four young kids and they just made sure we were fine until my husband was able to get back. We have a big woodstove and propane stove top and plenty of food. I wrapped the two 25 foot chest freezers in sleeping bags and when the spousal unit returned from his work cross the country with a generator and other things we needed we fired that up and saved the freezer food.
I enjoyed the silence. Even with a quiet road one does not realize the background noise of a house until the electricity goes out.
I was cared for, by men I didn’t know in the big that I finally understood. Some of these men take care of me even today, working my driveway, plowing my snow, and generally watching out.
I had never had that before.
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