Posted on 03/15/2025 12:11:33 PM PDT by DallasBiff
Coming home to an empty house, managing homework without reminders, and making your own snacks wasn’t just part of the routine—it was the training ground for life. Boomer latchkey kids didn’t have helicopter parents hovering over every decision, which meant they developed character traits that today’s hyper-scheduled kids might never experience. Independence wasn’t a choice; it was the default setting.
While some might call it “neglect,” those solo afternoons shaped resilient, resourceful adults with a unique blend of grit, adaptability, and unshakable confidence.
(Excerpt) Read more at retirely.co ...
My next door neighbors owned a restaurant so the parents were both gone a lot. My other next door neighbor was a single mom, so she was gone a lot.
I had a trampoline and a pretty big playhouse. The neighbors pushed the trampoline to the playhouse and would jump off the playhouse until the trampoline. I was too scared to do that.
“We did not HAVE microwaves as young boomers.”
Nor cellphones, no cable, no computers. We shoveled snow to make a buck, or did most anything else. If you wanted to buy something, you had to go earn it.
A latchkey kid, or latchkey child, is a child who returns to an empty home after school (or other activities) or a child who is often left at home with no supervision because their parents are away at work. Such a child can be any age, alone or with siblings who are also under the age of maturity for their community.
I was a latch key kid without a latch key as we never locked our door unless we went on vacation. The lock was a circa 1940 padlock that had been left to us by the previous owner. Key was left somewhere in the garage.
It was not lonely for me as I had three brothers and friends in the neighborhood.
Did not know there was a phenomenon of this till later when my home town of Yarmouth Maine created a Latchstring Award after I had moved away.
Latchstring Award
Since 1980, the Town Council has annually recognized citizens of the Town of Yarmouth who have contributed their time, efforts and concern for an extended and exemplary period for the benefit of the citizens of Yarmouth.
The Latchstring Award with its name derived from the town motto “Our Latchstring Always Out”, is intended as an acknowledgment of those citizens whose examples of citizenship and leadership keep Yarmouth a warm and welcoming community of caring individuals.
I'm 77. My two sons are 58 and 54. I don't remember the year I bought my first microwave, but it was probably in the 70's. I bought it from Sears. It was a big old thing, heavy too, but that darn thing lasted 15-20 years. One time it stopped working, so I took it to a small appliance repair shop. He put in a new fuse for $5.00, and the thing lasted until I got tired of having to move it when me moved to a new apartment...so I got a new, smaller one.
My childhood was right out of the Little Rascals, just a bunch of unsupervised kids running around getting into stuff all day long.
I had a remote and colored TV. In the early 60s.
Yes. I ironed clothes (at home) to earn money. Also, weeded in the fields and garden. We were paid for the field, but the work did not last long. I cannot, nor could not, deal with the heat.
My two sons were latch-key kids. I got divorced in 1979. They were 13 and 8 at the time. I had to work full time to support us. In 1980, I took a job with NY State, and we moved to Auburn, NY so I could take the job. We stayed there until 1983 when I was able to transfer back to this area, where we had been living when I took the job. Me and my sons were born in Rochester, N.Y.
We had neither until maybe the early 70s.
I know what a latch-key kid is.
At one point I got good at baking my own cinnamon and sugar "something" on a cookie sheet. Come to think of it, my beautiful Wife of fifty years would never let me do something like that.
1. Independence wasn’t optional—it was survival.
2. Problem-solving became second nature.
3. Resilience was built into their DNA.
4. Time management was learned the hard way.
5. Self-sufficiency became a badge of honor.
6. Emotional toughness came with the territory.
7. Adaptability became second nature.
8. Creativity flourished in quiet moments.
9. A strong sense of responsibility developed early.
10. Resourcefulness was key to getting through the day.
11. Confidence grew with every small victory.
Now consider this is the same generation the Depression and WW 2 generations considered to be spoiled and weak. It seems like each generation is subject to degeneration.
I graduated college in 1985. Switched my major from chemical engineering to computer science because the oil industry had gone bust in Texas. Then I moved to Silicon Valley.
I didn’t know a sole in California when I moved there. I was a single young lady. My dad almost died the year I graduated from college from complications from a heart valve replacement surgery. Then my mom had a mental breakdown. My older brother had cancer. I really was on my own.
Despite having an author’s name, many of these “list-icals” read like they’re AI generated.
The push for the home market was started in the 60s and they were getting more common during the 70s, and of course the 1980s.
“Sales volume of 40,000 units for the U.S. industry in 1970 grew to one million by 1975.” “By 1972, Litton (Litton Atherton Division, Minneapolis) introduced two new microwave ovens, priced at $349 and $399, to tap into the market estimated at $750 million by 1976”
Of course there are all sorts of socioeconomic pockets within pretty much any location and, yes, IMO the whole “generations” focus is overblown.
But as far as “Jonesing”, this is from the wikipedia page citing its key theorist, if you will:
“Pontell suggests that Jonesers inherited an optimistic outlook as children in the 1960s, but were then confronted with a different reality as they entered the workforce during Reaganomics and the shift from a manufacturing economy to a service economy, which ushered in a long period of mass unemployment. Mortgage interest rates increased to above 12 percent in the mid-eighties,[14] making it virtually impossible to buy a house on a single income. De-industrialization arrived in full force in the mid-late 1970s and 1980s; wages would be stagnant for decades, and 401(k)s replaced pensions, leaving them with a certain abiding “jonesing” quality for the more prosperous days of the past.”
I think it is bad analysis.
Ours was from Sears too and it was huge! We didn’t really know what to use it for at first. I remember making baked apples in it.
Sounds like some tough personal circumstances not tied to any particular generation or subgeneration.
Until we got cable TV with a wired remote, my brother and I were the remote control. "Get up and change it to channel 7!"
We played with gasoline and matches, I have to admit that was some dangerous stuff, I can’t imagine letting the average modern kid around that military grade destructive play stuff.
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