Tell me about the '60s (vanity)

[HungarianGypsy]

I am wanting to write a story based on a young adult in the 1960s. Since I was born in 1973 all I really know is what I studied in books. But, I want to get beyond love beads and LSD. I want to be able to write this as it really was. I know it's said if you remember the '60s you weren't really there. But, if anyone does remember I would appreciate reading your stories and facts. Thank you.

[bannie]

We had a party line with neighbors two houses down. They picked up when it had one ring, and we picked up when there were two rings. Our phones were all black and were owned by the phone company (one phone company!). Also our phone number had just four digets.

[bannie]

Nobody from the 60's remembers the 60's.

You're so silly.

[brazzaville]

Good evening.

Well armed Americans with good taste. There's hope for the country yet.

Michael Frazier

[bannie]

Girls were supposed to be flat like Twiggy.



I was out of the loop.

[isthisnickcool]

You're so silly.

Yea, that's true. Sarcastic too.

I scored an 80 by the way,....

[Revolting cat!]

Fiat 600 Multipla.

[Ditto]

I remember the Apollo fire was it Apollo 13? What year did the tragedy occur? All I can recall, was watching the funerals for the Astronauts on TV, sick on the couch.

That was Apollo 1 and it was in January, 1967 when we lost 3 great Americans, Lt. Col. Virgil I. "Gus" Grissom, USAF; Lt. Col. Edward H. White II, USAF; and Navy Lt. Roger B. Chaffee., on the launch pad in a flash fire during a pre-flight test.

My brother was on the ground crew and the first reports over the news said that there was a fire on the pad and launch crew workers were killed. I called my brother immediately and woke him up --- he had been working night shift and was home in bed when it happened.

Apollo 13 happened in April of 1970 and thank God (and good engineering) they came back alive.

[Renegade]

Whoa !!! On House tonight, House prescribes Electro-shock therepy for a patient . He says he is bringing out the 1940's playbook for this one . Talk about Deja-Vu!!

[TomSmedley]

Let me cite an insightful quote from a graphic novel, Watchmen by Alan Moore and Dave Gibbons.

(Hollis Mason Under the Hood, p. 13) All the cases I ended up investigating during the '50s seemed sordid and depressing and quite often blood-chillingly horrible. I don't know what it was ... there just seemed to be a sort of bleak, uneasy feeling in the air. It was as if some essential element of our lives, of all our lives, was vanishing before we knew entirely what it was. I don't think I could really describe it completely except maybe to sometbody who remembered the elation we all felt after the war: we felt that we'd taken he worst that the 20th century could throw at us and stood our ground. We felt as if we'd really won a hard-earned age of peace and prosperity taht woudl see us well into the year 2000. This optimism lasted all through the '40s and into the early '50s, but by the middle of that latter decade it was starting to wear thin, and there was aa sort of ominous feeling in the air.

Partly it was the beatniks and the poets opening condemning American values whenever they opened their mouths. Partly it was Elvis Presley and the whole Rock 'n' Roll boom. Had we fought a war for our country so that our daughters could scream and swoon over young men who looked like this, who sounded like that? With all those sudden social upheavals just when we thought we'd gotten everything straight, it was impossible to live through the '50s without a sense of impending catastrophe bearing implacably down upon the whole country, the whole world. Some people thought it was war and others thought it was flying saucers, but those things weren't really was was bearing down upon us. What was bearing down upon us was the 1960s.

[bannie]

(Graduated in 1970.) In high school, our dresses couldn't be shorter than 4" above the knee. At 5'2", this wasn't so bad for me. When I was called in to the office, however, I had to kneel on a chair while a spinster touched a ruler to the chair and measured my 4".


The boys had to keep their shirts tucked in, and their hair couldn't touch their collars.

Shoes got really ugly and clunky. If you DIDN'T wear make-up, you were a hippy. We had two hippies at our school in central California. They thought they were hippies, anyway.

[bannie]

oooooo..remember Rat Fink????

And those models (like car models) of The Phantom of the Opera, Frankenstein and The Mummy!

[CatoRenasci]

I didn't know him, but I vaguely remember the flag at half-staff after he was killed - we did that in those days - and his name was read in the general orders.

[G Larry]

He had two parents, still married to each other.
Mom worked at home.
He had 2 brothers and 2 sisters.
Lived in a 3 bedroom, 1 bath house.
1 car in the family.
1 black & white TV w 2 channels.
Walked or took a bus to school until his Junior year.
He still feared authority, even if he didn't respect it.
Acting up in school could result in "hacks".
Only 5% of the kids didn't graduate from High School.
One kid in a class of 500 had a new Mustang.
'57 Chevy's were still pretty cool.
Cultural divides included kids who liked the Beatles vs. kids who liked the Monkey's.
Fights rarely escalated beyond fists.
Public schools still taught American History that included 'Dead White Guys'.
You could mention God in school and even sing real Christmas Carols.
We learned what "assassinate" meant.

[toldyou]

Oh, we love to reminisque about the 60's!

[bannie]

We had SIX tv stations...abc, nbc and cbs. Yes, SIX: We got both twice. Halfway between Bakersfield and Fresno, we got each from each.

TV, however, DID have a short day...starting at about 6 in the morning and ending at 12 or 1 AM. The TV day began and ended with The Star Spangled Banner.

[gcruse]

The sixties came forty years after the Roaring 20s. Accordingly, shouldn't the 2000's be a time for irrational exuberance? We're due a big bash.

[Howlin]

What did you think the perspective of those of us that went to war would be?

Well, I presumed that the facts would enter into your rationalization, but obviously I was wrong.

... and don't have any time at all for those that could've but didn't.

Wow, lonely you.

[toldyou]

"Accordingly, shouldn't the 2000's be a time for irrational exuberance? We're due a big bash."

Where's the party? I'm in!

[Trteamer]

We took apart our metal roller skates, screwed them onto two foot 2 x 4's and had "skateboards". It was groovy.

[bannie]

You could make book on the TV Guide. If it said Bonanza was going to be on, it was ON our you had a right to know why. You knew what night each show came on.

Also, Laugh-In shocked us.