You know you are getting old when:

[BlueTrain]

It's because we're now the ones over 30. Way over 30!

I knew about the Buick V8 and one of the cars I owned was a Rover 3500, which had one of those V8s. It was the only high-performance car I ever owned. I also had a Rover 2000 TC. I also had three Renaults, which I thought were highly underrated. We as a family have had four Volvos but they have become very expensive lately. Now we have a Ford Escape and a VW wagon. Our daughter still has one of the Volvos. I probably would have bought a VW wagon instead of the Ford but that was when the big flap over VW diesel emissions was all over the news. As it happened, an engineer at WVU, where I graduated, discovered the problem. But someone else writing in the WVU alumni magazine pointed out that given all the 18-wheelers on the road and how few VW diesels there were, it didn't really amount to a real problem. It seems odd that diesel fuel is more expensive than gasoline.

 

[belfastboy]

It's because we're now the ones over 30. Way over 30!

I knew about the Buick V8 and one of the cars I owned was a Rover 3500, which had one of those V8s. It was the only high-performance car I ever owned. I also had a Rover 2000 TC. I also had three Renaults, which I thought were highly underrated. We as a family have had four Volvos but they have become very expensive lately. Now we have a Ford Escape and a VW wagon. Our daughter still has one of the Volvos. I probably would have bought a VW wagon instead of the Ford but that was when the big flap over VW diesel emissions was all over the news. As it happened, an engineer at WVU, where I graduated, discovered the problem. But someone else writing in the WVU alumni magazine pointed out that given all the 18-wheelers on the road and how few VW diesels there were, it didn't really amount to a real problem. It seems odd that diesel fuel is more expensive than gasoline.

I remember hitchhiking in Donegal in the 70's and getting a ride in a Rover 3500. I was just the passenger but thought it was possibly the nicest riding vehicle I had ever driven in.

 

[tonyb]

I wish that I had a 1968 Checker Marathon (complete with bumpers mounted on shock absorbers and painted flat silver). I want a 250 (4.1 Liter) inline 6 Cylinder fuel injected engine and a 4-speed automatic transmission.

Properly maintained you could achieve 1,000,000 miles on the body. Simply keep up the regular maintenance and you'll be fine for 100,000 miles. Keep replacing parts and engines every 100,000 miles and you can drive the car for 30-40 years.

But what do I know?

I've known a few Checkers. A friend still has a '67 model. Gotta be on the lookout for sheet metal corrosion on those things. But it's body-on-frame construction, so body cancer doesn't render it structurally unsound.

 

[LizzieMaine]

It can also be argued that Older People in the 1950s and 1960s were not exactly demonstrating particular wisdom and understanding in the way that they led the world at that time -- thus leading to the reasonable conclusion that maybe they weren't as smart as they thought -- and younger people were expected to think -- they were.

The same thing happened in the 1920s -- we've talked often about the parallells between the twenties and sixties, and the dismissal of "age and wisdom" as an entitled expectation was very much a marker of the generation of young people who came of age in the late 1910s, who were enraged at their elders who sunk the world into what was quickly becoming perceived as a pointless, useless war for which much of their own generation had been expected to bleed without question, only to be promptly tossed aside and forgotten once they came home. One can understand why they might have been disillusioned, especially when they came home to see their country led by an unusually corrupt and morally dissolute President.

What WWI did for the generation of the late 1910s, the Depression did for the kids who were reaching adulthood in the late 1920s and early 1930s -- showing them a world that had, in their perception, been bled utterly dry by The Older Generation, leaving them nothing but the crushed, empty husks. There was a lot of distrust for "the wisdom of the Elders" at this point in history, and it kept up all thru the 1930s -- again with the 1960s paralell, there was a sense that the rising generation was the only hope for a hopelessly mucked-up world, and "moldy old ideas spouted by moldy old men in celluloid collars" were widely dismissed.

The irony, of course, is that it was these two generations who were the moldy oldies against whom the youth of the 1960s were rebelling. Some of those generations kept their ideals to the ends of their lives, but a great many didn't, becoming every bit as corrupt and venal and dissolute as the ones they themselves had denounced thirty earlier, and with eerily similar results. The moral of the story, I would suggest, is that (1) no generation of young people has any particular reason to bow to the wisdom of its elders, and (2) every generation of young people will eventually grow up to be an Older Generation that isn't anywhere near as smart or wise or morally pure as it thinks it is.

 

[tonyb]

^^^^^
I think I've that story.

 

[Zombie_61]

Great story - sounds like a great guy...

I don't know about "great", but he was definitely "interesting". Born and raised in Canada; worked as a logger in his teens; moved to the U.S., became a citizen, and joined the Marines. At some point after he returned to civilian life he suffered a spinal injury in a car accident, and his doctor told him he'd never walk again; six months later he walked into that doctor's office just to prove him wrong. He was meticulous and very particular about the work we did--there was a "right" and "wrong" way to do everything. He often exhibited a short temper when things weren't going according to plan, but he countered that by being fair and reasonable and understanding that sometimes things happen that are beyond our control. These occasional outbursts (which in hindsight were actually relatively mild by comparison to others I've experienced) didn't help his high blood pressure, and you could always tell when he'd taken his medication because he was suddenly the calmest and most relaxed person in the world. He treated me well, but I believe his ex-wives (at least two, maybe more; I don't really remember) would have had some interesting stories of their own to tell.

...I grew up in the late '60s / '70s, for "older" adults then, I think, there was an expectation that their life experience gave them "the answers" to life's issues as experience, age and wisdom were all kind of wrapped together back then - again, IMHO. "Listen to / respect your elders" was a phrase one heard often and not with cynicism. This created a kind of feedback loop that, probably, made older people feel pressure to appear knowledgable, in control - a font of wisdom...

I was also a child of the 60s and 70s. Another way in which I consider myself very fortunate is that my parents taught me to listen to and respect my elders, but also to use my own judgement to determine whether or not they deserved my respect. As such, I've lived most of my life giving people the benefit of the doubt, and my respect, until they prove they aren't worthy of it. Mom and Dad were born in 1915 and 1913, respectively, so they lived through the Great Depression, World War II, the Korean War, the Vietnam War, the Hippie movement, the advent of television, a Presidential assassination, and so on. It was very much a "blue collar", "middle class" home life, but they appreciated everything they had because they knew what it was like to go without. By way of example they passed those values, and a strong work ethic, on to me. It was never anything that was discussed, but simply the way things were. They had problems like everyone else, but dealt with them in the simplest and most reasonable methods available to them. And I can't recall them ever trying to "hide" any of their problems from me. It was as if they were trying to show me, "Hey kid, this is life, good and bad. You'd better get used to it."

 

[LizzieMaine]

My grandparents weren't the kind of people to sit you down and self-consciously deliver Sage Life Lessons. They weren't sage or intellectually-minded people in any way whatever -- my grandfather would rather sit in his chair and sing a dirty song to annoy my grandmother than pontificate. They'd always been too busy scratching out a living to care about such things. The things I learned most from them were not moral values or any kind of a worldview -- instead, I learned practical things: how to sew, how to fix broken things that needed to be fixed instead of calling a repairman, how to avoid wasting time on nonessentials while taking care of the things that were really important. If I did learn a life lesson that still follows me today, it's that results are far more important than procedure, and that there are a very great many "serious" things in life that, in fact, aren't worth being taken seriously at all.

The most important thing I learned from them, though, was to have nothing to do with tobacco. I watched it kill both of them, in a brutal, horrific way, and that was a lesson I never forgot.

 

[Trenchfriend]

Many many people know about tar, nikotin, irritant-gas and carbon-monoxid.

But, what primary school and secondary school doesn't teach the kids, is, what nitrosamines are and what they do.

 

[2jakes]

I was a child of the 60s and 70s. Another way in which I consider myself very fortunate is that my parents taught me to listen to and respect my elders, but also to use my own judgement to determine whether or not they deserved my respect. As such, I've lived most of my life giving people the benefit of the doubt, and my respect, until they prove they aren't worthy of it. Mom and Dad were born in 1915 and 1913, respectively, so they lived through the Great Depression, World War II, the Korean War, the Vietnam War, the Hippie movement, the advent of television, a Presidential assassination, and so on. It was very much a "blue collar", "middle class" home life, but they appreciated everything they had because they knew what it was like to go without. By way of example they passed those values, and a strong work ethic, on to me. It was never anything that was discussed, but simply the way things were. They had problems like everyone else, but dealt with them in the simplest and most reasonable methods available to them. And I can't recall them ever trying to "hide" any of their problems from me. It was as if they were trying to show me, "Hey kid, this is life, good and bad. You'd better get used to it."

I was a child of the 50s and 60s.
Grew up with a grandmother who doted on me.
She would tell the others that I was her favorite
because I was not a spoiled brat and I minded her.

(Some folks still do this and don’t realize how much it
hurts if you are not a favorite)

My grandma never handed any rules or preached to
me about things or religion.

I was mostly by myself in that big house of hers playing
with things I made, drawing cartoons on cardboard.
This came in handy when I started oil painting later
in life.

At age six, was sent back to live with my parents when
I started elementary.
My parents were always having to work or too busy.
So at an early age, I learned to fend for myself.
I may have made a mess in the kitchen but I
never went hungry.

So indirectly, my folks taught me if I wanted something
it was up to me to do something about it.

 

[2jakes]

Many many people know about tar, nikotin, irritant-gas and carbon-monoxid.

But, what primary school and secondary school doesn't teach the kids, is, what nitrosamines are and what they do.

The schools never taught us about such things except that if you
were caught smoking in school.
You were sent to the “boiler room” where you would get a
whipping with a wood paddle by the vice-principal.

I only got whipped once.
But that was for skipping sixth period and going with my pal
downtown to look for a part-time job.

Btw:
Whatever “nitrosamines” is....
it don’t sound too good!

 

[Captain O]

The schools never taught us about such things except that if you
were caught smoking in school.
You were sent to the “boiler room” where you would get a
whipping with a wood paddle by the vice-principal.

I only got whipped once.
But that was for skipping sixth period and going with my pal
downtown to look for a part-time job.

Btw:
Whatever “nitrosamines” is....
it don’t sound too good!

Nitrosamines are compounds in food, rubber and other consumables that are carcinogenic (cancer causing) in nature.

 

[2jakes]

Nitrosamines are compounds in food, rubber and other consumables that are carcinogenic (cancer causing) in nature.

How are companies which use nitrosamines in their food products
able to get away with it?

 

[Captain O]

Most products don't have amounts exceeding Federal Nitrosamine compound safety levels. It is much like everything else.

Remember the "Cyclamate scare" of the mid-to-late 1970's? The trumped-up fears were bogus because you had to consume more cyclamates than you normally would in a course of five lifetimes to make the artificial sweetener a true carcinogenic threat.

It is the same old "nanny state" BS.

 

[2jakes]

You know you are getting old when:

 

[BlueTrain]

I agree with Zombie_61 (!!!) about the way our parents and relatives were and why they were that way. They all had twenty difficult years that my generation never had, if you ignore Vietnam, which wasn't much like WWII (unless you went there). I have no idea who Loeb and Hollenbeck were. I also grew up in a blue collar neighborhood. My father never attended high school and struggled with reading. I graduated from college, the first in my family to do so. Only a couple of my relatives did but none I saw regularly.

I have no memory of any student smoking around school when I was in junior high or high school but I'm sure some did. But since so many people smoked, it probably wouldn't have made any impression on me. The usual joke is that you learn to smoke from the janitor down in the boiler room, which was probably never true. But I did work on a tobacco farm one summer and I can tell you that the tar they talk about is literally tar. It is black and a little gummy and comes off on your hands when you handle the plant. But everyone knew that cigarettes were unhealthy. They were being called coffin nails and cancer sticks before I was born. There was even a popular country & western song in the 1950s about smoking.

"Tell St. Peter at the Golden Gate that you hate to make him wait, but you just gotta have another cigarette!"

 

[LizzieMaine]

Loeb and Hollenbeck were two good, decent men driven to commit suicide because of the vicious, hateful paranoia of the times. -- Hollenbeck in 1954, and Loeb in 1955.

Loeb was a distinguished Broadway actor who had been an activist in union circles since the 1930s, who in 1949 achieved fame and popularity on television as Jake Goldberg on "The Goldbergs" opposite Gertrude Berg as Molly. In 1950, Loeb was cited by a fascist organization called "Aware, Incorporated" in its publication "Red Channels," with his list of indictments including his support for a petition proposing to dissolve the House Unamerican Activities Commttee, the fact that his name appeared in the Daily Worker on January 19, 1938, his support for Republican Spain during the Spanish Civil War, and his membership on the End Jim Crow In Baseball Committee. Shortly after, name-namer Lee J. Cobb claimed that Loeb had been a member of the Communist Party, something which Loeb denied. But CBS and program sponsor General Foods pressured Berg to fire Loeb from the program. To her credit, she had the courage to refuse to do so -- but the pressure continued until, finally, in 1952, she relented. Loeb never worked again in television or radio, and only sporadically on the stage, until, crushed by financial burdens relating to medical care for his mentally-disabled son, he killed himself in a bedroom at the Hotel Taft with an overdose of sleeping pills. He is remembered in theatrical and broadcasting circles to this day as a kind, intelligent man who was one of the blacklist's most poignant victims.

Hollenbeck was a prominent news broadcaster at both NBC and CBS during the 1940s, one of the "Murrow Boys," and by 1954 he was the anchorman of the nightly 11pm report at WCBS-TV. The night of Murrow's expose of Sen. McCarthy on March 9th of that year, he opened his own broadcast by expressing his public support for the position taken by Murrow in that broadcast. The next day, he was attacked in print by columnist Jack O'Brien of the Hearst-owned New York Journal American, the beginning of a three-month-long campaign of personal accusation and invective that drove Hollenbeck, a sensitive man, to kill himself in his apartment by gas asphyxiation. And may I state for the record that the life of one Don Hollenbeck was worth more to journalism, and the world, than the lives of a million Jack O'Briens.

I could tell a lot of stories like these, and not just about famous people. I could talk about the kindergarten teacher on Long Island who was driven out of her profession because she believed forced loyalty oaths to be un-American, or the Army dentist who was cashiered from the service because one of his relatives was seen reading a foreign-language newspaper. There are literally thousands of stories like this involving ordinary people living ordinary lives who were hounded by the FBI, physically attacked by so-called patriots, driven from their jobs and ostracised by their "friends," sent to prison, prohibited by law from traveling outside the United States, or forced into political exile, simply because they didn't follow the National Association of Manufacturers/American Legion/Religion In American Life party line. For people like these, and for people who cared about people like these, "The Fifties" were very very far from any kind of a happy, pleasant time. They were a nightmare of crawling, intolerant proto-fascism.

 

[BlueTrain]

I had just look up those two on Wikipedia. In never knew anyone who was in television, on stage or in Hollywood, nor have I known anyone who was hounded by the FBI or assaulted by so-called patriots. But I understand completely what your point is. The 1950s were very much a time of conformity, even of enforced conformity, although it still had moments of a progressive nature. Perhaps that's what people were rebelling against later, although for youth to rebel against their parents generation is nothing new.

Something new in the 1950s, however, but which had nothing to do with McCarthyism and all that, was the creation of a distinct teenage culture as characterized by their own music. That really started earlier with the bobbysoxers, in a way. But I think it tended to create more of a generation gap than there used to be. None of this stuff applied to everyone, of course.

I still think the 1950s were a pretty happy time for most people, McCarthyism not withstanding, but I have known six people who committed suicide. I wonder what we'll be saying about these years a decade from now.

 

[Fading Fast]

...Something new in the 1950s, however, but which had nothing to do with McCarthyism and all that, was the creation of a distinct teenage culture as characterized by their own music. That really started earlier with the bobbysoxers, in a way. But I think it tended to create more of a generation gap than there used to be. None of this stuff applied to everyone, of course....

One theme we keep returning to here at FL is how the '20s and '60s had an echo. I'd say the first (or at least an earlier) teenage-led generation gap happened in the '20s highlighted by the flappers and their aggressive flaunting of social conventions and their parent's values.

There wasn't enough money to indulge a teenage generation in the '30s that would give them the opportunity to "rebel" and the first half of the '40s were about the war. But once money returned, so did teenage rebellion, as you noted, in the '50s. That one grew into the full-bore '60s youth rebellion which - while more strident - really parallels the one in the '20s.

 

[LizzieMaine]

My feelings about the period, I will freely admit, are motivated to a great extent by the fact that had I been born in 1913 instead of 1963, I could have easily been listed in Red Channels myself, right there on page 109 between Paul McGrath and Burgess Meredith. I knew people personally, as friends, who were involved in radio at the time of the witch-hunts, and I know what I, personally, would have experienced had I been among them at the time. It's a very sobering thing to think about, removing it all from the realm of the theoretical and making it all too real, and too close for any kind of personal comfort with any kind of smiley-faced idealization of that terrible time.

As far as assaults at the hands of so-called patriots are concerned, I personally knew a man who was brutally beaten and illegally jailed in the town of Litchfield, Illinois by members of the local American Legion because he refused to salute the flag. And he got off easy -- several of his associates, after being beaten, were chained together, forced to drink a quart of castor oil each, and frogmarched out of town. Hooray for the red, white and blue.

I'd argue, as far as teenage culture is concerned, that it existed fully formed in the 1920s. Kids had their own distinctive slanguage, their own music, and their own styles of dress, and this became even more pronounced in the 1930s, when flap-jowled old men and pruny old women wrote article after article for church magazines and the right-wing popular press denouncing the bestial rhythms of swing music, and the shiftless decadance of the 'gators who enjoyed it, in their dirty saddle shoes and their wrinkled beer jackets covered with hand-drawn cartoons and snappy sayings. What's the world coming to?

Teenagers and college kids were almost universally opposed to war during the 1930s -- they were firmly convinced that arms manufacturers and Wall Street profiteers had defrauded their parents into fighting a pointless World War in 1917 that in no way left the world a better place, and they vowed not to be similarly fooled themselves. It wasn't until the Fall of France that opinion really started to change, and it wasn't until the invasion of the USSR in 1941 that isolationism was finally dead for that generation.

 

[BlueTrain]

And we all thought it was rock 'n roll that was poisoning our little brains and made us do crazy things.

I wanted to add a footnote here about me and my relatives. My father served in the army but none of my other relatives with one or two exceptions. My son also served as did I. Those of us who served in the army, including my father, were far more liberal than those who did not. And in spite of all of those aunts and uncles being very happy with their relative success and economic circumstances during the 1950s and into the 1960s, they weren't so much conservative as they were full of hatred for certain things. So it doesn't follow that economic success and a relative comfortable life would make someone liberal. I vividly recall one friend's mother stating that we should have invaded the Soviet Union when we had beaten the Germans. Even then, that sounded like nonsense. One of my relatives who did in fact serve in the armed forces and even made it a career might have been construed as a liberal, relatively speaking, because he married a foreigner, if someone from Puerto Rico could be thought of as a foreigner. At the time, there, she was fully accepted into the family. One person from another country is a novelty; but eventually once an uncertain threshold is reached, they become a threat.

Someone once told me that old people make poor role models. They are impatient and bitter about everything. I think he may have had a point.