Childhood, Was one side of the family the "well off side"?

[vintagekitchen]

Growing up I didn't think about it a lot, but it was fairly common knowledge that dad's side of the family, (including dad, mom, and us) had more money, and were more willing to spend the money they had, than mom's side of the family, which meant of course that dad's side had more fun stuff.

Looking back, a lot of the things I took for granted, mom's side of the family saw as luxories, (which may explain part of why they have always viewed dad's side of the family, including my siblings and I, as wasteful).

When I was a kid in the 80's, Dad' side of the family all had microwaves, including us, big monstrous affairs, with the touchpad controls. Moms side didn't have microwaves until the early 90's, and then they were the ones with the single knob controls.

Of course, dad's side of the family all had those old HUGE satellite dishes, VCRs, and TV's no smaller than 20 inches, while on mom's side of the family, my aunts and uncles had 13 or 16 inch TV's with rabbit ears, and my grandparents didn't have a tv until 1999, which even then was a 13 inch.

Dads side of the family always had multiple window unit air conditioners, a large one in the living room, and usually a small one for the master bedroom, and possibly a small one for the kitchen, while on mom's side, my grandparents had a small one that barely cooled the living room, and my aunts and uncles had medium to large ones in their kitchens.

Of course, Dad's family had matching set appliances, while mom's had mismatched second-hand appliances. And on dad's side, name brand was king, whether it was food, clothes, shoes, cleansers, or appliances, while on mom's side, generic ruled supreme. I especially remember that on dad's side, granny and one aunt had Kirby vacuums, another aunt had Filter Queen, and Mom had a Rainbow, while on Mom's side, granny and one aunt had identical Eureka uprights, other aunt had a cheap singer upright, and other aunt had no vacuum at all, as she had no carpets, just linoleums.

I guess the main difference was dad's side of the family lived in either actual houses, or in the case of one aunt, in a brand new mobile home for a few years before getting a house, while mom's family all lived in older model mobile homes, most of them about 20 years old before they were bought by mom's family.

I never really thought about the differences as a kid, it was just part of life, and I don't think My dad's side of the family was really even that well off, just average 1980's middle class, but mom's side of the family really had it harder financially than I thought about back then. Of course, that explains a life long resentment held by them against my dads family, and against the way my siblings and I were raised, as apparently my mom still shopped like her family after getting married, for the first year or 2, until she got used to the way my dad's family did things.

I don't know why I started thinking about this today, I guess I am just curious, did anyone else experience this growing up? Was it weird for you going between the 2 different lifestyles? I know it was odd for me, since I took for granted that everyone could live like dad's family.

 

[polkanut]

For me both sides of the family were more or less equal.  Everyone has/had their own homes whether it was a traditional 2 story or a ranch, most have/had at least 2 vehicles, matching appliances, the usual modern conveniences throughout the home etc.  My parents families were fairly equally split between city dwellers, and farm families.

 

[whirlcool]

Both sides of our family were pretty equal too. None were really poor, but still watched what money they had. Everyone was pretty thrifty. My parents could have afforded a microwave early in the 70's but wanted to see if the microwave boom would stick around before they bought theirs. They bought their first microwave in 1982.

Most everyone upgraded their homes from window units to central a/c in the late 60's early 70's. Everyone did start buying color TV's, my uncle on my mom's side bought the first, a 1962 model Zenith. We got ours in 1964 and then everyone else did 1965-1969.

As far as cars went, everyone owned Fords, Chevrolets & Chrysler Corp cars. Then in the late 60's came the Pontiac's, Oldmobiles, Thunderbirds came along. We were definitely a Chevrolet family. Heck, so was I until 1976 when Chevy's turned to crap.

A lot of what people on both sides of my family had was directly related to their careers. I was the first in our family to graduate college. But everyone in our family had at least high school. And everyone had a "trade" of some sort. Nobody was ever unemployed. One of my uncle's worked at Moen faucet and was on the team that designed the first single handled faucet.

 

[zippyjet]

Poor side of the family

Funny you should be discussing this. My sister and I always laughed at our upbringing in retrospect. We were never wanting for anything however, our house was best described as funky. My mom was never a good housekeeper. Our beloved dad proclaimed our mother as "Hitler's housekeeper." (We are Jewish). My mom sort of was jealous of her sister and sister in law and many of her friends. They lived in bigger fancy houses with all the bells and whistles of the day. Especially their kitchens. My mom never had a dishwasher. In the 1980's I almost submitted pictures of our house to John Waters for his next trashy movie. My mom in her prime (pre- Alzheimers) was sort of like Divine. I'll have to find and scan some pics.