Life in the 1950's

[norgeway]

Re living in the past!

Just let someone invent a time machine and IM GONE!!!!I would go back in time to the 50s in a split second...No electronic aggravations, cars that looked like cars and Ike in the White house, oh yeah,, back when our budged was balanced and 2/3 of everything made in the world was made here!!Phones that had DIALS!, no cell phones, no computers...I could go on and on!!American made sheets and towels, not to mention, tvs, radios, hi fi's etc made here!!PARADISE!!!did I mention 25 cent gas!!!and 15 cent geating oil!

 

[washman]

I concur with norgeway

in addition we'd have solid tub machines with overflow rinses.
Detergents with phosphates that cleaned
No bombardment from social media discussing every "trend"
Food with trans fats and flavor
Algore would be another nobody
Piers Morgan would be yet another nobody
No vapid nonsense about global warming or climate change
No reality shows that are here today gone tomorrow
Women who acted like real women instead of inked up gutter mouth tramps of today
No Miley Cyrus "acting out" in rebellion to her religious upbringing
Young men of color and young white men would go around with their pants pulled up
Cars that actually had style and personality and could easily be distinguished from one another.
Levis made here
Fluffo shortening
No vapid pronouncements about job cuts to maximize "shareholder value"
Walmart was still a local thing and years away from the 800lb gorilla it is today
And last buy certainly not least, a whole bunch of Speed Queens featuring the famous Arc-Cuate transmission!

 

[norgeway]

WELL SAID!

My sentiments exactly!!People were raised right and knew how to act in public, you held a door for a lady, and always said yes sir and yes ma am, and if you were a kid and didnt behave, you got your hind end busted, and it sure never hurt me in the long run!And you didnt see people driving down the road with a D%^& cell phone up to there ear.....Oh to get to eat at a S and W cafeteria again and to go to Belks and Iveys stores in down town Charlotte again, oh I could go oN and ON!!!

 

[norgeway]

And if!

Your dirt driveway was dusty, you sprayed it with used motor oil, when you bought paint, it would stay forever practically because it had lead in it! And if you were a kid you knew better than to chew on the woodwork!!!!And your car could have 10.5 to 1 compression because gas was 100 octane with lead in it!!LOL..and electricity was cheap because your plants burned coal and there was no D%^& EPA to tell them they couldnt!!!I Remember my Mom and Dad saying they made 50.00 a week in 50 when they got married, they bought a car, rented an apartment and had t bone steaks every friday night, and went to the movies every saturday, no one needs to tell me today is better!NOTHING today is better.

 

[norgeway]

And I could!

Have driven a honest to goodness Plymouth Dodge or DeSoto with fins and pushbuttons, or a Super 88 Olds with a four speed HydraMatic!!!

 

[joelippard]

I would have absolutely loved to have lived back then.  I'm glad I'm old enough to have gotten in on the end of "the good ol' days"

 

[danemodsandy]

Lest We Forget:

The '50s weren't all fun and games. Shall I begin?

I remember the closed swimming pools because of polio fears, and I remember the kids who got polio anyway and were in braces.

I remember the "White Only" signs in any number of places.

I remember one of my little grammar-school classmates dying in a low-speed fender-bender, because a highly-styled pot-metal knob on the car radio went deep into his brain, when his small, un-seat-belted body was thrown against the car's dash.

I remember growing up in a world where the only information about anything gay came from classmates who mercilessly bullied me.

I remember clergymen preaching from their pulpits that segregation was "God's Plan."

I remember several female relatives of mine keeping the secret of their husbands' alcoholism, because it was considered a shameful moral weakness, responsive to nothing but Divine Intervention.

I remember the extreme sexual irregularities visited upon young campers by the counselors at the summer camp I went to.

I remember wondering why African-Americans had to sit in the balcony of Atlanta's Fox Theatre - and why I could not sit up there where it looked so beautiful and the faux sky was so close.

I remember wondering why none of the adults in my sphere would believe me when I told them that one of my teachers was emotionally and physically abusive towards students.

I remember people being terrified that the Russians had launched something called a "Sputnik" into space.

I remember that my favorite second cousin had terrible PTSD from his time in Korea, that his life was never what it should have been, and that no one even knew that his illness could or should be treated.

It wasn't all roses, folks. The T-bone steaks were there, but so were a whole lot of things best left in the past.

 

[whirlaway]

There still here!

Look around you! Everything but polio is still here! But people then didnt talk like trash as they do now! I was in a very nice Thai place tonight for dinner and the f bomb by the people behind me,you never would have heard then! People today dont have the manners they had then.Yes folks still have and always will domestic issues,but at least they didnt drag it out for everyone to hear,respect is all but gone!!!

 

[davey7]

I'd go back to the 20's or 30's (if I were wealthy), but not the 50's. The early 50's still had a lot of deprivation even in the US despite a boom compared to other countries, materials were in short supply and all kinds of unethical deals were cut.

 

[norgeway]

just let me be..

About 25 in 1953, and have a good paying job, the only thing I can think of that was really bad then would have been a visit to the dentist...of course its bad enough now!!LOL