Am I the only one who remembers the "hood" subculture?

[Crafter_Man]

I did some google searches, but didn’t find anything.

From about 1978 to 1986 there were a lot of guys I knew who were affectionately known as "hoods." It was sort of a post-hippie subculture. They were similar to "stoners," but were somewhat more ambitious. Characteristics included:

- White male between the ages of 15 and 25.
- Long, straight hair.
- Drove a very fast Trans Am. (A prerequisite!)
- Uniform included jean pants (sometimes bellbottom), T-shirt, and a jean or leather jacket. (Think Johnny Ramone.)
- Dealt drugs on the side.
- Smoked lots of pot.
- Had a menial job.
- Loner.

What really set the hoods apart from the hippies & stoners was the Trans Am. You were not a hood unless you had a Trans Am.

I'm not exactly sure when they disappeared. Seems like around 1986.

[Zeldar]

The term "hood" for "hoodlum" was in use in my high school days (late 50's) and was used to indicate the guy was into petty crime or was a gang member, even if the "gang" was not as well-formed or menacing as the LA gangs like Crips and Bloods and such.

Synonyms like "punk" and "badass" meant the same type of ne'er-do-well. I don't think the term(s) ever really faded away altogether in this part of the country, but I don't recall any "movement" such as described in the OP, and certainly not to the exclusion of other uses of the term(s).

[Larry Borgia]

Kind of reminds me of Todd from Beavis and Butthead. IIRC, he did have a bitchin' Trans Am.

Isn't it odd that Wikipedia would have a whole article on a minor Beavis and Butthead character?

[Stranger On A Train]

Where I grew up (around the era Crafter_Man identifies) the "hoods" were kind of a combination of his description and would-be cowboys. The mostly listened to ZZ Top and Hank Williams, Jr., smoked a lot of pot, drank crappy beer that they stole out of distributor's trucks, date-raped girls (and occasionally more...tolerated because "they're good boys"), bullied other students, and generally thought of themsevles as real badasses until they crossed the local Samoan family, who were in fact real bad mothers who didn't tolerate that kind of horseshit. I recall one particular case where one of these self-described hoods started trouble with the youngest Samoan brother. The next day he was pulled out of his car, savagely beaten, had the car rolled into a ditch and set on fire, and his girlfriend either courteously returned to her home or gang-raped, depending on whose story you believed. (Either way, she refused to testify regarding the beating and car theft.) I expect most of these people have either ended up working at the local powerplant or as meth users/distributors. A charming group of people with whom I have absolutely no interest in maintaining contact.

Good riddance to "hood" subculture. Now if we could only get rid of "gangstas" as well...

Stranger

[descamisado]

Originally Posted by Crafter_Man

I did some google searches, but didn’t find anything.

From about 1978 to 1986 there were a lot of guys I knew who were affectionately known as "hoods." It was sort of a post-hippie subculture. They were similar to "stoners," but were somewhat more ambitious. Characteristics included:

- White male between the ages of 15 and 25.
- Long, straight hair.
- Drove a very fast Trans Am. (A prerequisite!)
- Uniform included jean pants (sometimes bellbottom), T-shirt, and a jean or leather jacket. (Think Johnny Ramone.)
- Dealt drugs on the side.
- Smoked lots of pot.
- Had a menial job.
- Loner.

What really set the hoods apart from the hippies & stoners was the Trans Am. You were not a hood unless you had a Trans Am.

I'm not exactly sure when they disappeared. Seems like around 1986.

They morphed in the Black thugs, banjee boys and hip-hoppers of the mid-80s. And, instead of a Trans Am, they drive whatever vehicle their drug profits allowed them to afford.

[Crafter_Man]

Originally Posted by Stranger On A Train

The mostly listened to ZZ Top and Hank Williams, Jr.,

The hoods around here were devotees of Led Zeppelin, Kiss, and AC/DC.

[Wendell Wagner]

The way we used the term when I was growing up (in Ohio in the late 1960's in a working-class community), it could be used for either men or women. They were the group that didn't get very good grades in high school. They cultivated a bad-boy or bad-girl image. Perhaps some of them engaged in criminal behavior, but mostly they ended up in working-class jobs. They certainly weren't among the (relatively small) group from my high school who went to college and got good jobs.

[Laughing Lagomorph]

Originally Posted by Larry Borgia

Kind of reminds me of Todd from Beavis and Butthead. IIRC, he did have a bitchin' Trans Am.
...

In the main Beavis and Butthead article it is stated Todd drove a primer patched Plymouth Duster. I haven't seen the show in years so I don't remember either way.

We had people that fit the OPs general description in upstate NY in the 1970s. I guess every locale had a version.

[Rigamarole]

Interesting that this term is conflated with the modern usage of "hood". I read the title of this thread and thought, "Remember hoods? Huh? They're everywhere!"

Nowadays of course, "hood" as a shortening of "neighborhood" usually refers to the ghetto, and a "hood" can be someone from the 'hood, or a short form for "hood-rat", or even "hoodlum" still (with basically the same meaning now as then, but applied mostly to urban area-types).

I suspect that when this (more popular) usage took over any other connotation for hood was lost.

[Harriet the Spry]

I think my mom may have dated one. Is there any flexibility for the guy riding a motorcycle instead of driving the Trans-Am?

[LouisB]

Back in the 1950s, I was a hood; the Dallas City police often told me so to my very face. They told me so loudly and repeatedly. They weren't always consistent, they often told me I was other things, none of them flattering. The told my friends and companions the same things, often while we were in groups. If there are any Dallasites from the 50s here, I was usually to be found in the Lakewood area, unless we went out to the Jacksboro Strip for fun and entertainment.

[Argent Towers]

Originally Posted by 5-4-Fighting

They morphed in the Black thugs, banjee boys and hip-hoppers of the mid-80s. And, instead of a Trans Am, they drive whatever vehicle their drug profits allowed them to afford.

For anyone wondering what a banjee boy is (I looked it up after wondering myself,) here's their wiki. First I've heard of them.

[Wendell Wagner]

5-4-Fighting writes:

> They morphed in the Black thugs, banjee boys and hip-hoppers of the mid-80s.
> And, instead of a Trans Am, they drive whatever vehicle their drug profits
> allowed them to afford.

Huh? In what sense are these groups equivalent to hoods? These groups are black or Latino, while hoods were white. Banjee boys are often homosexual or bisexual, while hoods (I suspect) were the sort who would beat up homosexuals. Aside from engaging in criminal behavior, there's little in common among these groups.

[Otto]

Originally Posted by Larry Borgia

Isn't it odd that Wikipedia would have a whole article on a minor Beavis and Butthead character?

I take it that was your first visit to Wikipedia?

[John Carter of Mars]

Originally Posted by LouisB

Back in the 1950s, I was a hood; the Dallas City police often told me so to my very face. They told me so loudly and repeatedly. They weren't always consistent, they often told me I was other things, none of them flattering. The told my friends and companions the same things, often while we were in groups. If there are any Dallasites from the 50s here, I was usually to be found in the Lakewood area, unless we went out to the Jacksboro Strip for fun and entertainment.

Same thing here, same time period, Miami. There's nothing quite so fine as taking a new girl to a dance and having the two juvie cops standing outside call you over on your way in. Then they tell New Girl: "You look like a nice kid. Better find somebody else to take you to dances, this guy is nothin' but trouble."
Inside your head you're thinkin': "YES! And thank you Officer Maloney, you just guaranteed that I'm gettin' some tonight." Through the door you can hear the DJ spinnin' some Gene Vincent.....

[Wendell Wagner]

Crafter_Man writes:

> It was sort of a post-hippie subculture.

Whatever else it was, it certainly wasn't a post-hippie subculture where I grew up. People were using the term before there were hippies. Hippies, at least in the 1960's, came from middle-class (and often upper-middle-class) families. Hoods came from working-class families. Hoods greased their hair, while hippies didn't put anything in their hair. If anything, hoods may have gotten off on beating up hippies.

It also wasn't a subculture *in the same sense* as much of what we think of as youth subculture today. There was never any sense, as in certain movies like _Mean Girls_, that being a hood was consciously chosen subgroup that you clearly decided to join and then would always sit with at lunch. If you were white, came from a working-class family, knew that you weren't going to college, and accepted the criminal behavior of your friends, then you were probably going to be classed as a hood, but there was little conscious choice in this.

[descamisado]

Originally Posted by Wendell Wagner

5-4-Fighting writes:

> They morphed in the Black thugs, banjee boys and hip-hoppers of the mid-80s.
> And, instead of a Trans Am, they drive whatever vehicle their drug profits
> allowed them to afford.

Huh? In what sense are these groups equivalent to hoods? These groups are black or Latino, while hoods were white. Banjee boys are often homosexual or bisexual, while hoods (I suspect) were the sort who would beat up homosexuals. Aside from engaging in criminal behavior, there's little in common among these groups.

First of all, the "morphing" from one group into another was a joke, and was made mainly because of the of the similarity in the criminal, outsider status of both, and secondarily, because one was white and the other black. Second, the banjee boys moniker actually started out being applied to what would have been considered straight, street boys. Homesexuals later took over the dress and the persona as a way of (a) remaining undercover, and (b) attracting those same tough, bad boys. While being gay and having lived in New York for the last 25 years doesn't make me an expert, I think it gives me a closeup on both those cultures and the overlap between the two.

Regarding my first observation made in my original e-mail, I guess I forget this:

[descamisado]

And I forgot to explicitly state that those black "outsider" types, similar to those described in the OP are called "hoods." Cf., Urbandictionary.

[picker]

Originally Posted by Crafter_Man

The hoods around here were devotees of Led Zeppelin, Kiss, and AC/DC.

Growing up in Columbia, MD in the mid-80's we called them 'grits.' And it was all about Zep, Kiss, AC/DC, Metallica, denim jackets, Trans Ams, cheap beer and mexican dirt weed.

I generally avoided them, but their girls were fun to party with....

[descamisado]

Wendell Wagner, upon further research it does turn out the I erroneously chose the word "banjee" in my original post. That word seems be exclusively used to describe homosexuals who act and dress like street toughs and did not evolve from being used to describe straights who dressed and acted thusly. I made this incorrect assumption based on my earlier years, and my observations that those gays, then on the "downlow," who imitated the behavior of heterosexual street thugs and I back-attributed the word to that group.

I do, however, stand by my assertion, joke though it originally was, that the word "hood" is now used to described a black, street and criminal element, not unlike the which described in the OP.

[Anamorphic]

Originally Posted by picker

Growing up in Columbia, MD in the mid-80's we called them 'grits.' And it was all about Zep, Kiss, AC/DC, Metallica, denim jackets, Trans Ams, cheap beer and mexican dirt weed.

I generally avoided them, but their girls were fun to party with....

Oh wow, I haven't thought of the word "grits" in that context in a long, long time! I grew up not far from Columbia, MD during that same time period... I wonder if that was a strictly regional piece of slang?

[picker]

Originally Posted by Anamorphic

Oh wow, I haven't thought of the word "grits" in that context in a long, long time! I grew up not far from Columbia, MD during that same time period... I wonder if that was a strictly regional piece of slang?

I've never heard that term in that context anywhere except in that area - Howard/Montgomery/PG/AA counties...

Where were ya? I went to Oakland Mills HS, class of 89.


I seem to remember a lot of 'grits' down around Laurel/Savage and out towards western Howard County...

[LouisB]

Back in Dallas in the mid to late 1950s, Mexican-American boys who would otherwise have been called hoods were often referred to as "Pachucos"; the word connoted gang members. The identifying mark was a tattooed cross in the web of skin between the thumb and forefinger. There would be three dots in the tattoo; one between each arm of the cross and the upright; one immediately above the upright. The local police couldn't seem to grasp that most Anglos were excluded; we used to spend a lot of time holding our hands out so the police could check for the tattoo. I remember there was a lot of furor in the Dallas newspapers re the Pachucos taking over the local crime scene. In general the Anglo hoods and the Pachucos observed a sort of shaky truce but fights between the two weren't uncommon. I don't know if this was just a Dallas thing?

[Anamorphic]

Originally Posted by picker

I've never heard that term in that context anywhere except in that area - Howard/Montgomery/PG/AA counties...

Where were ya? I went to Oakland Mills HS, class of 89.


I seem to remember a lot of 'grits' down around Laurel/Savage and out towards western Howard County...

Randallstown High, class of '88... so add Baltimore County to your list of places it was used.

[E-Sabbath]

Pachuco dates back to the 40s in Cali.

Out east, we had the Guidos in their bitchin' camaros.

[saoirse]

I thought my childhood best friend's older brother was one, until you brought up the TA. He had a rustoleum-gray Nova which he was always working on, which could top out the speedometer, if it was running. Everything else checks out, though.

[picker]

Originally Posted by saoirse

I thought my childhood best friend's older brother was one, until you brought up the TA. He had a rustoleum-gray Nova which he was always working on, which could top out the speedometer, if it was running. Everything else checks out, though.

Well, I'd say that at least in my experience, Novas, Firebirds, El Caminos, (bitchin') Camaros and the like were all fairly common as well. I'd say anyone cool enough to be rockin' a more classically-authentic muscle car (Charger, Challenger, Mustangs) generally wouldn't fit the mold anyway.

[Wendell Wagner]

5-4-Fighting, I just checked the Urban Dictionary and it doesn't say a thing about "hood" in the 1950's through 1970's sense being used these days for blacks. All the senses of the word "hood" in it used for present-day black culture are clearly derived from the term "hood" which comes from "neighborhood" and is not related to the older sense of "hood."

[saoirse]

Oops. Also, he didn't have straight hair. He had an I-fro, as was the fashion at the time.

[descamisado]

Originally Posted by Wendell Wagner

5-4-Fighting, I just checked the Urban Dictionary and it doesn't say a thing about "hood" in the 1950's through 1970's sense being used these days for blacks. All the senses of the word "hood" in it used for present-day black culture are clearly derived from the term "hood" which comes from "neighborhood" and is not related to the older sense of "hood."

Yes, but isn't the word "hood" from the '50 spelled h-o-o-d, and the word "hood" today spelled h-o-o-d? Having not gotten the joke (even after it was explained to you) and not understood that I know they are of different derivations, I guess you'll continue to be a little too literal.

[Freddy the Pig]

Count me as another who associates hood=hoodlum with a much earlier era, roughly from the mid-1950's through mid-1960's. Hoods of that era wore leather jackets and big boots (Cuban heels), slicked back their hair (they were also called "greasers"), and smoked in school. Picture the Fonz with a more malevolent personality.

Reader's Digest would run articles like, "Are Teenage Hoods Taking Over Our Towns and Schools?", and parents would get all hot and bothered.

By the time I went to high school (1973-77), the term was obsolete. The same type of kids were called "burn-outs", wore jeans instead of leather, and added pot smoking to their repertoire.

[Zeldar]

Originally Posted by Freddy the Pig

...By the time I went to high school (1973-77), the term was obsolete. The same type of kids were called "burn-outs", wore jeans instead of leather, and added pot smoking to their repertoire.

My kids were in high school in roughly that same period and despite being in a parochial school where the real low-lifes were unlikely to have as dominant a presence as true "hoods" and where the class distinctions were less severe than they were in public schools, the rowdies and misfits and trouble-makers were dubbed "rednecks" by my kids and their associates. I can't remember the term "hood" carrying much weight in those days.

I don't really think those "rednecks" were a criminal element, but their preference for Skoal and snuff instead of Camels and Marlboros helped to set them apart.

Another category that has been around since I was a little guy and which hasn't changed all that much is Jocks. Where Jocks blended with Hoods you had some real trouble!

[Kalhoun]

Our "hoods" were short for "hoodlum" and were referred to as "greasers" in our neighborhood. They usually had cool muscle cars (but who didn't in the mid-60s?) and wore cabrettas and sharkskin pants. And you really needed to roll up a pack of smokes in your t-shirt sleeve to complete the look.

[An Arky]

I was a teenager in the late 70s, and that type of person was called a "head" or a "hescher".

[toadbriar]

Yeah where I grew up, they were heads, short, I presumed, for headbangers. Metallica teeshirts, denim jackets with band backpatches - Iron Maiden, Cinderella, frickin Whitesnake. Do they still make backpatches? Wallets on chains, big clunky workboots, tightass jeans, plastic comb in back pocket. Boys had long hair parted in the middle, bangs, feathered mullets. Girls had big hairsprayed hair, tall Wall of Bangs, and hoop earrings.

I graduated high school in 92, in Buffalo suburbs.

[Freddy the Pig]

Originally Posted by Kalhoun

Our "hoods" were short for "hoodlum" and were referred to as "greasers" in our neighborhood. They usually had cool muscle cars (but who didn't in the mid-60s?) and wore cabrettas and sharkskin pants. And you really needed to roll up a pack of smokes in your t-shirt sleeve to complete the look.

Yep, that's the classic "hood". Beavis and Butt-head did a hilarious riff on this in the episode where they had to watch a "scared straight" movie in Mr. Buzzcut's Driver Ed class. The movie was grainy and thirty years old, and the "careless drivers" were stereotypical 1960's greasers. Which of course prompted B&B to say, "Wooooo . . . these guys are cool!"

[elmwood]

They were still plentiful in Buffalo into the 1990s, and I still see a few every time I'm back there. They were also called "groders" and "heshers". More characteristics, at least from the Buffalo version:

* Fan of hard rock and heavy metal. Black concert t-shirts are a part of their uniform.
* Their other preferred car type was a 1970s-era Chevrolet Nova, or big GM coupes from the 1970s, with the exception of the Chevrolet Monte Carlo ("That's a fuckin' guido car!") "Hooker headers, glass pack muffler, Holley four-barrel carb, fuckin' a!" It'll be guaranteed to have a 97 Rock bumper sticker.
* Usually attended one of the vocational magnet high schools: Burgard and Seneca were their favorites, with a few at McKinley. If they could pass the tough entrance exam, the smart groders went to Hutch Tech.
* Breeding grounds: Riverside, Black Rock, Lovejoy, Kaisertown, First Ward, The Valley. They are all working-class, predominantly white neighborhoods literally surrounded by factories.
* Not necessarily a loner.

This bit of email lore circulated in the early 1990s. The "Riverside" it refers to is a neighborhood in Buffalo, not the city in Southern California.

You may be from Riverside (a neighborhood in Buffalo) if --

1) You consider abandoned grain mills and factories as places of worship.
2) Your car has at least two body panels that are painted in grey primer.
3) Your house smells like feet and "oregano."
4) You consider "F**kin' a!" to be a complete, grammatically correct sentence.
5) You ever lived within walking distance of at least three adult book stores.
6) You own more than five bongs.
7) "Glass pack muffler" is a regular part of your vocabulary.
8) The most prized item in your wardrobe is a Quiet Riot concert t-shirt.
9) You know the current market price for "ounces" and "nickel bags"
10) You still consider feathered hair to be an up-to-date style.
11) You don't have a cellular phone, but you have at least three CB radios, one of which is illegally modified for "extras."
12) All the buttons of your car stereo are set to "97 Fuckin' Rock, man!"
13) You ever spray-painted your significant other's name on a railroad bridge.
14) You ever spray-painted "Slayer" on a railroad bridge -- or carved it into your arm with an X-acto knife.
15) You know where "Snakeland" is.
16) You have a candle holder shaped like a skull.

[Captain Socks]

Sorry to bring this long-dead thread back up, but there seem to be some people like this at my school. They fit pretty much everything except the car, since none of them can drive, and their two favorite bands seem to be Iron Maiden and Metallica. I once saw the Iron Maiden logo drawn on a desk. It was really good. That logo's hard to draw.

[Captain Socks]

Sorry to bring this long-dead thread back up, but there seem to be some people like this at my school. They fit pretty much everything except the car, since none of them can drive, and their two favorite bands seem to be Iron Maiden and Metallica. I once saw the Iron Maiden logo drawn on a desk. It was really good. That logo's hard to draw.

[Captain Socks]

Sorry for the double post.

[Guinastasia]

Originally Posted by Freddy the Pig

Yep, that's the classic "hood". Beavis and Butt-head did a hilarious riff on this in the episode where they had to watch a "scared straight" movie in Mr. Buzzcut's Driver Ed class. The movie was grainy and thirty years old, and the "careless drivers" were stereotypical 1960's greasers. Which of course prompted B&B to say, "Wooooo . . . these guys are cool!"

They also looked like older, slighty more intelligent version of B&B.