We had sodium and, much more useful to the kids in the year ahead of me, potassium. It was those grade eight students who blew up the science lab – a decent explosion, a most excellent fire helped along by the gas outlets, and of course a full evacuation and a couple of fire trucks. The teacher was demoted to kitchen staff for the rest of his contract, and then was sent back to England, but in truth he never stood a chance against the combined destructive creativity of the students, so we all felt a little sorry for him.
Come to think of it, that was the same group of kids who dangled one of their own (quite willingly) out the window of that lab, two and a half floors above the ground.
Heh. My mother went to her grave still angry at me for using her good silver spoons with my chemistry set and taking the silverplate right off the spoons.
My Junior Handyman tool set had real tools, just reduced to kid size. I’m not sure why a “junior handyman” needed an awl, but I had one.
And what about fireworks? When I was a kid there were plenty of fireworks stands, and none of them bothered asking for an ID. Fourth grade kids who hadn’t even mastered long division knew how to open up firecrackers, collect the powder, pack it into a tin can and make a functional bomb with it.
But, probably electric motor driven. Go back a few more years, and those slow drills were even slower – they were powered by foot-pedals that the dentist drove while drilling. (Cite: Seen in museums.)
Maybe the admonition to wear your “seatbelts” was just a euphemism about condoms?
My parents were pretty careful about my health, as they were self-employed caterers and had done a lot of studying on nutrition, focusing on food for very sick children. I was born in '74 and I got my first bike when I was 8. After my family woke me and gave me my presents my dad said “Go down and get my cigarettes” so I dutifully went downstairs and saw my brand new bike. My family followed me a few seconds later to see my gloriously happy reaction and were not disappointed.
So me and my bike went traveling, as did the next bike and the next. As long as I was home before it was dark my parents didn’t care where I’d been. I only broke one bike (got hit by a car) which could be surprising as I was doing 50 - 200 miles a week. It was used either to travel to friends, relatives, neighbors or just as far as I could go until I knew I had to turn back. I was attacked by another (bigger) cyclist because I ‘looked at him funny’, I somersaulted down a hill and bled from both knees and arms and head, I crashed into a tree and a branch missed my eye by an inch, I thought nothing of riding down a bypass with trucks passing within 4 inches at 70 mph.
When I got hit by a car, at a junction, I launched as did my bike. This was a very busy roundabout with 5 roads and it was rush hour, and the traffic in every direction stopped. I lay there, in the middle of the road wondering if I was still alive and if I’d be able to walk. Slowly I got up and looked around, to see if my bike was still in one piece. A police officer (off duty) returned my bike, pump and saddle to me and the driver who’d hit me offered me a lift home. She actually said “It’s all my fault, I was driving too fast and didn’t see him!” to me and the off duty cop. He asked me if that was true and I said “I was going too fast as well” so he said she should take me home and drive slower.
I got home, in agony, and my mum, who was a nurse before, said I could either shower myself or go to the hospital and they’d scrub the gravel out of my skin after I’d probably wait for an hour or two. I chose showering and screamed for about half an hour. Now my knees are pretty ugly but I think it was the right thing to do (I was riding very, very fast through traffic after all). The upshot of it all is if I’d spent my time indoors playing WoW I’d never have seen the beautiful sights and experienced the emotional highs of rampaging through city streets on my bike.
Oh yes, firecrackers! It got boring to light them and put them on the ground, so we got creative. Some of the things I recall include the following:
– If you put one in a mudball, you had a great fragmentation grenade.
– You could blow up tulips with them.
– If you removed the packing from the end of the firecracker, you had a rocket.
Yep! My great-grandfather was a dentist, and my great uncle kept all his old stuff- and used to let me play with it
Born in ‘83, England- I wasn’t supposed to be at home alone for more than an hour or so til age 11 (my older bro was supposed to be around before then)- but was fine to be out randomly until around dark, or bedtime, whichever came earliest. I was OK to walk the 2 miles or so to my parents’ work by myself if I was bored.
No car seat as a kid- and as the law did not require seatbelts to be fitted to cars designed without them, there were no seatbelts in the back seat of my Dad’s. We were allowed to play in the footwells, if we were quiet, or sit in the front if there was space, though adults got priority. My Dad taught me how to steer his work van (on work premises) when I was 6, but I was too small to reach the pedals, so had to sit on his knee.
My parents also gave my brother a bow and arrow set- with metal arrowheads- when he was about 5. They brought it back from holiday, though it had to travel in the cockpit, with the pilot, on the plane. I think they took it off him quite soon, as he kept trying to shoot things like the neighbour’s cows.
I have several cracks in my skull- no-one even knows where the most impressive one came from.
12 year olds were hired to babysit me at night when I was a tot – I was born in 61.
I guess it is all relative, for my mother, who was born in the 20s, was routinely bundled up in a sled when she was a toddler, and towed into town and back again by the family dog, so that it could stop at her uncle’s store for groceries to be loaded in the sled.
I was born in '84 and never wore a bike helmet, whittled with a pocket knife, had model rockets, had a wood burning kit, had a real chemistry set, played with a bb gun, played with real darts at ~4, etc. Is it really a generational thing?
I had a Thingmaker, too. It was a Creepy Crawlies set that made molded plastic bugs. I also had a chemistry set when I was younger. I remember heating sulphur one time and nearly asphyxiating myself.
When I was 5 or 6, I remember being allowed to freely wander the neighborhood to play with my friends. In first grade I was allowed to walk to school by myself, which was just around the corner, less than a quarter mile away. When I was a Cub Scout (between ages 8 and 11) I was allowed to go to den meetings by myself which were another street over from where I lived. My parents were never worried that anything would happen to me. If my mom or dad wanted me, they would yell from the front porch and if I got home within 10 or 15 minutes, everything was fine.
Cars had no seat belts. On long trips, if I got sleepy or bored, I was allowed to lie across the full width of the back seat and take a nap.
I remember we ran around playing with cap guns. One of our favorite pastimes was laying a roll of caps on the ground and banging it with a rock or hammer to make them all go off at once. The noise level probably approached that of a Who concert. Our ears often rang for several hours. We got the same high that the Mythbusters get from a really good explosion.
Which reminds me – fireworks! Good ones – good enough to kill you like 5 times over. Not those shitty little sparklers, which can only burn you a little bit.
My sister and I went to school in Mexico. My parents dropped us off at the border, we crossed, caught the public bus, rode a good twenty minutes into a city with about a million residents. I was eight and sis was six.
We had a minibike we’d ride-- no helmet, sometimes we didn’t even bother with shoes.
Climbing around on the roof was fine, as was jumping into the pool from the roof. It was more fun to play in the canals though.
The best was riding in hammocks in the back of the van. Dad bolted them to the roof and we’d snuggle in on long trips. Probably safer than the seats anyway. No seat belts meant flying into the dash console whenever there was a sudden brake. And why was the console burning hot?
I had an Evel Knievel Super Stunt bike. That bad boy would literally take off like a rocket. Useful for shooting it at your sister.
I have fond memories of orange and lemon fights. All the neighborhood kids would meet up at the citrus groves, form teams, and go at it. More than once I had to explain the bruises, black eyes and cuts when I got home.
One of my favorite toys was the Wham-O Air Blaster gun. When you cocked it you had to be careful or it would pinch the shit out of your hand. This thing could blow out someone’s ear drum, so it is no surprise it is no longer made.
Remembered another one. When I was going to grades 1 - 3, there was a spinster who would give you a homemade cookie if you knocked on her back door on your way home from school on Mondays. I don’t know if any of us kids knew her name, and I know my parents didn’t know who she was but every school day Monday we’d get a cookie from a stranger, until we moved away.
These days parents are freaky about Halloween candy…
My husband is quite fond of his brother’s grandson. Little DJ will be 16 in a few months, but he’s been driving Bill’s truck and tractor around the farm for over a year now. It’s private property, and the kid is fairly sensible. He’s also been using a chain saw to cut up trees and then branches for quite a while now. Both Bill and his brother supervised Little DJ at first, but they’re convinced that he won’t kill himself or cut off more than just a couple of fingertips.
Needless to say, Little DJ thinks that my husband is the greatest granduncle ever.
I remember eating raw cookie dough from the Pillsbury tube as late as 1990 - SCANDALOUS!
Regarding the “no seatbelts” thing, according to my mother back when I have NO memory of this (I must’ve been two or three or something) we were driving along in her Volkswagen Bug, me standing on the passenger seat completely unrestrained. There was some sort of accident and the car ended up upside down. She heard me screaming frantically from a distance, and was freaking out while she tried to reorient herself to a car which was now upside down.
She finally frees herself and rushes up to me, where I’m apparently completely unharmed, but standing in a ditch. I was crying because my sneakers were wet. SUPPOSEDLY what happened was I was flung through the back window just as the car rolled and either the force of the roof collapsing or my feet striking it caused it to pop out and I came out with not even a scratch on me.
I babysat at age 11. My aunt left me alone with her new born. he was less than a month old. I needed to change his diaper, the kind with pins. I went to the neighbors’ house to ask the mom to come help me. she said no, so I went back and didn’t pin the diaper to the baby.
