Well sure, but those things weren’t as important as beer, guns and cigarettes.
I must have grown up a couple towns north of you, it was all Chief Oshkosh in Waupun. I had forgotten about West Bend Lithia.
Every boy had a .22, but always long guns. I never saw kids playing with 6-shooters until I got down south.
In my neighborhood there were some of us whose dads came back from Korea with some “souvenirs” i.e. junky 1911 pistols. Dad would remove the firing pin and glue a block of wood into the magazine well and, voila, a toy gun made out of a real one.
That is definitely something from my childhood that would never be allowed today.
So we’re supposed to feel bad about good memories from our childhood because other people didn’t have it so good?
F.O.! You can get depressed and cry about it if you want, but I had a great childhood in Americana, USA.
One thing kids would never be allowed to do now, would be anything that smelled like Work. I got off fairly easy, not being a farm family. Just had to shovel several tons of coal every winter, shovel 50 inches of snow off walks and driveway before school, mow the lawn with a pushmower, rake the leaves and carry them to the bonfire, put up and take down storm windows, wash and dry dishes by hand – no power tools even dreamed of yet. I stilll refuse to use my dishwasher, I store plastic bags in it.
I had the greatest cap gun of them all, a Johnny Eagle. Though the green stick’em caps they used were a pain to put on.
My parents were as liberal as you could get-- my brother and I had a babysitter who was a gay man, because he happened to be one of the PhD students my father was advising, and he was completely out to my parents.
The most liberal, left-leaning position then, was that it didn’t matter what you did behind closed doors as long as you kept it there. This would have been the early to mid-1970s.
Fortunately, my parents did evolve with the times, and neither ever batted an eye at PDAs later on, nor my mother at gay marriage when it became legal (my father was dead by then).
Yeah, the best they could hope for was gritted teeth acceptance. Racism was openly expressed and women were routinely abused and none of this was even noticed, it was so common. People who objected to it were told to lighten up, after the movie Stripes came out, they were told to “lighten up Francis.” Crime rates were higher than they are now and rape wasn’t even considered that serious of a crime.
But, hey, you could walk to school.
Well, this thread is turning fun.
On the thrilling subject of rape, back in the day I was in cub scouts and later boy scouts, and we always had one leader present. Just one.
My mom (who was my cub leader way back when) has reported that in recent years, that would be absolutely verboten. There must always be two adults present, essentially to silently police each other by their very presence.
When I was in third grade (1969-1970) our class was going to make some pies. The principal watched the classroom while the teacher took 5 of us, myself included, to the local grocery store to buy ingredients. In her personal car.
Apparently the DVDs of the early seasons of Sesame Street, from around that same time period, come with a disclaimer that they should not be used for educating present day children. Those early episodes show things like teachers taking students to their homes.
We lived in a rural area, but in a neighborhood of about 7 old farmhouses, and they were close enough to have other children to play with. It was a struggle for our parents to get us to come home. We always wanted to be outside.
We were free range kids, especially after age 7. Before that, we weren’t allowed to range all that much, although we still had outside play time that was mostly unsupervised, but contained.
As we got a bit older, we played on rusty, chipped equipment by the barn and then went down to the creek to catch frogs and get into water fights. Our neighbors used to race field cars and occasionally they would let us ride with them. No seat belts and helmets, although I have to say that everyone had a light foot and protective behavior when kids were around. Once the kids were gone, all hell broke loose.
We had a handmade “cannon” type of toy. An early 1900s replica of some sort made out of wood and iron. We used to put firecrackers in the tube and light them, having volleys of bangs with other kids in the neighborhood who were doing something similar.
We also had a horse for a few years, and I came home from school every day, ditched my books, saddled up and rode for hours. No helmets there either. She was a feisty old mare and I was frequently thrown, bitten, and kicked. It was a battle of wills. Eventually we had to sell the horse due to new zoning restrictions, so I started working at a riding stable and became the lead wrangler. So much for oppressed women. I was in heaven.
And, yes, we had cap guns too, although not the sexy brand name ones. I didn’t get to play with real guns (bummer), although both the boys and girls in back were taught how to hunt, fish, and garden by their father. One of the girls enjoyed it so much that she went hunting every year, well into her 50s and 60s.
We had a lot of fun growing up even though our family was very middle class and there wasn’t a lot of spare money for extras. No vacations, no new cars, not much eating out, although sometimes there was a day trip to some interesting place as a family activity. But those were few and far between, and certainly not every year.
My parents didn’t smoke or drink, so there were no trips to the store to buy smokes, but the boy next door occasionally had to go down and buy cigarettes for his mother on occasion. It was no big deal.
I got to drink when I turned 18, but it was rather dull. A couple of us girls went to the bowling alley and I had exactly 2 drinks there. Very meh, but it was nice to able to order a drink while out. No need to get stupid about it.
I think this is something that today’s kids have a hard time picturing. To be kept inside was a punishment. And to be “sent to your room”! The kiss of death.
You city kids.
I first drove a tractor at age 5. No cab, no fenders on the rear wheels. By the age of 6, I was driving Dad’s pickup in the field and farmyard.
I was hunting by myself at age 10.
In high school, there were probably a dozen pickups in the parking lot each day with long guns in the gun rack.
Don’t think any of these things happen today, but it’s possible.
Plus Oscar was orange and Big Bird was portrayed as mentally retarded*.
*That’s the term they used back in the day. Another thing that was done that would never be allowed today.
My brother and I were free range kids from as early as I can remember. We lived on a bayou, which in Houston was a man-mad big ditch for flood control. It was an overgrown jungle. We routinely caught snakes and turtles, and had trails for miles up and down it.
We also rode our bikes everywhere. I remember one time we rode to the Houston Zoo (with no water on us!) in the Texas heat. At the time it was free to get in. We used some streets, but mostly used the cemented bayous; I have no idea how we knew where we were going. No GPS back then!
ETA: I just looked it up - it’s seven miles by car.
That’s right. I’m an adult Scout leader now and Youth Protection is strongly emphasized by the BSA (including mandatory yearly training online). No adult is supposed to be alone with any youth at any time.
Maybe the ditch was actually lesbian, but back then felt she had to stay in the closet.
Whatever. I think this comment is inappropriate, and decidedly unfunny. I obviously made a typo, and was unable to correct it in time.
Remember the scene in the 1947 Miracle on 34th Street where Kris Kringle goes into little Natalie Wood’s bedroom and sits on the bed while she’s in it? 
I wonder if that will be edited out at some point or blurred or something. It’s pretty darned important scene-- the plot would suffer without it.
Old Arizona joke: Howcome you always invite two Mormons to go fishing with you?
Because just one will drink up all your beer.