- On my first trip to the USA I flew PanAm from Rio de Janeiro to New York, and wore a "fashionable hat" as was then nice to do...

What a great thread/rope/cable! Some of the things I remember:
The fear on my parents faces when the radio told us of the attack on Pearl Harbor in the Pacific (it was a mild Sunday afternoon in Jersey City, NJ that day);
My father serving in the Civil Defense during the early days of the war, and helping enforce the blackout there, across the Hudson River from NYC;
Later, in 1943, when we moved back to Memphis, taking the troop train for more than 20 hours; my older sisters flirted with the GIs and sailors when they could get away with it;
Cutting out the paper models of US and Axis warplanes from the back of cereal boxes, and having "dogfights" with my buddies (no one wanted to "fly" the Jap Zero model);
Collecting tin foil along the roads for the war effort, and being disappointed when aluminum foil liners in cigarette packs started being used;
Hearing about Allied victories as the war progressed, and feeling good when my parents smiled for a change;
Being proud when WWII was over with the Japanese surrender on my birthday, August 15th (far Eastern date);
Remembering the day after the war when meat rationing was lifted in our town, and Dad could buy a roast without the red disc coupons;
Later on, while my Mom worked, having occasionally a lady, whose parents were born as slaves, come in to help with the housework.

Thanks PalQ, for starting this thread: memories, with the emotion, but not so much pain, become very dear as the days grow short.

Big John

...I was escorted to the train in Czechoslovakia when the Russians invaded;
...Twiggy was hot in Carnaby Street
...I could reach out and touch La Pieta (and not be arrested)
...I played photo "hide and seek" with the East Berlin border guards while standing on the West Berlin side
...the Chariot of Freedom still faced East
...I danced on the stage of an Athenian taverna after having been taught a few steps by the lead choreographer from the movie Zorba the Greek, and the audience threw plates at my feet (better than at my head) to show its appreciation. Plate-throwing was outlawed several months later.

PalQ, what a fantastic thread.

Reading this again, plus the extra post since I last read it brings tears to my eyes. Memories. Only those that have lived through them will understand.

And FamousUncleArt, thank you!

I am overwhelmed with the memories this thread has brought up.

My personal thanks to everyone who has posted here. I wish that this thread could be incorporated into a book - for the children of today and the next generation to read.

...so old that I remember buying dixie cups ice cream at the local Dairy Queen for a nickel. The best part for me was the picture of a movie star on the lid! You pulled a piece of paper from the lid and if you were really lucky, you had a small, round, black and white pic of Roy Rogers! Anyone remember those? I was a little tyke in Oregon at the time.

I am so old that I am sounding like my grandparents. The kids that work for me were upset because they had to ride the bus home when it snowed today.

I actually said to them. "Be happy that you did not have to walk a mile in the snow up hill both ways!"

And I meant it EVERY word! I could not believe it came out my mouth.

Hi dsm, LOL because you reminded me of a story. Our daughter was about ten years old and complained at dinner that she had to wait in the rain for the school bus. My husband said " well consider yourself lucky, when I was your age I had to walk two miles in the snow to school".

Our daughter looked at him and said "Gee Dad, I never knew it snowed in Long Beach" As in Long Beach California. The rest of dinner was very quiet with little conversation except for "pass the salt please".

Oh, just great.

Hey Unc,

My uncle bought himself a hacker's license when he came back from his European vacation.

He got the money teaching Sotheren boys how to shoot craps.

Thank you FamousUncleArt!!

I am so Old ... yesterday was my birthday

Thank you, FamousUncleArt. My dad is hiding Easter eggs this Sunday for many great-grandchildren, and had his European vacation at the same time you did in Northeastern Italy- he headed a Allied forces POW camp that repatrioted and replaced until the end of '46. As he was born in Germany and moved to the USA when he was 11, he was bi-lingual and could make a lot of the correct connections. He also tells of the differential "diets"- and he still has some c-rations and blankets.

I am going to print this out for him to read and also to save for my brother who is on an Iraqi vacation right now at 57 years of age.

I remember Roy Rogers as well, and how stunning I think I looked in my Mary Hartline cowgirl outfit complete with rodeo rope, cowgirl hat, and vinyl tasseled boots.

I'm so old that I almost wasn't permitted to write my thesis on Dante's "Divine Comedy" because the professor thought I'd gone to high school with Dante!!

BC

...that I remember bottle caps w/cork & that is was nearly always too expensive to fly.

Well, I guess we've all aged...but weren't Mary Hartline's costumes music-themed? It seems she had staves and notes and instruments embroidered on them.

She <u>was</u> a bit bovine, but not a cowgirl.

This thread was the best thing I've read in a long time. I came searching for information about Scotland, but I've spent my entire lunch hour nodding my head to so many things. I'm a native NYC girl and the memory of the JFK assasination is still vivid. I was in school and when the teachers and principal finally told us -- we were told to get under our desks because the communists might come for us! After what seemed an eternity, we were finally able to leave as frantic faces of all our mothers grabbed us and took us home. I was the first child that had her own TV in her bedroom (but was afraid to get undressed because they could &quot;see&quot; me). Going to the hamburger joints (like White Castle) and the &quot;carhops&quot; came out on roller skates and took your order (which they clipped to the driver's side window). Going to the drive-in movies in the station wagon, and your dad folding down the back seats (with sleeping bags) so you'd have your own bed to watch the show. No such thing as &quot;camp&quot; in the summer, you went &quot;down south&quot; to stay with relatives who could keep an eye on you and have you pitch in with the farm chores. Lastly everyone mom's was your mom and you had better give them the respect due a gorwn-up. Not one of my crowd ever ended up in jail (they might have called our moms).

Ah, yes. Carhops on roller skates clipping the tray to the driver's side window. I remember it well.

I should, because I ate lunch at the Sonic on Deer Valley road the day before yesterday.

Oh, Mary had that outfit as well. But when she was with Buffalo Bob and Howdy Doody(sp)she would wear her cowgirl outfit. She also had the music attired
skirt with red boots, but I wasn't interested in that one (it had baton accessory)because my brother had the Roy Rogers holster and chaps and also a Daniel Boone cap, and I wanted to match the motif. Also loved to lasso him when he got pesty.

I had a summer job in the Adirondacks which seemed normal at the time, but now seems otherworldly....my job was to go into huge pits filled with sawdust, and break of large chunks of slab ice which had been sawn from the lake and carried to the pit by sleigh during winter.

We then brushed off the sawdust and kept it in a little insulated shack, the icehouse, and would sell it to people by the pound. Good exercise,lots of fun, and the other kid working with me wound up getting killed in Viet Nam a few years later... a little dose of reality with nostalgia...

I wouldn't admit this to my kids...but I'm so old I remember candy at the movie theatres costing 6 cents and 12 cents.....but then again a hershey bar was 5 cents or 6 for a quarter

I'm not so old ('63) but old enough to appreciate these postings!! To refer back to &quot;travel&quot;, if you're looking to return to a place where children play outside, electricity is not always available and not everyone owns TV's etc - check out the mountains of Lebanon this Summer. The children play outside, the air is clear (in the mountains!!) and fresh, goats and chickens are walking freely in the neighborhood and there is still a butcher so there's no question about what you're buying. Oh, and the Catholic priests still give the strong impression that they are celibate ...

When Hershey bars were 6 for a quarter, I was making $450 a month as a programmer for TWA.

The price of just about <i>everything</i> has decreased (in terms of income) since the beginning of the 20th century. Gasoline at $2 a gallon is near its all-time low.