Lessons on Being a Grown-Up from… Vincent Price?

PJ Media ^ | February 5, 2013 | Kathy Shaidle

[Squawk 8888]

The Seventies was a lousy time to be a kid.

Oh, sure, it wasn’t all bad:

We didn’t wear bike helmets. Our parents made us play outside (“Get out of this house, and don’t come back ’til the street lights come on!”). We “bounced around in the back of the station wagon.” No one was allergic to peanut butter, or very much else.

Evel Knievel was a role model.

But something freakish, sinister, and incomprehensible was always being talked about, over at the Me Decade’s grown ups’ table:

Watergate (which had something to do with “bugs” invading America, I concluded; men in suits talked about it on TV so much, they interrupted my lunchtime Flintstones for months), the Patty Hearst kidnapping, Vietnam, Jimmy Carter, Bicentennial toilet seats, The Gong Show, hijackings, the Loud family, D.B. Cooper, divorce, things called “muggings,” crying Indians, gas station lineups and an unprecedented combination of high inflation, unemployment, and interest rates that adults muttered about in worried voices just out of earshot.

Epitomized by Howard Hughes’ will, fakery was epidemic:

We decorated our houses with plastic flowers and fruit. Squeaking drugstore paperback racks were laden with books about astrology, crypto-zoology, alien astronauts, and other junk history. “Everyone knew” that some all-powerful “They” had gotten away with killing the Kennedys and King. What chance did a timid, puny seven-year-old girl have?

If a rich child porn aficionado could bury a bunch of kids in their school bus, what the hell couldn’t happen?

A kid needed a break.

If you lived in my part of the world, starting around 1971, that respite came in the form of a cheap local TV show called The Hilarious House of Frightenstein.

[Squawk 8888]

That show was an afternoon staple when I was a kid.

[Squawk 8888]

To all- please ping me to Canadian topics.

Canada Ping!

[skinkinthegrass]

absolutely loved, Chuck Barra's The GONG! Show

[Buckeye McFrog]

We didn’t wear bike helmets. Our parents made us play outside (“Get out of this house, and don’t come back ’til the street lights come on!”). We “bounced around in the back of the station wagon.” No one was allergic to peanut butter, or very much else. Evel Knievel was a role model.

Wow, that is a bang-on description of my childhood in the 70's. Thanks for sharing! (actually my mom HATED Evel Knievel. She suffered endless nightmares about sons with broken bikes and broken bones thanks to him. I think she honestly would have ridden a Greyhound all the way to Montana for a chance to smack him in the puss)

[getarope]

The part with the DJ was the best! Cannot hear that Sly & the Family Stone song (Boom Shaka Laka Laka!) without thinking about that show. It was so out there!

[Ingtar]

If this was on in my area, I did not see it. I was too busy waiting for the porch light to come on.

[Squawk 8888]

Let's not forget the Best National Anthem Ever:

Gory, Gory Transylvania
Where werewolves and bats will always maim ya
The murky moat will likely maim ya
As we go stumbling through

[Squawk 8888]

It was a local show that aired in Hamilton, Ontario and later syndicated in the USA so not everyone had it.

[BuffaloJack]

> “Get out of this house, and don’t come back ’til the street lights come on!”

This would be a great tag-line.

[latina4dubya]

so this i where MJ got the idea for Vincent Price’s rap segment on THRILLER... cool...

[blackdog]

At the age of 13 in 1972 I was given a speedometer for my purple Schwin Stingray. During the average day during the summer We put 40 miles on that odometer. When school was in session it was around ten miles. We carried fishing gear, skateboards, canned food, sports gear, etc.....as we ventured far and wide from our basecamp neighborhood.

Now kids get a fine and court appearance for the same thing. That and a counselor specializing in childhood obesity.

[Ruy Dias de Bivar]

***At the age of 13 in 1972 ...***

Life was more fun back in the 1950s and 60s.

[SoCal Pubbie]

In Los Angeles we had Vampira, then later Seymour, and finally Elvira at night, and a show that was briefly on in the afternoons, Shrimpenstein.

[Buckeye McFrog]

In Pittsburgh we had “Chilly Billy” Cardille who was perhaps the lone horror movie host that did not wear makeup (he apparently thought his normal persona as the Channel 11 weatherman was scary enough) SCTV’s Joe Flaherty, a Pittsburgh native, allegedly based his “Monster Horror Chiller Theater” on Cardille’s show. Chilly Billy is now 84 and still doing a daily radio gig.

[Boogieman]

In Chicago, we had “Svengoolie”, and now “Son of Svengoolie”, who was a fan of the show who ended up replacing the old guy.

[ExCTCitizen]

The Seventies was a lousy time to be a kid.

Oh, sure, it wasn’t all bad:

We didn’t wear bike helmets. Our parents made us play outside (“Get out of this house, and don’t come back ’til the street lights come on!”). We “bounced around in the back of the station wagon.” No one was allergic to peanut butter, or very much else.

We played TACKLE football....without helmets or padding...and baseball without leagues.

[Rebel_Ace]

Here in the Metro Detroit Area in the 70's, during Saturday Afternoon we had the creepy-campy "Sir Graves Ghastly" and late at night, after the "Lou Gordon Show" we had "The Ghoul"

Plunk yer magic twanger, Froggie!
Hiya Gang, Hiya, Hiya, Hiya...

[Rebel_Ace]

Found them. Here's The Ghoul:



And here's Sir Graves Ghastly:

[Squawk 8888]

My bike was my ticket to freedom, that and the 10-cent subway fare.

[blackdog]

We used to skip school, take the train into downtown Philadelphia and spend the day in the historical district because we would blend in with all the other kids visiting the Liberty Bell and the Independence Hall. We would go to the museums, exhibits, have lunch in a real restaurant, and ride the train back to the burbs before our parents got home.

Joke's on us I suppose. We didn't need the school.