Back in the early 70’s I worked at an aluminum smelter in Tacoma, Washington - brutally hot, dirty, strenuous work with excellent pay at the time. About 1/3 of our shift was made up of black guys and everyone got along just fine - we socialized to some extent, beer call after work, Christmas parties and the like. These were hard working men with families and mortgages, many of them military veterans. Granted, the bros got a little loud when playing dominoes at lunchtime, but never once was there anything racial brought up and I’d just like to know what the hell happened.
I noticed the same thing. Up until the '80's, our mixed neighborhood was open and sociable for everyone..Cookouts, parties, helping each other with projects. Then something slowly began to rot it all out. It was slow and insidious and no one really noticed when it started. Some people seemed to begin looking for slights.
By the time the '90's came, we were back to 1965, and nobody saw it coming, or knew why.
Before the whole race garbage gained momentum, everyone from what I can guess understood that life wasn’t about blaming people for what they didn’t get what they were taught they were entitled to. Everyone had a job, family, and while people wanted to be rich, they didn’t want to make a fortune at the expense of their self respect.
Money wasn’t the be all and end all and being a celebrity was something that was looked down on.