[sodpoodle]

For those who prefer to think that God is not watching over us... go ahead and ignore this.

For the rest of us... please pass this on.

[Sacajaweau]

Had an older brother. He always took care of me. Even found a leech to suck out the poison on my cut up knee. LOL Boy, was I trusting. Never told mom.

[kelly4c]

Bkmk

[bruoz]

Born in ‘49. Did all those things and more. Raised in Florida by Yankee parents displaced by WW2. No home A/C in those days either.

[FroggyTheGremlim]

Well, I had a Chemistry Set with Potassium Nitrate, Sulfur, and powdered charcoal.

Powdered magnesium,powdered aluminum and some other things.

We made gunpowder that burned in all kinds of colors.

Can’t do that today.

[BuffaloJack]

nice

[mjp]

If you are one of those born between 1925 &1955, CONGRATULATIONS!

I'm one. My next door neighbor's kid lost an eye from a BB gun.

[BuffaloJack]

At the age of 10 we would ride our bikes (in a group) to the Yorktown Battlefield to play. That was 23 miles from home and nobody every got hurt, kidnapped, or in trouble.

[EC Washington]

My Parents were born in 1920 - their families were wrecked by the depression. They never got over it. My Aunts and Uncles and my Parents lived like 1929 was around the corner. They all had good paying factory jobs in the 50’s and 60’s until they retired, but to them they were always the poor kids growing up in the 1930’s.

[chicagolady]

I rode me bike from the Northside of Chicago to Navy Pier and back, on a regular basis, and thought nothing of it. NOW I thank God I am out of Chicago.

[PIF]

Then, after that trauma, we were put to sleep on our tummies in baby cribs covered with bright colored lead-based paints.

—
Lead paint chips were tasty as were the tubs of library paste! Not to mention crawling around poking those funny looking holes in the wall which always seemed to make us cry and bring mommy running, her saying, “Don’t put your fingers into the electrical outlet.”

Or running around the front yard head down watching my feet move until I hit a tree and mom watching from the kitchen window doing the dishes called the doctor who rushed over to revive unconscious me ... twice and into the same tree both times.

[Hiddigeigei]

Growing up in the 1930s, we didn’t have TV or computers, but there was Jack Armstrong and the Long Ranger on the radio for kids.

[Chgogal]

I remember I was around 3-4 years old and driving with my dad in an old black 1940s car. I was sitting up front in the passenger seat (there was no seat belt). All of a sudden the car door popped open while driving. My father quickly and calmly reached over shut the door.

[RetiredScientist]

I rode my bike 2 miles to school starting in 2nd grade. We had a wooded area and a lake behind my house. There were snakes in the woods. Our parents taught my friends and me what to look for and we tramped through there for many hours without incident. Our parents were training us to be careful and resilient.

That said, I did have one friend in third grade whose last words reportedly were "I can make it." as he tried to cross a busy intersection. It was very sad. That said, accidents happen all the time. It is worse to raise want Nasim Taleb calls "fragile children".

[simpson96]

bookmark

[dakine]

Hitchhiked (13-18) - Detroit area, some interesting folks met along the way - farthest ever hitchhiked, Virginia.

Walked to all schools - Elementary, Jr. High, and High School. In Elementary - would walk home for lunch, no lunch room.

Police - me being a smartass @ 15 had the cops beat the $hit out of me - Mom & Dad came down to cop shop and knew the cops involved - told me to apologize for being an a-hole.

Worked from age 13 on - first job $1.50 an hour under the table at a Greek restaurant...

Work - paper route, all thru 10th grade , delivered Detroit Free Press to ~100 houses, cleared over $40 a week.

Gosh, I loved my youth...

[Exit148]

We early ones rode in the rumble seat of a car -— with no seat belt.

[SamAdams76]

I would extend this excellent post to the 1970s as well.

The image below encapsulates my 1970s childhood. I turned 13 in 1975 and during that era I was turned out in the morning (on non school days) with my bicycle and I was not to return home until around dark. For lunch, sandwiches and bug juice were to be handed out through the window by neighborhood mothers (so as not to dirty up their floor and carpets) and we would always find plenty to do on our own. Stickball, street hockey, Risk and Monopoly games on picnic tables, or just hanging out somewhere outdoors. Probably burned 3,000 calories a day so it didn't matter what we ate.

And yes, from about May to September, we pretty much went barefoot all day long. Even on our bikes.

[kaktuskid]

And they had yearly rounds of polio and measles and various flus without vaccines... and the country just got on with fighting wars and doing business

[SuperLuminal]

"First, we survived being born to mothers who may have smoked and/or drank - while they were pregnant."

My Mother rode a motorcycle a few times (on country dirt roads), in 1933, when she was 7-8 months pregnant...
Here I am, still waiting to see any effects...

[A Navy Vet]

I was born in 1950 and still Truckin On.