Remember When: Daily Life in the 1950s

There is probably no other time in American history that is talked about as much as the 1950s.

But, amid all the reminiscence and nostalgia, how much is truth and how much is rumor or inaccurate memory?

Let’s play a game and find out what our 1950s IQ is. Or, maybe we can call it “Are You Smarter Than Someone who used to watch ‘Dragnet’ in black and white?” OK – here we go.

Public schools had rigid dress codes: Partly true! There were rules, yes, but they were few and backed up by parents. Girls had to wear skirts and dresses – nothing cut above the knee, however. Boys could wear just about anything as long as the pants were long, the outfit was clean and the shirt had a collar and was tucked in.

Kids sneaked radios into class to hear the World Series: The “sneaking” part is false. In my school district (no reason to believe it wasn’t typical), teachers cut classes short on game days, and some even brought the radios themselves. Sometimes we went whole hog. I watched Don Larsen’s 1956 perfect game on a school TV.

Adult couples held lots of Bridge parties: Many did, and that’s why this statement is at least partly true. Bridge, though, had a tough competitor in the new game of Canasta, which swept America in that decade. How do you play Canasta? Hey, don’t ask me. The last card game I played was Old Maid. Maybe that’s why I didn’t get invited out much.

Restaurants had juke boxes: Absolutely true! If the eatery didn’t have a big, colorfully lighted Wurlitzer in the corner, it had smaller ones with coin slots and flip mechanisms at the individual tables.The idea was to be quick and pick your songs before someone else picked theirs. And, yes, couples (not just teens either) sometimes jumped up and danced amid the servers carting out cheeseburgers.

Families were close: Again, absolutely true! Many families were just a couple of generations removed from “the old country” (fill in the name yourself). They tended to cluster in the same neighborhoods, often working nearby and attending the same church. My relatives today live all up and down the East Coast and points west.

People bought in small stores: If you answered “mostly true,” you’d fit right in. There were still many smaller grocery stores, and some neighborhoods had little clusters of stores of all kinds – clothing,hardware, pharmacies. If you craved a bigger shopping experience and brighter lights, a short bus ride took you to downtown Wilkes-Barre, then a cornucopia of shops and department stores.

Juvenile delinquency was rife: Bah, humbug – and false. There have always been parents who didn’t watch their children carefully, but the kid who broke the rules big-time and had to call mom and dad from the police station was a rarity. Much of the fear of youth terror in the streets, I tend to think, was fueled by movies like “The Wild One,” where be-jacketed young bikers terrorized a small town.

Prices were low: No other way to put it but a “true” resounding from the hills all across our valleys. Whether we’re talking about a five-cent ice cream cone, a $500-a-year college education or a brand new$6,000 ranch-style home, good things were within reach for most.

Well, sad to say, there’s no practical use for reminiscences – unless time travel becomes a reality. In that case, I’ll work to upgrade my card-playing skills. Animal Rummy, here I come