SIX DECADES, GOING ON SEVEN
I think back at what I have witnessed during my life. It
amazes me of the all the things that we now take for
granted. I have lived in six decades and will soon be
into my seventh.
The first thing that came of major importance after I was
born was the day that the Japanese bombed Pearl Harbor and
got the United States into the beginning of the second world
war. The President declared war on the Japanese and shortly
after, war was declared on Germany and Italy. That war, as
it turned out, was the most technical war in the history of
mankind. During this time of war, the nation was rationed.
Copper and brass to make shell casings and other things were
in short supply. Sugar, gasoline, rubber tires could only be
obtained by the use of ration stamps. A few years back I
found the last ration book that I had gotten. It was over at
my mother's house. It even had stamps left in it.
It was as if the United States got involved in a World War
that had been all but lost before we ever got involved. The
country pulled together and worked as if it would be the end
of us if we did not win that war. Automobile production was
halted until the end of the war. Then the world changed
forever with the invention of the Atomic bomb.
At the end of the 1940's it seemed as if the United States
started all over again. In 1948 Israel was made a nation for
the first time in nearly two thousand years. The United
Nations was formed and that was the first thing that pointed
us toward a world wide economy and government.
The world was simple back in those days. The reason being,
we did not have what we have today. Little things that I
don't even think about anymore, were the only things we had
to work with during those days.
As we started into the 1950's, the morals of the country was
very strong. People revered the bible and it's teachings.
The country stuck together and worked to accomplish the
goals that the country had set.
We got involved in another war in Korea. The changes of the
United Nations had already started to be felt. The Korean
War was down played and designated to be only a United
Nations Police Action. If we had only known?
Looking back at the past several years at this point, I can
see there have been a lot of changes in attitude and the way
we look at things. The saying, "I don't have anything to
do", was unheard of. It seemed as if there was always
something to do. In the evenings, you would visit with your
neighbors. In the afternoons. You could find a kid with his
ear glued to the radio to listen to any of a number of radio
programs. Red Rider and Little Beaver, The Lone Ranger, The
Green Hornet were just a few of the many programs that could
keep a boy occupied for hours. As the evening went on, the
programs changed to more adult programs. G-Man, Inner
Sanctum, Name that tune, George Burnes and Gracie Allen,
Fibber Magee & Molly, Amos & Andy, and the person that made
the number thirty-nine live forever, Jack Benny. The times
were simple because we did not expect that we were owed
anything.
Television was still a thing of the future for most. It was
not until the early 50's before television antennas started
to show up on a few of the houses.
We did not feel that we should have everything that hit the
market. Toys were few and far between. I remember back that
most of the toys I played with as a boy were homemade. We
would take the slats out of an apple create from the grocery
store and make and airplane. We would carve a propeller and
put it on with the use of a couple of buttons and a nail. A
string tied to the wing gave us the ability to make it
achieve flight. A rubber band, a wooden thread spool, some
soap and a match would make a toy that you could wind up and
would run along the ground till the tension on the band gave
way. A piece of wood, cut out to look like a gun and a
clothes pin would make a fine rubber gun when you would cut
up an old red rubber inner tube for the projectiles. It was
just left up to our imagination as to what sort of toy we
could make.
In school the pens we used were fountain pens. No such thing
as a ball point pen. We carried a bottle of Scripto ink
around with us and a lot of pencils. When there was math to
do, we did it on paper with a pencil. Calculators were still
a thing of the future. They did not come along till long
after I graduated from high school. Computers was just a
dream in the eye of scientists. The closest thing to a
computer that was around was one that would barely fit into
a gymnasium. Even with their size, they could not do more
than the average calculator of this day.
Movies of the earlier days could be viewed with nothing more
than a quarter. It cost a nine cents to get into the movie,
a dime for popcorn a nickel for a candy bar and a penny left
over for some bubble gum. Only problem with all that was, it
was not very easy to come up with that much money. The movie
consisted of a Cartoon, a Cereal and the main feature. Most
likely than not, it would be a double feature. How long has
it been since I have seen a double feature?
The music that was popular took a very drastic change when
about 1954 the Rock & Roll era began. I suppose that it was
the first thing that had actually divided the country since
the Civil War. The early Rock and Roll was a very unpopular
thing with the adults of that day.
The Civil Rights movement was still a decade off. There
was separate water fountains, schools, eating places and
restrooms. Thinking back, I don't suppose there was very
many that could even give a reason for the separation. It
was just a time that we lived in.
By the time the 60's came in, we had gotten ourselves
involved into another war. Viet Nam was like a burning ember
in a fireplace. The world almost came to a nuclear end when
we met the Russians face to face in Cuba. The beatnik age of
the late 50's gave way to the hippie age of the 60's. By the
mid 60's, Viet Nam was really starting to blaze. The kids
of that time, lost all forms of patriotism. Draft dodging,
draft card burning, protests, sit ins and riots were common
things. Morals had gone down the tubes. Free love and drugs
seem to rule the world. It was the first time in the history
of the United States that we fought from the front and the
rear at the same time. It got to where if you did not like
someone, you just killed them. John F. Kennedy, Martin
Luther King Jr., Bobby Kennedy were some of the ones that caught
the headlines. But others like the police officer Tippet,
in Dallas was killed in the same action. There was some
that survived assignation attempts. Later on, Governor
Wallace of Alabama was shot and paralyzed. President Ford
had an attempt on his life and President Reagan was attacked
and shot.
I suppose the thing that made me wonder if this country was
going to survive at all during the sixties was the killings
that took place by the Charles Manson clan. It was surely
one of our darkest times. The only highlight of the latter
60's was when our nation put men on the moon and then
brought them back again.
Into the seventies we went, still in war and still with all
the protests. The world was changing at an ever increasing
rate by this time. Computers were common place. Then home
PC's were introduced. The war in Vet Nam ended and our
soldiers came home to cries and calls of being baby killers.
They were spat upon and disgraced in every way that could be
imagined. I wondered to myself, just what is wrong with our
country.
God was being taken out of everything that had anything to
do with our country. The atheists filed lawsuits at every
turn to discourage the teachings of God and to disavow him
in any way. Abortion was given the green light. Millions of
babies were being aborted each year. School prayer was taken
away and anything that was anti-God or anti-Jesus was given
the blessings of our government.
We started to have to watch the things we bought in the
stores because there was those that would put poison in
bottles of goods that we were buying. Thus, the birth of the
tamper proof bottle.
Into the eighties with more police actions all around the
world. Terrorist bombings seem to be a daily event. Someone
would bomb the Jews and then the Jews would bomb them. Even
here in the United States there was terrorism but, not on
the degree as in the Moslem countries and Jerusalem.
The pace that the world was running had gotten into high
gear by this time. No one had time to visit. It was a rush,
rush world we were living in. Children only saw their
parents for a short time in the evening when they were
picked up from the Day Care Centers.
More separation of Church and State was being crammed down
our throats. By the end of the 80's, children had more toys
then even existed in the 40's and 50's. Work days went from
eight hours to eight hours plus overtime everyday. A family
with only one person working could make a living in the
50's. By the 80's and into the 90's it took two people
working all they could, and still could not make a living
for a family.
Divorce rates went beyond the 50% mark for the first time
in history. They would call it No Fault divorce. Any reason
that someone could come up with was good enough for a judge
to grant a divorce.
Into the 90's and we are involved in another war. Desert
Storm was the shortest war that we had ever fought. But as
with every war since World War Two, we did not finish the
job. Now, we are living to regret our actions.
We then ended up electing a President that had no morals and
it could be openly seen. A President that gave the United
States a black eye all over the world. This President has
lied and done all he can to promote his legacy around the
world. For the first time in my life I had witnessed a
sitting President being impeached. I then watched as our
leaders bowed to the pressure and did not follow through
with the impeachment.
The United States has lost respect of other countries. We
now, try to buy friendship from nations all over the world
with our money. We are being taxed to the point that most
can't even pay their taxes. We are acting as if we are the
police force for the whole earth. Our military has been cut
down and deployed all over the world to where if necessary,
we would be hard pressed to fight a war again or protect
ourselves.
Most of the American jobs has been shipped overseas. Our
enemies from day one are being sucked up too, to buy our
products. It used to be great when you could buy something
that was made in America. Then it was made in Japan, then it
was made in Taiwan and now it is made in China. The American
companies have gone multi-national and no longer have any
allegiance to the American worker. The bottom line anymore
is more and more money and corporate greed. To heck with the
workers, the cheaper they can produce the product, the
better the bottom line looks.
Now as we are preparing ourselves to enter into the new
millenium, there is outright fear of what might happen as
the clock turns over at midnight on the 31st of December
1999.
I have no idea what will happen in the seventh decade for
me. I have seen the world change in so many ways since the
40's. I see a country that has lost it's anticipation to
look forward into the future. A country and world that is
running around and burning the candle on both ends. No time
for anyone to sit down and rest or visit. I just pray
to God that he will give me the strength to keep up with this run
away world that we live in now.
Smokey
All I can say is,"God Bless America. She needs all the help
she can get".
GO TO PAGE EIGHT, I Believe
RETURN TO PAGE SIX,
RETURN TO MAIN PAGE
CONTENT PAGE
I think back at what I have witnessed during my life. It
amazes me of the all the things that we now take for
granted. I have lived in six decades and will soon be
into my seventh.
The first thing that came of major importance after I was
born was the day that the Japanese bombed Pearl Harbor and
got the United States into the beginning of the second world
war. The President declared war on the Japanese and shortly
after, war was declared on Germany and Italy. That war, as
it turned out, was the most technical war in the history of
mankind. During this time of war, the nation was rationed.
Copper and brass to make shell casings and other things were
in short supply. Sugar, gasoline, rubber tires could only be
obtained by the use of ration stamps. A few years back I
found the last ration book that I had gotten. It was over at
my mother's house. It even had stamps left in it.
It was as if the United States got involved in a World War
that had been all but lost before we ever got involved. The
country pulled together and worked as if it would be the end
of us if we did not win that war. Automobile production was
halted until the end of the war. Then the world changed
forever with the invention of the Atomic bomb.
At the end of the 1940's it seemed as if the United States
started all over again. In 1948 Israel was made a nation for
the first time in nearly two thousand years. The United
Nations was formed and that was the first thing that pointed
us toward a world wide economy and government.
The world was simple back in those days. The reason being,
we did not have what we have today. Little things that I
don't even think about anymore, were the only things we had
to work with during those days.
As we started into the 1950's, the morals of the country was
very strong. People revered the bible and it's teachings.
The country stuck together and worked to accomplish the
goals that the country had set.
We got involved in another war in Korea. The changes of the
United Nations had already started to be felt. The Korean
War was down played and designated to be only a United
Nations Police Action. If we had only known?
Looking back at the past several years at this point, I can
see there have been a lot of changes in attitude and the way
we look at things. The saying, "I don't have anything to
do", was unheard of. It seemed as if there was always
something to do. In the evenings, you would visit with your
neighbors. In the afternoons. You could find a kid with his
ear glued to the radio to listen to any of a number of radio
programs. Red Rider and Little Beaver, The Lone Ranger, The
Green Hornet were just a few of the many programs that could
keep a boy occupied for hours. As the evening went on, the
programs changed to more adult programs. G-Man, Inner
Sanctum, Name that tune, George Burnes and Gracie Allen,
Fibber Magee & Molly, Amos & Andy, and the person that made
the number thirty-nine live forever, Jack Benny. The times
were simple because we did not expect that we were owed
anything.
Television was still a thing of the future for most. It was
not until the early 50's before television antennas started
to show up on a few of the houses.
We did not feel that we should have everything that hit the
market. Toys were few and far between. I remember back that
most of the toys I played with as a boy were homemade. We
would take the slats out of an apple create from the grocery
store and make and airplane. We would carve a propeller and
put it on with the use of a couple of buttons and a nail. A
string tied to the wing gave us the ability to make it
achieve flight. A rubber band, a wooden thread spool, some
soap and a match would make a toy that you could wind up and
would run along the ground till the tension on the band gave
way. A piece of wood, cut out to look like a gun and a
clothes pin would make a fine rubber gun when you would cut
up an old red rubber inner tube for the projectiles. It was
just left up to our imagination as to what sort of toy we
could make.
In school the pens we used were fountain pens. No such thing
as a ball point pen. We carried a bottle of Scripto ink
around with us and a lot of pencils. When there was math to
do, we did it on paper with a pencil. Calculators were still
a thing of the future. They did not come along till long
after I graduated from high school. Computers was just a
dream in the eye of scientists. The closest thing to a
computer that was around was one that would barely fit into
a gymnasium. Even with their size, they could not do more
than the average calculator of this day.
Movies of the earlier days could be viewed with nothing more
than a quarter. It cost a nine cents to get into the movie,
a dime for popcorn a nickel for a candy bar and a penny left
over for some bubble gum. Only problem with all that was, it
was not very easy to come up with that much money. The movie
consisted of a Cartoon, a Cereal and the main feature. Most
likely than not, it would be a double feature. How long has
it been since I have seen a double feature?
The music that was popular took a very drastic change when
about 1954 the Rock & Roll era began. I suppose that it was
the first thing that had actually divided the country since
the Civil War. The early Rock and Roll was a very unpopular
thing with the adults of that day.
The Civil Rights movement was still a decade off. There
was separate water fountains, schools, eating places and
restrooms. Thinking back, I don't suppose there was very
many that could even give a reason for the separation. It
was just a time that we lived in.
By the time the 60's came in, we had gotten ourselves
involved into another war. Viet Nam was like a burning ember
in a fireplace. The world almost came to a nuclear end when
we met the Russians face to face in Cuba. The beatnik age of
the late 50's gave way to the hippie age of the 60's. By the
mid 60's, Viet Nam was really starting to blaze. The kids
of that time, lost all forms of patriotism. Draft dodging,
draft card burning, protests, sit ins and riots were common
things. Morals had gone down the tubes. Free love and drugs
seem to rule the world. It was the first time in the history
of the United States that we fought from the front and the
rear at the same time. It got to where if you did not like
someone, you just killed them. John F. Kennedy, Martin
Luther King Jr., Bobby Kennedy were some of the ones that caught
the headlines. But others like the police officer Tippet,
in Dallas was killed in the same action. There was some
that survived assignation attempts. Later on, Governor
Wallace of Alabama was shot and paralyzed. President Ford
had an attempt on his life and President Reagan was attacked
and shot.
I suppose the thing that made me wonder if this country was
going to survive at all during the sixties was the killings
that took place by the Charles Manson clan. It was surely
one of our darkest times. The only highlight of the latter
60's was when our nation put men on the moon and then
brought them back again.
Into the seventies we went, still in war and still with all
the protests. The world was changing at an ever increasing
rate by this time. Computers were common place. Then home
PC's were introduced. The war in Vet Nam ended and our
soldiers came home to cries and calls of being baby killers.
They were spat upon and disgraced in every way that could be
imagined. I wondered to myself, just what is wrong with our
country.
God was being taken out of everything that had anything to
do with our country. The atheists filed lawsuits at every
turn to discourage the teachings of God and to disavow him
in any way. Abortion was given the green light. Millions of
babies were being aborted each year. School prayer was taken
away and anything that was anti-God or anti-Jesus was given
the blessings of our government.
We started to have to watch the things we bought in the
stores because there was those that would put poison in
bottles of goods that we were buying. Thus, the birth of the
tamper proof bottle.
Into the eighties with more police actions all around the
world. Terrorist bombings seem to be a daily event. Someone
would bomb the Jews and then the Jews would bomb them. Even
here in the United States there was terrorism but, not on
the degree as in the Moslem countries and Jerusalem.
The pace that the world was running had gotten into high
gear by this time. No one had time to visit. It was a rush,
rush world we were living in. Children only saw their
parents for a short time in the evening when they were
picked up from the Day Care Centers.
More separation of Church and State was being crammed down
our throats. By the end of the 80's, children had more toys
then even existed in the 40's and 50's. Work days went from
eight hours to eight hours plus overtime everyday. A family
with only one person working could make a living in the
50's. By the 80's and into the 90's it took two people
working all they could, and still could not make a living
for a family.
Divorce rates went beyond the 50% mark for the first time
in history. They would call it No Fault divorce. Any reason
that someone could come up with was good enough for a judge
to grant a divorce.
Into the 90's and we are involved in another war. Desert
Storm was the shortest war that we had ever fought. But as
with every war since World War Two, we did not finish the
job. Now, we are living to regret our actions.
We then ended up electing a President that had no morals and
it could be openly seen. A President that gave the United
States a black eye all over the world. This President has
lied and done all he can to promote his legacy around the
world. For the first time in my life I had witnessed a
sitting President being impeached. I then watched as our
leaders bowed to the pressure and did not follow through
with the impeachment.
The United States has lost respect of other countries. We
now, try to buy friendship from nations all over the world
with our money. We are being taxed to the point that most
can't even pay their taxes. We are acting as if we are the
police force for the whole earth. Our military has been cut
down and deployed all over the world to where if necessary,
we would be hard pressed to fight a war again or protect
ourselves.
Most of the American jobs has been shipped overseas. Our
enemies from day one are being sucked up too, to buy our
products. It used to be great when you could buy something
that was made in America. Then it was made in Japan, then it
was made in Taiwan and now it is made in China. The American
companies have gone multi-national and no longer have any
allegiance to the American worker. The bottom line anymore
is more and more money and corporate greed. To heck with the
workers, the cheaper they can produce the product, the
better the bottom line looks.
Now as we are preparing ourselves to enter into the new
millenium, there is outright fear of what might happen as
the clock turns over at midnight on the 31st of December
1999.
I have no idea what will happen in the seventh decade for
me. I have seen the world change in so many ways since the
40's. I see a country that has lost it's anticipation to
look forward into the future. A country and world that is
running around and burning the candle on both ends. No time
for anyone to sit down and rest or visit. I just pray
to God that he will give me the strength to keep up with this run
away world that we live in now.
Smokey
All I can say is,"God Bless America. She needs all the help
she can get".
GO TO PAGE EIGHT, I Believe
RETURN TO PAGE SIX,
RETURN TO MAIN PAGE
CONTENT PAGE