I grew up (an only child) in a small town in northern Idaho, and pretty much the whole town was safe back then. We owned a small neighborhood grocery, and that was where I spent my younger years, and lived in the house next door. When I was 10, my mom and dad bought me a Welsh Pony (I had wanted a horse from my earliest memories), and after that , all of my time was spent riding my horse, or caring for him. I went on trail rides with the local Horseman’s Association, along with the rest of the kids that had horses, and the old timers. We had playdays (called gymkhanas) sometimes on weekends, and otherwise, we kids just rode anywhere we felt like riding in the summer. My folks loved fishing and camping, and on weekends when my dad was off work, my mom would make fried chicken and potato salad, and we would go up to a mountain lake and spend the weekend camping out and fishing. My dad was a lineman for the electrical company, and he was allowed to take me along with him when he went to work sometimes; so I also did that in the summer, and I actually learned how to drive in the big old 1-ton 4x4 power-line truck. In the winter , was snow halfway up to the roof of the house, so we kids went sledding and built snow forts, and stuff like that. I remember climbing up the snow bank beside the house to break off the 2-3 foot long icicles to use for “sword-fighting”.
I know exactly where that is, Don... and I grew up outside of Nashville in Berrien County. I think it's about 40 miles to Moultrie from Nashville.
Yes my brothers and their friends built go carts exactly like that, held together with old bits of wood , pram wheels and washing lines... . The played marbles, 5 jacks, climbed every wall and tree they could find!! Played cowboys and Indians with makeshift clothing, and bows and arrows!! Shot cap guns... played rounders ( like cricket for those who don't know) with makeshift bats.. football.. swapped football cards, and of course everyone went to the swing park. We girls played all different types of skipping games, hopscotch, we'd spend hours swapping scraps (pictures)... we'd play hide & seek, leap frog, ...play bouncing balls against the walls games, Chinese ropes... we'd make tyre swings across the Burn ( creek /stream) ... we'd go to the much bigger park ( all of us boys and girls) and sail our paper boats..or jump in the lake and swim or paddle... This is the actual park where we used to sail our paper boats or watch in awe at others who had real boats, sailing theirs!! if we could gather up a few pennies we could rent a paddle boat between us, but that was rare... We'd go to the local Baths on alternate Saturdays, to the indoor unheated pool and swim..or lark around if we couldn't swim... and share one bag of hot steaming chips between a group of us .. from the Italian cafe next door, when we came out teeth chattering , hair soaking wet , still!! Other Saturday mornings we'd go to the Cinema, to see films like The Love Bug, or Cinderella, or some cowboy and western show. Most of us had no money so one kid would pay to get in, and then he'd unlock the emergency door behind the stage, and we'd all pile in... maybe 4 or 5 of us...!!
My posts from two years ago about my summer on top of the mountain in Missouri was my best times. Otherwise my brother and I with one or two neighbor kids played- army, or doctor , hide and seek. Sure there were other things..oh we played Monopoly for a solid week one summer. Never played again after that. When we were real small mother would fill the nbr 2 wash tubs wth water- and we splased around in that. Mother would make a picnic lunch and we would climb the large hill outside our yard and have a picnic. We did have bicycles and I loved riding mine though my dad got it from a haunted house
The cheapest thing you could buy at the movie theater (for five cents) was a big slab of Bonomo's Turkish Taffy, which was pretty awful but it would last ya through two features, a cartoon, and a newsreel. It could pull the teeth right out of your gums. If you had a conversation while eating it, it would sound like this: "Mfffffmmm, mmnnnmmmm fffmmmmmssss, mmmmfffffmmmmmm….."
@Mary Robi: The cheapest thing you could buy at the movie theater (for five cents) was a big slab of Bonomo's Turkish Taffy, five cents - what a deal. As a kid, I really liked those individual wrapped bars of Turkish Taffy. Thought they were no longer sold, but saw some in the Amish stores in PA. They also have them in their stores in MD, or at least they were in Annapolis.
I lived only 20km from the city but it may have been 100kms. Our home was built in a street that was still unpaved and we were surrounded by forest. This was a great place to go exploring and hunting for native fauna. Just watch out for snakes was what Dad told us. Animals proliferate in Australian forests at the time were small native marsupials.. gliders, tiger quoll, quokka and wallaby. You had to be late in the day to catch the gliders and quokkas as they are mostly nocturnal. Introduced animals such as wild rabbits were usually our hunting target. These were considered pests and made good eating. I can recall dad skinning the rabbit before mum boiled it. My dad was the family executioner. We also kept chooks and many occasions I had to watch him lop off the head of that nite's dinner. I can still see the headless chook in its final death throes. That should have put me off eating chicken for life.
@Gloria Mitchell Missouri! In 1999 we bought a 120 acre spread smack-dab in the middle of Mark Twain National Forest, grandfathered land privately owned before Uncle Sam got too many twinkles in his eyes. Split it 3 ways, we got the old farmhouse: Just behind where we are standing above, this Copperhead slithered out right at our feet as we returned from our evening walk one night: Locally, the big hills were called mountains, but few exceeded a couple hundred feet high. @Gloria Mitchell where in MO were you speaking of? Must be in the Ozarks, hardly any mountains elsewhere! Frank
St Jo ....GP lived on side if a mountain. I think my posts are under a Blast from the past for me....something like that. I was six going on seven. Then lived there in different area of St Jo for a year.
Copperheads like to hang out near the water at night, hunting. That's a nice-sized copperhead. The ones around my lake were eighteen to twenty inches. Rather a pretty snake though.
My brother and I got up to all sorts of mischief..specially him. In those days the local baker and dairy delivered our bread and milk. My older brother would go over to the neibors porch purloin the bread go to a safe place and eat the innards of the loaf the return the damaged goods to the porch. He also used to snatch the milk bottle drink half replace with water and reseal the lid. Proper monster my brother. Incredibly he got away with this for weeks. But when he was finally nabbed red handed he was marched by the ear to our place where he copped a hiding when Dad returned from work.
Ditto..and Australia has some of the deadliest on earth. I recall one day.. must have been no older than nine my brother and I and our pop were trudging thru the thick forest trying to spot the new season Waratah (native flower) when a deadly Red Bellied Black Snake slithered in front of him. In a flash he picked it up by the tail and smashed it against a rock. "Only way to treat a snake.. tiger" He always called me tiger. He was a giant of a man from a large country town.. a tuff as teak, laconic man of the land. Some of the stories he told me of his early days I can still remember.
I am so pleased this thread has taken off. Not everyone wants to talk about their past.. We are a happy bunch of nostalgics.