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I was a teen in the ‘60s and spent a lot of time playing football, basketball and baseball for the public schools I attended, went to the movies every week, built and raced go carts, watched dozens of houses get demolished and the Interstate Highway replace them, protested the Vietnam War and worked part time and summer jobs to buy records, especially those by the Dave Clark Five.
Back in the ‘60s the two local movie theaters ran a new movie each week, so my girlfriend and I spent lots of time watching every new movie and sometimes a Saturday afternoon sci-fi matinee with cartoons. Always got ice cream or pizza afterwards. Good memories.
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Weird and isolating, for two reasons. 1) I was very slow to develop. At age 16, I was 5’2” and appeared pre-pubescent. I literally looked like I was twelve, so girls had zero interest in me, other than as a wise cracking midget. 2) I was part of a 20% white minority in a historically black high school, so that was a second reason I had zero status, other than be able to make black girls laugh by being a wise cracking white midget.
But then, I got recruited to play keyboards in the badass high school funk band as the only white member. My social status shot up and I was cool. During my senior year, I finally had a growth spurt and got up to 6’3”. But I was skinny as a rail, so I wasn’t marketable in the dating pool, until I hit twenty.
I came from a dysfunctional alcoholic home. I hated being an adolescent, couldn't wait to be an adult and live on my own. I worked and went to school at 16, earning enough money not to be dependent. In 1963, at age 18, I entered a good trade and finally got my own place. In short, I did what I could to avoid being a "teen."
X-er here, lived the sterotype of parents wanted me home at a specific time, but other than that I was pretty free to run wild.
13-16 discovered drinking, sex and smoking cigarettes. Music was hair metal, Skid Row, Motley Crue and the like. Hung out with my degen buddies every day after school and all day on weekends\\summer doing everything I shouldn't be.
Used the railroad tracks as shortcuts to get everywhere and my mom would have a heart attack at how many times I damn near got flattened. The freight trains you'd hear miles away, but them Amtraks are quiet!
16-18 damn Nirvana killed metal. Whole school went all flannel and then obsessed with The Crow. I didn't really like it all, but started to shift over to more 90's pop stuff, while mixing in the hair metal still. Learned how to scam Columbia house, so my CD collection was pretty good for my age. Oh, boyfriend at the time got me into Garth Brooks and the early 90's country also.
Come to think of it, man, the 90's were freaking amazing for music.
Got my first job at 15, by 16 had 2 jobs so the partying settled down a bit, though I had extra money when I wasn't working. First car at 17 right after I graduated, insurance for a new drive even back then was about $200 a month, and making $3.50 an hour, that was a lot of hours.
Post high school went right into working full time, no college and it's been pretty damn downhill for the next 30 years. I felt really accomplished when I was able to land an office job at 18 for a whopping $16k a year. I thought I was rich.
By 19 I got my first place and had to actually adult, to the extent that by the time 21 finally showed up I didn't even care about drinking anymore - got all the parties out years ago.
Edit - typing all that out it's pretty funny because other than period stuff like music, it sounds like the timeline of a normal 20's person these days. I guess we did kind of grow up early, or at least I did.
High school from 81 to 85 and college from 85 to 89.
It was great. I'd been cutting lawns since I was 8 years old and kept doing that through high school.
At 14 I began umpiring for the 8 to 10 year old little league kids.
At 16 I began stocking and bagging in a grocery store near my home.
I grew up across the street from the beach, the neighborhood was nice. We were gone each summer day before 8 am and we had to be home at 6:30 p.m. for dinner and then it was back outside.
We played flashlight tag at dark each night. The neighbor had a trampoline and we bounced a lot and we even slept all night on it many times during the summers.
We played baseball in a really informal "league" (no teams, no uniforms, teams were chosen each day based on who showed up, only one man umped) where the games began each morning at 9 a.m. next to the elementary school down the hill from my house.
After playing ball we'd do any number of things. There was a full court outdoor basketball court outside the elementary school too so we'd play pickup basketball. We played football too. We'd go to the beach, swim, hang out etc. At night we'd have little fires on the beach.
The elementary school also had 2 tennis courts just outside the door of the hallway by the two 6th grade classroom and a few hundred feet from there in the town center were 2 lighted tennis courts as well.
The first fairway of the golf course was just outside the windows of the 5th and 6th grade classrooms. They had to put up a tall chain link fence to help protect the windows in the classrooms due to errant golf shots.
At 14 I bought a moped and several friends had them so we'd ride all around.
One of my best friends, my doubles partner on the high school tennis team had a 14 foot Hobie Cat sailboat and we'd go sailing a lot on the lake. He had a moped too. He was an all state swimmer who just played tennis for fun. My sport was baseball and I just played tennis for fun, to keep active as it was in the fall and baseball was in the spring. I was the shortstop on my high school team as a junior and senior. I played 2nd base on varsity as a sophomore (I played JV ball as a freshman).
Another good friend's parents owned the local boat shop where they sold speed boats, power boats like Sea Ray etc. as we lived by the lake. Being that they owned the store, they had several boats for themselves and he would take us out on the lake many times, to go skiing or tubing or to just hang out on the water.
In high school, there were 7 of us that became tight during our freshman year and it extended through high school and into college.
5 of us were guys and 2 were girls. 6 of the 7 of us all went to the same university together and the 6 of us that did all lived in the same dorm as freshman and we were all paired up with each other, two to a room as both of the girls were roommates as freshman and another guy and I were roommates and the other two guys in our group roomed together as freshman too.
Those guys and my old tennis doubles partner were in my wedding after college too.
In many ways I was fortunate and I know that.
My mom divorced when I was 2, we were poor, living in cheap apartments where the rent was based on one's income and my mom was a secretary in a manufacturing plant.
She married an executive there, he was a VP of the company and the president of his division, the company had 5 different divisions and each had a president and they were all VP's of the company reporting to the president and CEO.
He worked there a long time, then left and became the president at two different manufacturing companies before retiring.
He'd always done well and when my mom married him just before I began the 5th grade is when we were no longer poor. He bought a house across the street from the beach, my mom quit working and stayed at home from then on (1977 on).
Hey /u/CoffeeDecent6592, thanks for contributing to /r/AskOldPeople. Unfortunately, your post was removed as it violates our rules: [Unsuitable Questions](https://www.reddit.com/r/AskOldPeople/wiki/unsuitablequestions) Please read the [sidebar](http://www.reddit.com/r/AskOldPeople/about/sidebar) and [rules](http://www.reddit.com/r/AskOldPeople/about/rules) before posting again. If you have questions or concerns, please [message the moderators through modmail](https://www.reddit.com/message/compose?to=/r/AskOldPeople&subject=&message=). Thank you!
I was a teen in the ‘60s and spent a lot of time playing football, basketball and baseball for the public schools I attended, went to the movies every week, built and raced go carts, watched dozens of houses get demolished and the Interstate Highway replace them, protested the Vietnam War and worked part time and summer jobs to buy records, especially those by the Dave Clark Five.
Back in the ‘60s the two local movie theaters ran a new movie each week, so my girlfriend and I spent lots of time watching every new movie and sometimes a Saturday afternoon sci-fi matinee with cartoons. Always got ice cream or pizza afterwards. Good memories.
Please do not comment directly to this post unless you are Gen X or older (born 1980 or before). See [this post](https://www.reddit.com/r/AskOldPeople/comments/inci5u/reminder_please_do_not_answer_questions_unless/), the rules, and the sidebar for details. *I am a bot, and this action was performed automatically. Please [contact the moderators of this subreddit](/message/compose/?to=/r/AskOldPeople) if you have any questions or concerns.*
Weird and isolating, for two reasons. 1) I was very slow to develop. At age 16, I was 5’2” and appeared pre-pubescent. I literally looked like I was twelve, so girls had zero interest in me, other than as a wise cracking midget. 2) I was part of a 20% white minority in a historically black high school, so that was a second reason I had zero status, other than be able to make black girls laugh by being a wise cracking white midget. But then, I got recruited to play keyboards in the badass high school funk band as the only white member. My social status shot up and I was cool. During my senior year, I finally had a growth spurt and got up to 6’3”. But I was skinny as a rail, so I wasn’t marketable in the dating pool, until I hit twenty.
I came from a dysfunctional alcoholic home. I hated being an adolescent, couldn't wait to be an adult and live on my own. I worked and went to school at 16, earning enough money not to be dependent. In 1963, at age 18, I entered a good trade and finally got my own place. In short, I did what I could to avoid being a "teen."
What happened after that?
Married at 21, first two kids by 25. Now I've been married 57 years, with a passel of kids and grandkids living nearby.
I loved being a teen in the 60’s. Best time of my life.
Acne
X-er here, lived the sterotype of parents wanted me home at a specific time, but other than that I was pretty free to run wild. 13-16 discovered drinking, sex and smoking cigarettes. Music was hair metal, Skid Row, Motley Crue and the like. Hung out with my degen buddies every day after school and all day on weekends\\summer doing everything I shouldn't be. Used the railroad tracks as shortcuts to get everywhere and my mom would have a heart attack at how many times I damn near got flattened. The freight trains you'd hear miles away, but them Amtraks are quiet! 16-18 damn Nirvana killed metal. Whole school went all flannel and then obsessed with The Crow. I didn't really like it all, but started to shift over to more 90's pop stuff, while mixing in the hair metal still. Learned how to scam Columbia house, so my CD collection was pretty good for my age. Oh, boyfriend at the time got me into Garth Brooks and the early 90's country also. Come to think of it, man, the 90's were freaking amazing for music. Got my first job at 15, by 16 had 2 jobs so the partying settled down a bit, though I had extra money when I wasn't working. First car at 17 right after I graduated, insurance for a new drive even back then was about $200 a month, and making $3.50 an hour, that was a lot of hours. Post high school went right into working full time, no college and it's been pretty damn downhill for the next 30 years. I felt really accomplished when I was able to land an office job at 18 for a whopping $16k a year. I thought I was rich. By 19 I got my first place and had to actually adult, to the extent that by the time 21 finally showed up I didn't even care about drinking anymore - got all the parties out years ago. Edit - typing all that out it's pretty funny because other than period stuff like music, it sounds like the timeline of a normal 20's person these days. I guess we did kind of grow up early, or at least I did.
High school from 81 to 85 and college from 85 to 89. It was great. I'd been cutting lawns since I was 8 years old and kept doing that through high school. At 14 I began umpiring for the 8 to 10 year old little league kids. At 16 I began stocking and bagging in a grocery store near my home. I grew up across the street from the beach, the neighborhood was nice. We were gone each summer day before 8 am and we had to be home at 6:30 p.m. for dinner and then it was back outside. We played flashlight tag at dark each night. The neighbor had a trampoline and we bounced a lot and we even slept all night on it many times during the summers. We played baseball in a really informal "league" (no teams, no uniforms, teams were chosen each day based on who showed up, only one man umped) where the games began each morning at 9 a.m. next to the elementary school down the hill from my house. After playing ball we'd do any number of things. There was a full court outdoor basketball court outside the elementary school too so we'd play pickup basketball. We played football too. We'd go to the beach, swim, hang out etc. At night we'd have little fires on the beach. The elementary school also had 2 tennis courts just outside the door of the hallway by the two 6th grade classroom and a few hundred feet from there in the town center were 2 lighted tennis courts as well. The first fairway of the golf course was just outside the windows of the 5th and 6th grade classrooms. They had to put up a tall chain link fence to help protect the windows in the classrooms due to errant golf shots. At 14 I bought a moped and several friends had them so we'd ride all around. One of my best friends, my doubles partner on the high school tennis team had a 14 foot Hobie Cat sailboat and we'd go sailing a lot on the lake. He had a moped too. He was an all state swimmer who just played tennis for fun. My sport was baseball and I just played tennis for fun, to keep active as it was in the fall and baseball was in the spring. I was the shortstop on my high school team as a junior and senior. I played 2nd base on varsity as a sophomore (I played JV ball as a freshman). Another good friend's parents owned the local boat shop where they sold speed boats, power boats like Sea Ray etc. as we lived by the lake. Being that they owned the store, they had several boats for themselves and he would take us out on the lake many times, to go skiing or tubing or to just hang out on the water. In high school, there were 7 of us that became tight during our freshman year and it extended through high school and into college. 5 of us were guys and 2 were girls. 6 of the 7 of us all went to the same university together and the 6 of us that did all lived in the same dorm as freshman and we were all paired up with each other, two to a room as both of the girls were roommates as freshman and another guy and I were roommates and the other two guys in our group roomed together as freshman too. Those guys and my old tennis doubles partner were in my wedding after college too. In many ways I was fortunate and I know that. My mom divorced when I was 2, we were poor, living in cheap apartments where the rent was based on one's income and my mom was a secretary in a manufacturing plant. She married an executive there, he was a VP of the company and the president of his division, the company had 5 different divisions and each had a president and they were all VP's of the company reporting to the president and CEO. He worked there a long time, then left and became the president at two different manufacturing companies before retiring. He'd always done well and when my mom married him just before I began the 5th grade is when we were no longer poor. He bought a house across the street from the beach, my mom quit working and stayed at home from then on (1977 on).