‘57 Chevys yes…Boy George…not so much

My friend Chuck sent me an email filled with nostalgic pictures from the 1950s. Most of us get these if we’re beyond a certain age. No matter how many I get, I still enjoy receiving them. But sometimes I wonder if nostalgic emails are circulating among the truly geriatric set, extolling the virtues of the 1940s. Certainly there are eighty-somethings out there who are techno-savvy. Do they secretly share photos of Glenn Miller, Frank Sinatra and Kate Smith? Do they delight in looking at pictures of War bonds, Rosie the riveter and Kilroy? Do they recall zoot suits with fondness too?
World War II was of course the central story of the 1940s. I suppose it’s impossible for people of that generation to look back on those years in the joyful way baby boomers romanticize the 1950s. At least 300,000 Americans died as a result of the war. Millions of people were touched by sadness for having lived through it. Yet, when the war was over, the people who fought the battles made the armaments or kept the home fires burning, made the 1950s the decade we baby boomers cherish.
Most of the 1950s cultural artifacts I’m reminded of in these “remember when” photo displays are the things of childhood; like candy cigarettes, pea shooters, hula hoops, Howdy Doody and the Lone Ranger. And there are other triggers like 1957 Chevys, black and white TVs that took three minutes to warm up and S&H Green Stamps. These collages seem to suggest that we all lived in harmony, safe and well fed. We all went to schools where we learned what we needed to know and almost never ate the paste. On Sunday we all went to church. After church we had roasted chicken lots of vegetables and Mom’s home made apple pie for dessert.
The point of these messages is that life was way better back then. Life made sense. We lived in simpler times. Of course life was simple. We were kids. What did most of us know about discrimination, A-bombs or Commies? I have never received an email from someone from my parents’ generation extolling the virtues of the ‘50s.
I think people playing the role of adults at the time, probably remember the 1950s as an unsteady era. A time when having just defeated the Nazis, we were now involved in a new kind of war, a cold one with our former allies in Russia. A Senator from Wisconsin was conducting witch hunts that could actually be watched on a box in the living room. And well into the 1950s, our parents feared we might get polio. Millions of Americans still worked in factories at jobs that may have paid reasonably well but under conditions that in no way can be compared to the typical office environment today. Ed Norton, the sewer worker had little in common with The Office’s Dwight.
Generations that came before us were happy to see their children enjoy such good times. They could live vicariously through us. And they weren’t the least bit nostalgic for the 1930s either, by the way, when they were actually kids. Would anyone suggest that pictures of men selling apples on the street or people living in tents would call to mind better days?
Adults tend not to be nostalgic over things they did or witnessed after they grow up. If we did wouldn’t Chuck (and 50,000 other friends) be sending me pictures of Boy George, Hootie and the Blowfish, a picture of a PC with AOL on the screen and a reminder of how it took soooo long to get on-line with dial up? You can be sure there would be a picture of George Costanza in the mix too. Well, maybe not George. Thanks to cable TV I can still visit with him every night of the week.

Copyright 2011, Len Serafino. All rights reserved.