Home Forums Hunting & Shooting Hunter's Campfire The 50's

Station wagons were popular in the 50's but it wasn't until years later when someone invented the gas lift cylinder that any decent tailgate lift mechanism worked very well. They all rattled and leaked cold air. SW's fell out of favor for a while but then someone came out with an SUV and they're back with a vengeance, just under a different name. The younger generation drives station wagons all the time but haven't ever heard them called that.

+1............... I should go back to calling them station wagons because that's what they are !...... At least to someone my age. I spent a lot of time in the rear cargo area of a 55 Ford Ranch Wagon with the back window open watching the scenery. Back before you had to be in a seat with a seat belt on. Can't even legally ride in the bed of a pickup truck any more, either.

The first were wagons, they hauled people, and baggage from the train station.

"I like Ike". Aldi Stevenson's hole in shoe.

My 1st car, when I was in college, was a '58 Ford Fairlane wagon. I quickly turned into a hauler for students moving or going home for weekends. I lived in Boise and school was in north Idaho, 300 miles on slow, windy roads. Every time I wanted to go home for a weekend, I quickly had a car full of others willing to pay for the gas. I met my wife that way. She heard a car was heading south and begged a ride.

More than once, that big, heavy wagon was the only car that could move on the bad roads. 4x4's were very uncommon in those days, pretty much limited to specialty pickups.

Remember almost all of that, great times!

Not the 50’s, but remember eating at a Horn and Hardart Automat in NYC in June of ‘62. Purchasing and eating a piece of cherry pie stands out in my minds eye. During the same trip attended a Mets (Casey Stengel was the Mets manager) vs Houston Colt 45’s game at the Polo Grounds that was rained out. Back at the hotel got to watch a good portion of the Yankees vs Tigers 22 inning game in the lobby.

Howard Johnson fried clam rolls were a favorite.

I was there for 9 1/2 years of the 50's.

Excellent/fun video.

Great video about a great decade.

I remember all that stuff. Especially those clip-on roller skates that kept falling off.

And it was a lot easier to find a place to hunt then, too.

Hulo hoops!

5[Linked Image]7 Ragtop

Dad couldn't see spending good money on a stupid ring of plastic. He took a length of garden hose, whittled a plug to hold the two ends together in some semblance of circle, and that was that. Mom used to cut off my long underwear when spring came and make me short underwear out of them. I only tried to hula hoop in the privacy of our back yard (didn't work for crap) and always changed for the swimming pool at home.

In the spring, we would always roller skate at recess. The school had lots of sidewalks intersecting in the grounds around it. We wore our key on a shoelace around our neck. One day, I fell on my dignity twice, and each time there was a penny lying on the sidewalk near me.

We were thrown into a quandary about the skates. In the spring our mothers would fretfully allow us to ruin our feet by wearing tennis shoes instead of our sturdy leather shoes. The problem was that the skates did not hold onto the tennis shoes as well as they did to the soles on the leather shoes.

We ‘flipped’ baseball cards at recess. The Mickey Mantle card was the most coveted.

Dad had a 69 Olds Vista Cruiser with the 400 engine. Flat out hauled ass, two ways.

I busted my butt more than once with those clamp on skates. They were a form of torture.
I never got to where I could keep a hula hoop up for more than 2 or 3 rounds. My butt was as big as everyone else's but it would just fall down. I didn't have Elvis's moves I guess.

The decade of rock, and roll. Buddy Holly.

We thought a Volkswagen was a small car.

Born in 37, forgot a lot of those years...

For me, and I'd guess the world, a lot changed from 1950 to 1960.

It sure did. Medicine, industry, construction, education, and on and on. The war brought us out of the horse buggy age. It was starting on a small scale during the depression but most couldn't afford to buy anything. When all those war factories were converted to civilian factories, it really took off. Then all those soldiers made up for lost time by cranking out a few million of us boomers.

I'm on the older side here, I turned seven years as the decade rolled over.