Reader's Praise

“...a delight to the heart...
I (was) laughing out loud.”
– Don H.

“...a charming memoir...
a masterful job!”
– Judy L.

“I was mesmerized.”
– Tom S.

“Well crafted and entertaining.”
– David E.

“Inspiring!”
– Mikala W.

If the answer is “Yes” to almost all of these things listed below, then you probably are among the “baby boomer” generation – those people who were children during the decade of the 1950s. You are not alone - there are 35 million baby boomers alive in America today. Counting
anybody older than the boomers, there are 60 million Americans who lived through the 1950s, when everything on this list was part of our culture.

Most things below are mentioned in Makers of Mischief. How many of these do you remember? How many items below transport you back to those days of your own childhood, when it was a more innocent  life, in a simpler  time?

• playing “hide-and-seek,” or “kick-the-can” in the street . . . at dusk
• playing “red-rover, red-rover”
• playing dodge ball at school recess
• playing soccer . . . or baseball (or softball) after school . . . in the rain
• playing “tag” or “you’re it”
• playing in the “woods” – climbing trees, crawling through berry bushes
• being tired . . . from play, but never admitting it
• parents whistling or calling for you from your front doorstep, wanting you to
  come home for supper
• imagining shapes (usually animals and heroes) in clouds
• the sound of crickets at night
• catching fireflies in a jar
• the neighborhood “haunted house” . . . especially at Halloween
• running through sprinklers
• cereal boxes with a prize in the bottom
• “Cracker Jacks” boxes of caramelized popcorn also with a prize inside
• Popsicles with two halves, and sticks in each, for sharing with a friend
• Dreamsicles
• listening to radio programs of your heroes after school, or of comedy programs
  with your family after dinner
• black and white televisions in furniture consoles
• watching Saturday television – Howdy Doody, Captain Midnight, Buster Brown,
  and scads of cartoons
• Chief Thundercloud, Phineas T. Bluster, and Clarabelle the Clown
• the Cisco Kid, the Lone Ranger, the Range Rider, and TV Superman
• Tonto
• Kukla, Fran, and Ollie
• Desi and Lucy
• Martin and Lewis
• Abbott and Costello
• Uncle Miltie
• the first day of school
• the last day of school
• pumping as high as you could in a swing to reach the sky
• jumping down steps
• jumping on your bed
• avoiding cracks in the sidewalks
• Buffalo Bob and Princess Summerfall Winterspring
• bedtime prayers and good night kisses
• singing choruses of, “There’s a place in France …”
• pillow fights
• laughing so hard your stomach hurt
• eating so much ice cream (or pie) that your stomach hurt
• when doing “chores” meant washing or drying the dishes
• “blackboards,” chalk, and felt erasers
• cleaning the erasers after school . . . as punishment
• Kool-aid
• Kool-aid popsicles made by mom, with toothpicks frozen in them for holding onto
• PB&J (peanut, butter and jelly) sandwiches for lunch, on white “Wonder” bread
• one speed bicycles
• clothes-pins
• attaching playing cards to your bike frame with clothes-pins to make “engine” noises
• “Red-Flyer” wagons
• when you got home from school, your mom was also home
• your first allowance . . . maybe it was a quarter, or a half-dollar
• dimes, quarters, and half-dollars were real silver
• you could buy things for a penny
• your biggest fear was your parents getting mad at you
• big decisions were made by “eeny-meeny-miney-mo”
• the order of “choose-ups” was determined by who got “toppers” on the baseball bat grip
• mistakes were corrected by “do-overs”
• you had at least three or four “best” friends who you were pledged to until death
• scrapes and bruises in competition were “didn’t hurts”
• “Stick’s ‘n stones’ll break my bones, but . . . . .”
• throwing rocks for the pure fun of it
• a “double-dare” could never be ignored
• a “triple-dare” was life-or-death
• swimming in any body of water, any time, regardless of the temperature
• relieving yourself while swimming because, “They’ll never know!”
• great energy and effort spent on “get-evens”
• spinning around, getting dizzy, and falling down, producing uproarious laughter
• adjustable metal roller skates
• the magical “skate key” for the adjusting
• “trick-or-treat” at Halloween meant real tricks (soap on the windows) if no treat
• real “fire works” at fourth of July, not just “sparklers”
• fourth of July picnics, with all-you-can-eat watermelon . . . with seeds
• playing “stomp” in any mud puddle
• “Faster than a speeding bullet . . . .”
• “Who was that masked man . . . . ?”
• “dime” stores
• naugahyde covered stools (usually red) mounted on the floor . . . at the soda fountain . . . in the dime store
• climbing up on one of those stools and ordering a malt or milkshake for a quarter, as though you “owned the joint”
• pneumatic tubes in stores which sucked shuttles up to a room in the second floor
• Saturday afternoon matinees where more popcorn was thrown than eaten
• Roy Rogers and Dale Evans
• Flash Gordon serials with Dale Arden, Dr. Zarkov, Princess Aura, and “Ming the Merciless”
• Tarzan of the Apes played by Johnny Weismuller
• Tarzan’s jungle call
• The Captain Midnight Secret Squadron with their Secret Decoder Badges
• sliding down dry grassy hills on cardboard, or rolling down – each trip an adventure
• injections or vaccinations in school on Public Health Days
• “monkey bars” and “Jungle Jims”
• drive-in movies . . . and “Spotty”
• cap pistols
• pea shooters
• “Wham-O’s” and homemade slingshots
• having dreams that could offset any reality
• heroes as alter egos who could get you through any danger
• Big-Hunk candy bars
• galoshes with buckles that clattered
• Erector sets
• Slinkys
• CinemaScope, VistaVision, and TechniColor
• pop cans smashed inward on the shoes to clatter like horses’ hooves
• soda pop in glass bottles, that cost only a nickel
• Bazooka bubble gum
• ConelRaD
• “duck-and-cover” drills
• bomb shelters
• air raid sirens
• Ike and Mamie
• P-51 Mustangs
• The 38th Parallel and the DMZ
• hula hoops
• Dynaflow, Hydramatic, and Torque-Flite
• “salt-and-pepper” cords
• “crew” cuts, “flat-tops,” and “DA’s”
• “grade school” metal lunch boxes
• Salk vaccine sugar cubes
• iron lungs
• DC-6’s and Constellations
• watching The “Spendid Splinter,” “Jackie” Robinson, and “say-hey Willie”
• movie ushers in uniforms, with flashlights
• respecting anybody wearing a uniform, even the school traffic monitors, or movie ushers
• an American flag with 48 stars
• Sputnik . . . then Vanguard
• the “Blob”
• white bucks and blue suede shoes
• watch fobs
• Lucky Strikes and L.S.M.F.T.
• View-Masters
• TV test patterns
• Lionel trains
• the heartbreak of psoriasis
• a lucky rabbit’s foot
• watching the freight trains pulled by steam engines puffing smoke
• roasting marshmallows, and eating shmores
• at least one kid in the neighborhood had a tree house – spending time in it
• spinning tops
• mom in hair curlers wrapped in a bandana that tied in the front
• clip-on suspenders for your pants to hold them up
• “aggies” and “shooters”
• “Disneyland” on TV, with Walt Disney himself narrating
• the “Beaver” and Wally
• coonskin caps
• poodle skirts, bobby sox, and saddle shoes

If you have other memories, send them to us.