Fun pub discussion last night - things your kids will never know or experience

[dixiegrrrrl]

354. "the mass culture experience, where everyone gets the same news, watches the same tv shows, "

You make such a good point.
There were only 3 tv stations...CBS, NBC,ABC.
Walter Cronkite was at CBS, that was the news we watched.
and the parents controlled the one black and white tv in the house.

"us kids" did not watch news, of course, we were too busy doing "other stuff"
EXCEPT
The Cuban missile crisis and Kennedy's assassination. Then, everyone was glued to the screen.

The tv was in a console, it was a piece of living room furniture, and there was a ceramic figurine on top..something about you could not have a tv with a bare top, I guess, it had to have a doily and some kind of "decoration".
For years my Mom had a ceramic black panther on top of the doily.

You had to get up and walk over the tv and manually change the channel.
Usually a kid was told to do it, while the adults sat on a couch or chair and smoked and drank coffee.

Everybody smoked almost everywhere, including on tv shows and there were lots of tobacco commercials.
Your parents would say, with a cigarette in their mouth.." don't you kids smoke when you get older".

Riiight.