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People are not prefect, and earth is not paradise. Did that really have to be said?
If so, I said it. Nothing will ever be perfect for anybody, even rich successful people have their problems. Part of life is overcoming trials and tribulations, it's a learning experience.
That might be so. However, that does not mean I have to put up with certain. Some things are worth fighting for and dying for.
In the 50's? Most women didn't need to drive, but if they did, they sure didn't drive a stick-shift.
Oh yeah?
Okay, okay they drove horses and carriages then. I distinctly remember my mother telling me that when SHE was a teenager -- must have been around 1940 -- her older sister bought a fancy convertible and would go driving by, honking the horn and waving while my mother walked home with the groceries for their mother.
My mother's aunt (my great aunt) drove around in a turquoise T-Bird convertible in the mid 50s. She earned her own money as a music and singing teacher.
My own mother gave up her driver's license when we kids were really young because she could walk to the grocery store but by the mid 50s she got it back because by then we lived in suburbia and she needed a car to get to the grocery store.
I can remember driving in an aunt's car about 1950 and saying that the car sounded like a fire engine (must have been when she shifted and it made a whining sound.)
I remember a friend's mom coming over to pick up her daughter at my house and she was driving a brand new Chevy. It was a 1955 or 56 and had curved windows at the front corners and we all looked inside the car because she said it looked like an airplane control panel.
There was a disastrous flood in Connecticut in 1955 (it's in the record books) and an aunt who lived in CT came and picked me up so I could stay with my cousins for a week. No one knew there was going to be a flood but I remember she remarked about the rain as we were driving. Next morning we learned of the disaster and we were without power for days.
In elementary school, even though we rode our bikes most days, there would be some days in winter when my best friend's mother would drive us to school in an Oldsmobile. When school got out on bad weather days, there were tons of mothers in station wagons picking their kids up. This would have been the mid 50s.
Lots of women drove their husbands to work early in the morning so they could have the car during the day. Most families only had one car. If they were not standard transmission then I don't know what they were but I learned on a 1957 standard and I didn't learn to drive until 1962 because I wasn't old enough. We weren't rich so even in 1962 we only had a 1957 car.
Also, at school, some of the older women teachers got rides to school but I don't remember seeing the younger female teachers tying their horses up.
In the 50's? Most women didn't need to drive, but if they did, they sure didn't drive a stick-shift.
Have to disagree w/u there Claud. I learned how to drive in 1958 on a stick shift; and very glad I did. My father was a long distance truck driver and he insisted. Then in my very early 20's he taught me how to handle an 18 wheeler. I've driven a 39 ft. RV attached to a 27 ft. diesel truck across many states, as well as here in the mountains. That training by dad was valuable. My sister doesn't know how to drive a stick tho. Shame on her. In 1965 when I turned 21, I bought my first car, (really the '64-1/2) Mustang with 4 on the floor.
My mom did. She drove a 1951 or '52 Plymouth with a stick-shift. And she was far from being the only one who did.
And many women did need to drive in the medium and large cities. Driving kids to school, going shopping, going to the bank, etc.
I wonder where anyone got the idea in the 50s most women didn't have to drive or didn't know how to drive a stick shift. My mom started driving before WW2, of course she drove a stick shift. Most of my girlfriends mom drove and most of us drove. Some of us learned on a stick shift, a few others did start driving after automatics became the in thing.
I wonder where anyone got the idea in the 50s most women didn't have to drive or didn't know how to drive a stick shift. My mom started driving before WW2, of course she drove a stick shift. Most of my girlfriends mom drove and most of us drove. Some of us learned on a stick shift, a few others did start driving after automatics became the in thing.
Well, we really aren't talking about some people. The typical 1950's housewife was just that, a stay-at-home mom/housekeeper. Dad had the family car for work. Remember the OP? Check out those old sitcoms. This was the model family.
Back to OPs question: if you were not born prior to the 50s it would be very hard for you to even imagine what it was like, anymore than those of us born after the depression or at the end of it, can imagine what that era was like. I won't go into detail like Kevxu did, but the 50s was a good time to be young.
Of course nothing is truely like we see on TV, or hear on the radio, or see in the movies, that is called fantasy land..but much of it was pretty close. We had emerged from a depression and a war, things were peaceful, except for the very early years of the Korean war.. More women were entering the working world or going to college, our parents, many of them were middle or upper middle class and we just really didn't have many cares. We were not introduced to drugs like todays kids, heck most of us didn't even drink in highschool: well the girls anyway and many of us didn't smoke til after we graduated from high school. We didn't have the world sitting on our shoulders, we were obivious no social problems for the most part.
I think the turning point might have been the very late 50s, but the 60s brought on the civil rights movement, the awareness of racial issues, war protesting, the age of more open sex and yes, drugs. Before then, we were what was known as the silent generation. We did pretty much what we were told to do, respected authority, whether is was school, home or workplace and we didn't doubt much. Toward the end of the era young people started asking "why?" Whether right or wrong, it started a complete change in life as we knew it.
I wonder where anyone got the idea in the 50s most women didn't have to drive or didn't know how to drive a stick shift. My mom started driving before WW2, of course she drove a stick shift. Most of my girlfriends mom drove and most of us drove. Some of us learned on a stick shift, a few others did start driving after automatics became the in thing.
Yes, I have no idea where they get that idea where women didn't drive in the 1950s. It sounds more like a guess than a fact. And it's a wrong guess!
Yes, I have no idea where they get that idea where women didn't drive in the 1950s. It sounds more like a guess than a fact. And it's a wrong guess!
This thread is full of them, mostly by people who weren't alive in the 1950s. Those same people get some kind of satisfaction by mocking and denigrating a time they never knew and people they've never met.
This thread is full of them, mostly by people who weren't alive in the 1950s. Those same people get some kind of satisfaction by mocking and denigrating a time they never knew and people they've never met.
Maybe they are thinking about the 1850s or something? or maybe they think we all still lived on farms, wore homemade chothes (nothing wrong with that, I did do a lot of seweing) and got married at 17 or something?
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I've driven a 39 ft. RV attached to a 27 ft. diesel truck across many states, as well as here in the mountains. That training by dad was valuable. My sister doesn't know how to drive a stick tho. Shame on her. 