13
The Way They Were
WERE THE GOOD OLD DAYS REALLY SO GOOD?
Grandparents, and their grandparents, might have mentioned or talked at length about how much better things were in “the old days.” Their memories might have softened over time—because life in the “good old days” wasn’t always easy. For example:
Frontier women did laundry by putting it in washtubs and stamping on it with their feet, pounding it with rocks on a riverbank, or scrubbing it against a washboard.
Until as late as 1860, pigs were free to roam urban American streets. This was encouraged because they would eat the garbage left strewn all over the roads.
Federal child labor laws were passed in 1938. Before that, children often were made to work twelve to fifteen hours a day in factories. If they got hurt or couldn’t work, they were quickly replaced by others who could. Before 1900, a third of all mill hands were children.
In the 1960s, women couldn’t open up a checking account without a husband co-signing for them.
Women were banned from attending certain colleges, like Princeton, which finally opened its doors to women in 1969.
Think back to what life was like fifty or a hundred years ago. In the 1950s, families felt most modern when they ate convenient canned food or frozen TV dinners. Most didn’t want the trouble of fresh vegetables and fruits. But nowadays, we know that fresh is best. My, how times change!
What about life today do you think could stand improvement? Imagine how things might be in the future. For example, do you hate having to take a daily vitamin? Some day, there might be a type of “vitamin pill” given to you at birth that would take care of all your vitamin needs for your entire life!
WRITE A LETTER TO THE PAST
Pick one of your ancestors and write that person a letter. What would you say to your great-great-grandfather who came over from Poland? What would you tell him about yourself? What would you want to ask him? What do you think he would say to you?
BE A GREAT-GREAT-GREAT FOR A DAY!
A few years back several so-called “reality” shows were aired on TV with families or groups of strangers living as pioneers did hundreds of years ago. They had no running water, no electricity. They wore the same kinds of clothes and used the same tools as the pioneers did, and they grew crops and ate the same food as in “the old days.” To make things even more authentic, some were given a list of rules to follow, based on those the pioneers lived under so long ago.
Even if you didn’t see these shows, you can still imagine what life was like. Think about what you have now that they didn’t. Start with running water; and not only running water but hot and cold running water!
But back then . . . You open your eyes and try to wake up. There’s no running water, but you might splash your face from a basin of cold water (of course, in winter you would first have to break the film of ice covering it)! No indoor plumbing, so you know what a hassle it would be dealing with that! And forget taking a real bath or a shower.
Now, what was life like for your great-grandparents and grandparents? Your grand-parents were probably around your age in the 1950s or ’60s. Your great-grandparents were most likely around your age in the 1930s. That’s not as long ago as pioneer days, but what do you suppose they had at your age?
Ball point pens.
Rotary telephones—landlines only; definitely no wifi or cell phones!
Radio programs (think TV drama, sit-coms, concerts without a picture). There was no Internet radio or podcasts.
Record players played 78 rpm (revolutions per minute) vinyl records with one song on each side, then albums at 45 and 33⅓ rpm. No music-to-go, available 24/7.
You went out to the movies. There were no DVDs to bring the theater experience right into your home.
No SUVs.
Black-and-white TV, then color; no flat, wide, and hang-on-your-wall or 3D screens with news instantly “beamed in” from around the world.
Manual, then electric typewriters; now, computers and printers, digital cameras, even cell phones and watches that act as computers, all unknown to your great-grandparents in “their day,” are there for you today.
In the kitchen, your great-grandmother’s grandmother probably had a wood- or oil-burning stove and an “ice-box” to keep things cold (the melting ice collected in a pan underneath and would overflow if she didn’t empty it in time). For entertainment, books were always around, but forget computer games. Games were a deck of cards or were on boards and meant for two (chess, checkers) or a whole family to play together. Early TV had only a few channels, and programs were on for only a few hours a day. The shows were broadcast live. If someone made a mistake or something unexpected happened (think America’s Funniest Home Videos) everyone who was tuned in saw it! No hundred channels coming into your home by cable or bounced off satellites! No pictures sent back from cameras launched into space or “rovered” around on nearby planets.
Girls, you might not have been deciding what you wanted to be when you grow up. You might have been expected to marry and stay home, keeping house and taking care of your family while your husband went out to work. Your days would be spent cooking, washing, ironing, and sewing. Of course, many of those things are still done today, but timesaving devices (washer/dryers, microwave ovens) have made things a lot easier. Boys, you might not have had much of a choice in your career, either—if your family owned a farm or a business, you might have been to carry it on. Now, people have the chance to decide for themselves what they want to do with their lives and see how far they can go—whether it’s to win a gold medal at the Olympics, be the first one in the family to get a Ph.D., or fly to Mars.
Yes, things have changed a lot over the years from your great-grandmother to you. Can you even imagine what things your grandchildren will see when you reach the age your grandmother is now? What will the world be like in your children’s future?
Things are constantly changing, and it’s hard to imagine what effect these changes had on your ancestors and older family members. Sometimes, to understand things, it helps to see them. Since your family stretches back through time, you can get a better picture of their life changes by making a genealogical timeline.
GENEALOGICAL TIMELINE
WHAT YOU NEED
photographs, news clippings, historical items
lightweight clothesline or twine
small paper clips
yarn or ribbon of different colors
stick-on labels
WHAT TO DO
1. Gather some family photos or make copies. You’ll want pictures of your grandparents from babyhood to the present, of your parents, and of yourself, too. Look for house photos: the one your great-grandparents lived in, the one your grandparents lived in and, finally, the house you live in now. If you want more, consider photos of family pets through the years, the cars your family owned, groups at special occasions, even favorite toys.
2. Put all the pictures in order chronologically, the oldest ones first.
3. Use tape to put up a length of clothesline, twine, or ribbon so it stretches across a wall. This is your basic timeline.
4. Divide the timeline into time periods by tying and hanging down some yarn or ribbon to represent time periods of ten, twenty-five, or fifty years. Tie them loosely so that space can be adjusted based on the number of photographs you want to hang.
5. To make the timeline’s years easier to see, write the time periods (1920s, for example) on labels and attach them to the hanging markers.
6. Clip each photo from the pile onto the timeline, starting at the left: Your grandfather as a young boy. The year he was twenty-two. Your mom when she was five, and when she got married. Adjust the positions and time period markers as you go to fill the timeline with photographs.
7. If there’s room, add historical information such as special dates, illustrations, and clippings from books. For example, if a relative fought in World War II, attach copies of photographs or newspaper items about the war in that space on the timeline.
What did they do before these popular inventions? Ask your parents, grandparents, and great-grandparents:
| ballpoint pen | 1938 |
| Band-Aids | 1920 |
| bubble gum | 1928 |
| cell phone | 1980s |
| credit card | 1950 |
| crossword puzzle | 1913 |
| disposable contact lenses | 1980 |
| The Internet | 1990s |
| jet engine | 1930 |
| Post-it notes | 1974 |
| roller blades | 1979 |
| teabag | 1904 |
| 3D movies | 1922 |
| TV remote control | 1950 |
| zipper | 1913 |