A Blast from the Past - 1958

For some, the arrival of Spring means working in the garden. For others, it means the opening of the Essley-Noble Museum and reading old issues of "The Times Record" on microfilm. Instead of focusing on the best years of our lives, i.e., high school, I decided to take a look at our beginnings. Hence, here's a little bit of news from 1958. Yes, do the math...that was 50 years ago!

We forget that our teachers were not always mature and scholarly, totally focused on providing us with a quality education. So here's a photographic reminder from that year that La Senora had another life besides AHS. (Second from left, junior class president)

It seems that our elders were too terrified to donate blood in sufficient quantities, so 9 year olds were enlisted to demonstrate how easy the entire process really was. That's our very own Jane Brown on the left and she is the cutest nurse I have ever seen.

Life wasn't all fun and games in 1958. The Times Record reported on the changing weather patterns (yep, global warming) and suggested the causes might include the clearing of the atmosphere of the dust thrown up by the eruption of Krakatau in 1883, changes in sun cycles, or (here's a new idea) the increase in carbon dioxide in the air caused by man's burning of fuels.

Of course, we probably weren't reading the TR then so were not worrying about the weather. There was the time Mike Crawford found the baby rabbits in a tree trunk and was photographed holding one. His intention was to give them milk through an eye dropper. No word on whether they survived.

1958 was also the year we had to get licenses for our bicycles and we were still participating in the Halloween parade that must have stopped all automobile traffic in downtown Aledo. I saw a photo of costumed youngsters and there is a hobo that bears a striking resemblance to Ann McWhorter. (Let me know, Ann, if you were a hobo back in '58)

In September the hula-hoop craze apparently made it to Aledo. The newspaper reports that the stores stocked up for the weekend and were sold out by noon on Saturday. I remember mine, but I do not remember taking it over to the Hilligoss homestead where there was so much gyration going on that the trembling ground caused the worms to come out and the hula-hoopers filled several number 10 cans with worms. No photo of that event in the TR, but if you have one, Dan, we all want to see it.

Those are some highlights from 1958. My impression from reading an entire year of the paper is that things don't change much. There were some heated local political contests, what seemed like a car wreck a week, discussion of the new gas system, the fair queens, swimming lessons, the homecoming, and football. At least two of our classmates lost parents that year, changing their lives in a way I don't believe my 9-year old inner self could have understood.

What an amazing journey we've been on....

No More War

While reading old Times Records on microfilm at the museum, I was struck by the impact of the Vietnam War on our small town and our people in 1969. I had a visceral reaction to what seemed like a flood of guys enlisting, guys getting drafted, couples getting married, and, finally, reports of the wounded and killed.

I, on the other hand, had a very different experience. For one, I'm a woman and the military was different back then. Second, the two men I cared most about in the world received numbers in the draft lottery somewhere close to 300. But, that was later, and, in truth, I have met nurses who were in Nam, so I could have been, too.

No, I chose sex, drugs, and rock-n-roll (figuratively speaking, for the most part) and war protest. This photo shows the porch of the home where I was living in Urbana in the summer of 1969. That sign reporting the number of dead and I made our way to the 4th of July parade shortly after this photo was taken. Before autumn I was married, making babies, and less worried about war than putting food on the table.

Nearly forty years have past and I still feel called from time to time to put signs in my yard decrying war, but I am also called to try to understand what that time was like for the rest of you. Some served, some loved and married those who served, and I am certain there were others whose path looked not unlike mine.

For the most part I have skipped the VietNam movies, though I do play the music from "Good Morning, Vietnam" occasionally. But I have recently read 2 books which touched me in different ways: The Things They Carried by Tim O"Brien and Tree of Smoke by Denis Johnson. Both bespeak the horror of war but they are powerful books.

Will you share your stories of that time?