Are you a 1%er

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Mark Wainwright

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This special group was born between 1930 & 1946 = a 16 year span.

In 2022, their age range is between 76 and 92.

Interesting Facts:

You are the smallest group of children born since the early 1900's.

You are the last generation, climbing out of the depression, who can remember the winds of war and the impact of a world at war that rattled the structure of our daily lives for years.

You are the last to remember ration books for everything from gas to sugar to shoes to stoves.

You saved tin foil and poured fried meat fat into tin cans.

You
can remember milk being delivered to your house early in the morning and placed in the "milk box" on the porch.

Discipline was enforced by parents and teachers.

You are the last generation who spent childhood without television; instead, you “imagined” what you heard on the radio.

With no TV, you spent your childhood "playing outside".

There was no Little League.

There was no city playground for kids

The lack of television in your early years meant that you had little real understanding of what the world was like.

We got black+white TV in the late 40s that had 3 stations and no remote.

Telephones were one to a house, often shared (party lines), and hung on the wall in the kitchen (no cares about privacy).

Computers were called calculators; they were hand-cranked.

Typewriters were driven by pounding fingers, throwing the carriage, and changing the ribbon.

'INTERNET' and 'GOOGLE' were words that did not exist.

Newspapers and magazines were written for adults and the news was broadcast on your radio in the evening. (your dad would give you the comic pages when he read the news)

New highways would bring jobs and mobility. Most highways were 2 lanes (no interstates).

You went downtown to shop. You walked to school.

The radio network expanded from 3 stations to thousands.

Your parents were suddenly free from the confines of the depression and the war, and they threw themselves into working hard to make a living for their families.

You weren't neglected, but you weren't today's all-consuming family focus.

They were glad you played by yourselves.

They were busy discovering the postwar world.

You entered a world of overflowing plenty and opportunity; a world where you were welcomed, enjoyed yourselves.

You felt secure in your future, although the depression and poverty were deeply remembered.

Polio was still a crippler. Everyone knew someone who had it.

You came of age in the '50s and '60s.

You are the last generation to experience an interlude when there were no threats to our homeland.

World War 2 was over and the cold war, terrorism, global warming, and perpetual economic insecurity had yet to haunt life.

Only your generation can remember a time after WW2 when our world was secure and full of bright promise and plenty.

You grew up at the best possible time, a time when the world was getting better.

More than 99% of you are retired now, and you should feel privileged to have "lived in the best of times!"

If you have already reached the age of 80 years old, you have outlived 99% of all the other people currently in the world! "You are a 1% 'er"!
 
My parents. Dad was a pack-rat. Mom says he learned that from his parents. His father worked for the railroad all his life. When he put in for his retirement, he was told there was no record of him having ever worked for the railroad. He went home and got all his check stubs from day one and showed them.

Dad passed in February of 2023. So now Mom has a basement full of Dad's stuff. I never wanted to bother it while he was here but Mom said there was nothing she wanted so I was in charge. So last few months I went through boxes and totes and bags and shelves full of stuff... probably 90% trash to me. Bags of rusty nails, cardboard nail boxes that contained a random assortment of nails, screws, washers and nuts. Very little was organized or sorted. Banana boxes and tomato boxes may contain a shelf bracket, a cabinet knob, a box of screws, a pair of moldy leather gloves, a golf ball, a used electrical outlet, screw in glass fuses, hardware store receipts, etc. Then the next box would be the same. I found an Army ammo can packed full of envelopes. It was their tax returns starting in 1956. As I looked through them, I saw my name on them beginning in 1969. I don't even remember that my Dad did my taxes until 1975. Kinda cool so I kept them for now.

Mom just turned 90, so I have been spending lots of time with her. We can sit and talk for hours. She tells me about her life from as early as she can remember. Her father would send her on her bicycle to pick up something from a grocery store ½ mile away. When she was 14, she would drive their car to that store even though she wasn't licensed. After she married Dad, he joined the Army. They lived in El Paso for a while. Then he was sent to San Francisco. They had an apartment, but Dad was on a 24 hour on / off schedule. So every other night and day she spent alone. She was young and scared. They didn't need a car until it was time to return to North Carolina. They bought a used car and started cross country. Driving day and night crossing the desert with no AC. Sleeping in the car. Adding oil and coolant along the way. Having to replace tires also.

We have looked through hundreds of old black and white pictures, many of their travels, many of her grandparents, aunts, uncles, cousins, and friends that I never saw. She could probably fill a book with these stories. And I can listen for hours.
 
My parents. Dad was a pack-rat. Mom says he learned that from his parents. His father worked for the railroad all his life. When he put in for his retirement, he was told there was no record of him having ever worked for the railroad. He went home and got all his check stubs from day one and showed them.

Dad passed in February of 2023. So now Mom has a basement full of Dad's stuff. I never wanted to bother it while he was here but Mom said there was nothing she wanted so I was in charge. So last few months I went through boxes and totes and bags and shelves full of stuff... probably 90% trash to me. Bags of rusty nails, cardboard nail boxes that contained a random assortment of nails, screws, washers and nuts. Very little was organized or sorted. Banana boxes and tomato boxes may contain a shelf bracket, a cabinet knob, a box of screws, a pair of moldy leather gloves, a golf ball, a used electrical outlet, screw in glass fuses, hardware store receipts, etc. Then the next box would be the same. I found an Army ammo can packed full of envelopes. It was their tax returns starting in 1956. As I looked through them, I saw my name on them beginning in 1969. I don't even remember that my Dad did my taxes until 1975. Kinda cool so I kept them for now.

Mom just turned 90, so I have been spending lots of time with her. We can sit and talk for hours. She tells me about her life from as early as she can remember. Her father would send her on her bicycle to pick up something from a grocery store ½ mile away. When she was 14, she would drive their car to that store even though she wasn't licensed. After she married Dad, he joined the Army. They lived in El Paso for a while. Then he was sent to San Francisco. They had an apartment, but Dad was on a 24 hour on / off schedule. So every other night and day she spent alone. She was young and scared. They didn't need a car until it was time to return to North Carolina. They bought a used car and started cross country. Driving day and night crossing the desert with no AC. Sleeping in the car. Adding oil and coolant along the way. Having to replace tires also.

We have looked through hundreds of old black and white pictures, many of their travels, many of her grandparents, aunts, uncles, cousins, and friends that I never saw. She could probably fill a book with these stories. And I can listen for hours.
Treasure the time you spend with your mom, and the memories that she shares with you, they are truly priceless.
My mom turned 90 in February, she still has her faculties and over the last 5 plus years she was putting together a family history for us. It's truly amazing to realize all of the things that we take for granted today that didn't exist 50, 60, 70, or more years ago.
Mom was the eldest child, and she was often tasked with raising her younger siblings when my grandmother was busy with the household. My grandfather was overseas for 3 years during WW2, and there were many anxious times when they hadn't heard from him for some time, unsure if he was ever coming home.
Different times that we will never really understand.
 
I almost fall in that age being born in 1948. Funny (interesting) part is my parents were in early their early to mid 40s when I was born. Old enough to be my grandparents. Dad had already seen all of WW11 and 1 tour of Korea when he got out if the service in
'55 when I was 7. They had both seen the Great Depession as young adults. They had both gone from the horse/buggy mule farming days to see the auto and the airplane and the A bomb.

They were farm raised, thirft and threw little ever away. They would help anyone was needing and deserving help, would kill anyone that threatened the family, and told you exactly what they thought in no uncertain terms.

Sad part is say my age of 75, I have outlived so many of my classmates, friends, and family.

Yes, the wife and I still save used tin foil, bacon grease, and a multitude of other 'stuff!" :thumbsup:
 
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Sad part is say my age of 75, I have outlived so many of my classmates, friends, and family.

Yes, the wife and I still save used tin foil, bacon grease, and a multitude of other 'stuff!" :thumbsup:
I'm 67 and only see a handful of life long friends and I appear to be the healthiest of all of us. If I outlive them, life will keep getting less interesting. I have one daughter and she and her husband decided they weren't having kids.
Mom cooks for me several times a week. Green beans or cabbage cooked with bacon grease. Mmmmmmm!
 
I'm 67 and only see a handful of life long friends and I appear to be the healthiest of all of us. If I outlive them, life will keep getting less interesting. I have one daughter and she and her husband decided they weren't having kids.
Mom cooks for me several times a week. Green beans or cabbage cooked with bacon grease. Mmmmmmm!
Just about everything tastes better fried in bacon grease. That’s my Sunday morning heart attack on a plate bacon, eggs over easy potatoes all fried in bacon fat, I’m drueling just thinking about it
 
Just about everything tastes better fried in bacon grease. That’s my Sunday morning heart attack on a plate bacon, eggs over easy potatoes all fried in bacon fat, I’m drueling just thinking about it
back in the day (before the wicked witch whitmer killed our economy) we had a steak-n-shake in town
they had something that was lovingly called "the heart attack"

it was a double cheese burger, with 2 franks (sliced longways and placed on the burger like bacon) and several slices of actual bacon

man, that was a good burger
 
My mother and father are 1 percenters and we play 9 ball on my pool table every day
 
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