First you need to listen to this song:
It's the year 1954, the summer I turn eight years old. I am with my mom in the kitchen. The kitchen looks something like this:
Mom has a radio on the shelf in the kitchen. It looks something like this:
That song you just listened to is playing on this radio. Hearing that song now takes me right back to that kitchen in 1954.
I am almost eight years old, and it's summer time. The window above the sink is open and I can feel the warm summer breeze coming in. It smells like grass and the starch Mom uses on the curtains. The curtains look a lot like this. Mom made them herself.
Mom always dressed like this, even while she was doing housework.
She made all of my sister's and my clothes. We dressed in a lot of pinafores, like these two little girls.
She probably used patterns like this:
We didn't have a television until I was six years old. We used to go to my grandparents house to listen to all the old time radio shows.
Eventually, we did get a television. It looked a lot like the one in this photo:
That was my childhood in the 1950s. When I heard that song this morning, it all came back to me.
I am almost eight years old, and it's summer time. The window above the sink is open and I can feel the warm summer breeze coming in. It smells like grass and the starch Mom uses on the curtains. The curtains look a lot like this. Mom made them herself.
Mom always dressed like this, even while she was doing housework.
She made all of my sister's and my clothes. We dressed in a lot of pinafores, like these two little girls.
She probably used patterns like this:
We didn't have a television until I was six years old. We used to go to my grandparents house to listen to all the old time radio shows.
Eventually, we did get a television. It looked a lot like the one in this photo:
That was my childhood in the 1950s. When I heard that song this morning, it all came back to me.
Loved this post Judy. We had a large radio like your grandparents in our living room, and a brown bakelite one the same as the green one featured here on top of the refrigerator in the kitchen.
ReplyDeleteEarliest music memories emanating from it at 4 years old (1957) - Harry Belafonte's Banana Boat Song and Island in the Sun, and Debbie Reynold's Tammy.
At around 5 years old I think the Purple People Eater song came out, and He's Got the Whole World in His Hands.
The kitchen looked identical to the one featured also, and all dresses had bows - accessories- springy bracelets of false pearls,a bluebird brooch, rope petticoats, and stiff court shoes with white socks and lace tops.
Can remember my Dad doing a clap-ing hand jive dance to "He's got the whole world.." - Haven't seen him dance before or since!
I love your comment, Pam. Isn't it nice that our childhood memories are so similar? I remember hearing "Tammy" all the time, too. Oh, and the "Purple People Eater" was sung for fun by all the kids, especially the boys.
ReplyDeleteI wore short white socks with all my shoes, and ruffles and bows were a fact of life for girls. I still tend toward them more than I should at my age!