Not GenX (I've turned 40 recently, which makes me an early millennial), but I feel identified: no child car seats, no phones during childhood and none of the safety measures parents today apply.

I was a Baby Boomer... so not compulsory to fasten seat belts in cars. 🙄

Edited February 18, 20251 yr by martin-w

My niece is 10 now and still has to ride in a car seat.  I remember back in the day, sitting next to my Mom on a bucket seat.  No seat belt.  When Mom had to hit the brakes fast, her arm went out to hold me in the seat.  

I always laugh when I see school buses going house to house.  The next kid who lives next door is standing there, not even a bus length away, but has to wait for the bus to come to their "stop".  The doors close, the bus creeps up 5 feet and picks them up.  

I'm sure things are much safer today, but honestly, I don't remember kids dying back in the day in large numbers.  

Edited February 18, 20251 yr by kerosene31

1 hour ago, martin-w said:

I was a Baby Boomer... so not compulsory to fasten seat belts in cars. 🙄

Seat belts??  Both my older sister and I would stand on the front bench seat between my parents,
My sister did that and went head first into the windshield of Dad's 48 Packard.  Poor windshield!

The first seat belts my dad and I installed on my mom's 63 Ford Galaxy for a trip up to Portland Oregon.

My dad had a Ford Escort Estate car back in the 1970s when I was a kid. It did not have any seat belts in the rear....and my brother and I sat in the "estate" section when numerous members of my extended family came to stay with us in the summer holidays.

Those were the days

1 hour ago, Christopher Low said:

My dad had a Ford Escort Estate car back in the 1970s when I was a kid. It did not have any seat belts in the rear....and my brother and I sat in the "estate" section when numerous members of my extended family came to stay with us in the summer holidays.

Those were the days

 

 

My first car was an Escort Popular Plus. Come to think of it, I'm not sure if that had belts in the back. And I can't recall if they were inertial belts or not, probably not. Obviously no air bags in those days. Zero ABS or traction control. The ABS was your foot pumping the brake and hoping you could still steer. 😁

Edited February 18, 20251 yr by martin-w

I installed seat belts on my car(s) before they became mandatory.

I also adjusted the brakes, changed the oil, and tuned the engine of my '52 Ford.  Anyone here know what a timing light is?

Noel

Those old phones remind me of the two crooks who started Apple: Steve Jobs and Steve Wozniak created a blue box that hacked the telephone network, tricking telephone companies into connecting calls for free. There is nothing worse than a thief in my opinion. Because it is premeditated, not done out of momentary passion.

 

The best was riding in the back of a pickup truck with about 10 kids, we even rode in a flatbed pickup truck on the back with about 7 kids and our friends mom driving, on a flatbed you had nothing to hold onto or stop you from flying off and you laughed so hard knowing you could die 😁

Nowadays Generation X sounds more like what Musk would call the kids he fathered with all those different women.

The mother of one of my neighborhood's friends had an early-to-mid 1950s Buick.  That thing was built like a tank, and I don't remember any seat belts in it.  Back in those days, we were always in and out of each other's houses, especially in the summer.  One of the rituals we had (early to mid 1960s) was going to the public pool to take swimming lessons.  Our mothers would take turns in bringing the neighborhood kids to the pool.  Our favorite transportation was that old Buick.  It was huge, loud and the back seat was like a huge sofa.  When she would floor it, us kids would sink into the sofa and collapse into a pile of giggles.

Kids in the 70s & 80s were tough? Ha! They had fancy massed produced skateboards.  My friends and I? We were at the beginning, the "Stone Age" of skateboarding.  I remember when these came out; most of my friends got one:

Not me.  I went back one step further.  I made my own.  I used my roller skates, they looked similar to these:

I took the skates apart and used both front ends, and banged the front foot grips flat with a hammer.  I then nailed them to a white painted slat that was left over from an old picket fence (shape shown below)

And that, my friends, was my first skateboard.

I was born in 74. Growing up in Australia we hardly ever used sunscreens. I am paying the price today as every year I get a skin cancer removed.

1 hour ago, Mike A said:

And that, my friends, was my first skateboard.

The memories! I remember seeing those at school in Texas around '62-'64, homemade, same metal skates, I think they were using 2x4's. We had concrete "ramps" on each side of the outdoor stairs, probably 8" wide, and guys were riding down that. No helmets or pads, some falls, no broken bones. 

Hook

1 hour ago, Mike A said:

Nowadays Generation X sounds more like what Musk would call the kids he fathered with all those different women.

The mother of one of my neighborhood's friends had an early-to-mid 1950s Buick.  That thing was built like a tank, and I don't remember any seat belts in it.  Back in those days, we were always in and out of each other's houses, especially in the summer.  One of the rituals we had (early to mid 1960s) was going to the public pool to take swimming lessons.  Our mothers would take turns in bringing the neighborhood kids to the pool.  Our favorite transportation was that old Buick.  It was huge, loud and the back seat was like a huge sofa.  When she would floor it, us kids would sink into the sofa and collapse into a pile of giggles.

Kids in the 70s & 80s were tough? Ha! They had fancy massed produced skateboards.  My friends and I? We were at the beginning, the "Stone Age" of skateboarding.  I remember when these came out; most of my friends got one:

Not me.  I went back one step further.  I made my own.  I used my roller skates, they looked similar to these:

I took the skates apart and used both front ends, and banged the front foot grips flat with a hammer.  I then nailed them to a white painted slat that was left over from an old picket fence (shape shown below)

And that, my friends, was my first skateboard.

That's some fancy wood there, Mike!  Mine was just a piece of 2 X 4 and the skate in half and nailed to both ends!

32 minutes ago, charliearon said:

That's some fancy wood there, Mike!  Mine was just a piece of 2 X 4 and the skate in half and nailed to both ends!

I used that picture to show the shape. I didn’t have a 2 X 4. I had an old leftover slat from some long-gone picket fence.

It’s funny how I remember the details. I was around 6 years old at the time. It was a big moment deciding to sacrifice my skates for a skateboard; I was no longer a little child and on the road to reckless adolescence. 🤣