Ok, so some things in the golden era were not too cool...

[LizzieMaine]

My ma backed her car into the middle of the street, climbed up onto its roof, and waited for the plow to come back the other way. Then she stood on the roof of the car and in a voice that could crack cast iron called him every kind of an SOB there is in the language. He was terrified and called the police, who showed up and said "Patty, you can't do this." Her response, highly sanitized, was "Like hell I can't." The cop -- the same one she had conked with the ashtray -- just shrugged, the plow driver apologized, and that was the end of that. As long as that plow driver had the route he never filled her in again.

She was about the age I am now when she did that. She was even more ferocious in her younger years.

 

[Stearmen]

My ma backed her car into the middle of the street, climbed up onto its roof, and waited for the plow to come back the other way. Then she stood on the roof of the car and in a voice that could crack cast iron called him every kind of an SOB there is in the language. He was terrified and called the police, who showed up and said "Patty, you can't do this." Her response, highly sanitized, was "Like hell I can't." The cop -- the same one she had conked with the ashtray -- just shrugged, the plow driver apologized, and that was the end of that. As long as that plow driver had the route he never filled her in again.

She was about the age I am now when she did that. She was even more ferocious in her younger years.

Sounds like something my one Grandmother would have done!

 

[Fading Fast]

^^^ My grandmother could stand her ground with Attila the Hun; although, her style was a quiet but quite gritty persistence and an unwillingness to give an inch if she was 100% in the right. I don't ever remember her raising her voice, but I saw her emulsify people - store clerks, gov't officials, neighbors, etc. - with her steely demeanor, intensive arguing and withering intelligence.

She was a force of nature, but she did it quietly but not necessarily low-key - her presence alone was noticeable and fear inducing. I think it had something to do with that generation. When you go through a depression and keep your family together, you don't suffer fools lightly, worry about little rules and are not intimidated by, well, anything.