The Pace of Life in the Golden Era...vs. today

[Weston]

I've been doing a lot of thinking on this lately. Im curious to hear other thoughts before I give my own, but what are yours about the pace of life back in the 30s-40s vs. today? Is it possible to slow down enough today? What does that involve giving up?

Hope this goes some interesting places.

 

[CharlesB]

I'd go stir crazy in all honesty

 

[KY Gentleman]

I think given the choice people in the golden era would choose to live as we do now.

 

[Staredge]

I've been doing a lot of thinking on this lately. Im curious to hear other thoughts before I give my own, but what are yours about the pace of life back in the 30s-40s vs. today? Is it possible to slow down enough today? What does that involve giving up?

Hope this goes some interesting places.

Did it speed up with time, or slow down??? We like to think that it was a lot easier back then, but was it? Think of all the time-saving technology that has been created in that time. How much leisure time did the average man or woman have 60-70 years ago?

Will

 

[happyfilmluvguy]

Take your time and things start to go slower. Better yet, stop driving and take public transportation and things will definitely go slower.

 

[LizzieMaine]

I don't think life sixty or seventy years ago was at all slower -- the average working-class family of that time was just as busy as people today: the six day work week was still common even for white-collar people in the 1930s, housework tended to be backbreaking for anyone who couldn't afford to hire help, and it was expected that when kids reached working age they'd take some kind of part time job to help out the family finances. All those things put strong demands on time, and when the war came along, those demands became even stronger. Even if you weren't in the military, you were expected to do your bit in other ways -- Red Cross work, volunteering as a civil defense warden or an AWS spotter, working on neighborhood scrap drives, all that sort of thing took time and effort. The idea that Golden Era folks tended to sit around on porch swings on warm summer nights sipping lemonade and listening to the gentle chirp of crickets in the flower garden is a bit of revisionist nostalgia.

 

[Amy Jeanne]

My dad is always telling me how miserable his parents seemed because they never had a free moment. Both worked full time and in their "free time" they had to do things like cleaning, sewing, laundry, cooking, repairing; all on primitive equipment! My grandmother still used a washing board and wrung clothes in the 40s (you can see it some of the old home movies!)

I work full time and do all of these things with modern conveniences and seem to have loads of free time.

 

[BORNTOOLATE]

I think we've all been conditioned to fill our luxurious free time with more activities. Movies at home, video games, sports events, shopping, exercising, road trips, eating out, socializing, etc. and etc. all make life seem more hectic than it has to be. In the "golden age", I wouldn't be sitting here typing away to people I don't really know all over the world about things that aren't really that important. I'd have to be up probably before the crack of dawn to do lots of mundane chores before I went to work where I would be more thankful that I had a decent occupation. I wouldn't care that my work environment was somewhat unsafe or ergonomically incorrect and that the boss always made sure he was the boss. Actually , today I should be getting ready for church, but 4 out of 5 of my family are sick with a bad cold. I'm probably next.

 

[surely]

I don't think life sixty or seventy years ago was at all slower -- the average working-class family of that time was just as busy as people today: the six day work week was still common even for white-collar people in the 1930s, housework tended to be backbreaking for anyone who couldn't afford to hire help, and it was expected that when kids reached working age they'd take some kind of part time job to help out the family finances. All those things put strong demands on time, and when the war came along, those demands became even stronger. Even if you weren't in the military, you were expected to do your bit in other ways -- Red Cross work, volunteering as a civil defense warden or an AWS spotter, working on neighborhood scrap drives, all that sort of thing took time and effort. The idea that Golden Era folks tended to sit around on porch swings on warm summer nights sipping lemonade and listening to the gentle chirp of crickets in the flower garden is a bit of revisionist nostalgia.

Once again I find your post strikes the right note; except for the last sentence. There were "Golden Era folks" who sat around .... But these were people with huge amnts of disposable income and leisure time. I think that too many here have been seduced/deceived by the movies, ads, etc. For the rest, like you point out, life was filled with necessary chores.

Now that I reread this I guess we do agree.

 

[LizzieMaine]

Having said all that, though, I'll point one thing out -- one real advantage the Golden Era had over today's society is the relative tranquility of its media. If today's people don't feel stressed out enough, the contemporary media goes out of its way in every possible way to increase that sense of pressure to BUY BUY BUY with its constant screaming din.

That's not to say there was less blatant crass salesmanship in the Golden Era, because there wasn't. The difference is in the artfulness of it. One good comparision might be to look at a typical magazine rack of today. The next time you go to the grocery store, take a look at the covers displayed at the checkout stand -- a constant barrage of jumbled screaming headlines on every cover, demanding your immediate attention, plastered across huge photos of interchangeable celebrity bimbos. Most of us today have gotten to the point where we don't even notice, so the covers constantly compete to be louder, crasser, and more aggressive.

Now, imagine a typical magazine rack in, say, 1938. Sure, you had cheap tabloid papers with huge block headlines and gory crime photos on the front -- but more often, publications had quiet, tasteful cover images with a minimum of type. You didn't have every square inch of cover space plastered with screaming banners about how to improve your sex life or how to take inches off your waistline or who Carole Lombard is sleeping with this week.

Imagine a visitor from 1938 taking a look at a 2008 magazine rack, and you've got an essential difference between life then and life now -- it might not have been easier or more relaxed, but it certainly wasn't as *blatant.*

 

[reetpleat]

I think given the choice people in the golden era would choose to live as we do now.

In one way, as a culture, the choice has been made. Weather that is a good thing or not who can say.

 

[Mr. Lucky]

You know, there's something to be said for geography. I live in L.A. and at a very hyper pace. The place moves so fast all the time. The day starts early and ends late and what needs to get done never seems to. Now, last year I spent some time in my home town of Buffalo and, after evaluating and cross checking my motivations and thoughts, I've come to the conclusion that the pace there is quite a bit more civil, or what I would consider civil. It's smaller, therefore getting places is soooo much more easy and the compulsion to move quickly is somewhat quelled. As an example - Our luggage was left behind in D.C. when we changed planes. After speaking with the airline, they said that it had arrived and that it would be delivered in four hours or so. I agreed and hung up. At that moment my wife pointed out to me that we could just "go pick it up!" That, given where we live in L.A. would never be an option - it would take half a day! But in the smaller community we hopped in the car, drove to the airport, picked up the luggage and were back in a half an hour.

And one of the reasons that, after pretty much bottoming out, people - young, talented entrepreneurs - are finding their ways to places like Buffalo, Pittsburgh, Portland, etc. and are leaving the densely populated urban centers - they want to slow down. They want affordable housing. They want safer places to raise their kids. They want a sense of community. Now, is that comparative to the Golden Age? I don't know. But it plays to the much propigated illusion of a better time.

But I do remember, as a kid, on hot summer nights, porch after porch after porch, up and down my block, being populated with hard working, blue-collar folks sipping lemonade and other beverages and basking in the moment of doing nothing but such. And I know I breath, and sleep, and feel MUCH better there than I do here. And that's why I'm working to get us back there. Back to our own new Golden Age.

 

[Weston]

These responses have been great. Keep em coming. I've noticed many might have read into things I did not say... Interesting to see what people read my post to have said. Keep it up!

 

[Lincsong]

Driving on a two lane road with no a/c??????

Trains were late then, airplanes are late today. There was no Interstate 80 to drive from Frisco to New York, you drove on the two lane Lincoln Highway. It took 6 hours to drive to Reno from San Francisco, now if you don't get a ticket you can make it in 3 and half. I can't understand why morons want to go back to public transportation buses and trains and add all that extra time when it can be spent on something more productive or enjoyable.:rage: "oh it's so quaint to ride a ferry" yeah right, they'll take my air conditioned, V-8 car from my cold dead hands!!!

 

[citRon]

I remember hearing a prediction of the future from around the 30's or so,talkingabout life in 50 years- the 80's. They predicted that with the advancements in electronics and technology, transportation and roadways, etc...that the average person would have so much free time on their hands, that boredom and lazyness would be rampant problems in the modern society!
Ok, I've given up on getting my 'Flying Car', but I WANT MY BOREDOM!!

 

[Tango Yankee]

Yup,

The predictions that all of these labor-saving devices would enable the work week to be cut, drastically reduce the hours spend doing household chores, leave us more leisure time to spend time with our families, engage in more hobbies, etc., seem to have been a bit optimistic. Instead, as we became more and more automated the expectation is to accomplish even more at work than before. Seems to me I've heard stats quoted that shows the average number of hours worked each week actually went up, instead.

I know, it all gets down competition... everything is a competition. Cutthroat world and all that. Doesn't mean I gotta like it even if I do have to live in it.

Regards,
Tom

 

[imported_the_librarian]

I just checked into the thread and I may have missed it, but I think life today is just about the same as back then. Really, to me, I can't see that much of a difference. Material things change, but......

If anything, with TV, I think folks get less done today than they did years ago.

Just my two cents...........

 

[Twitch]

My grandmothers were born in about 1896 and welcomed modern conveniences and no illusions that there was anything good about "the good old days." I used to hear them say how much better it was to live when they did (50s-70s)over the early the early part of the 1900s.

The one thing I vividly recall that is a bitter memory is that in the 50s-60s the consensus was that by 2000 we would all be working LESS, not the most hours of any peoples of any industrialized nation. Where is the #$#^@@& 6 hour work day they promised?

 

[Paisley]

It's in France!

If you think the 1940s would have been a great time to live in, watch a program called The 1940s House the next time it's on PBS. Lots of housecleaning, bomb shelter building, broken-stove fixing, meal-making out of little food, etc. The family who participated in the program said it was a good experience, but seemed to appreciate their modern amenities more for it.

 

[JazzBaby]

I remember hearing a prediction of the future from around the 30's or so,talkingabout life in 50 years- the 80's. They predicted that with the advancements in electronics and technology, transportation and roadways, etc...that the average person would have so much free time on their hands, that boredom and lazyness would be rampant problems in the modern society!
Ok, I've given up on getting my 'Flying Car', but I WANT MY BOREDOM!!

I'm sure I'm just speaking for myself here, but they were right about the laziness! If I had to get up at the crack of dawn to do chores, I'd whinge about it for the entire day (so unfair, etc.) People back then didn't take free time for granted, and certainly wouldn't have wasted a perfectly fine day off playing The Sims like I did all day...