70's Clothes

When it comes to 70s culture some will call the 70s the best decade ever, while others will say it could have been better. You can probably get those same opinions no matter what decade you are discussing.

The 70s culture was still before cable TV, satellite dishes, microwave ovens... Heck,  VHS wasn't even around yet!  The video games that were available were very simple and hard to find.  Pong was enough to fascinate me for hours.  There were no cell phones or text messages.  For Pete's sake, cordless phones were not even in use yet!  In the 70s, the push button phone was just starting to replace the rotary dial phone.  When we finally got one, I'd stand there and push the buttons just to hear the nifty sounds it made.  Most kids spent their days outside playing various games with their friends or riding bikes.

The 1970s... a Simpler Time

70s culture was simpler, and seemed to run at a slower pace than things do today. The fashions at the beginning of the 70s were bell-bottomed pants leftover from the late 60s and plain black and white fabric tennis shoes. The fashions changed when disco became the rage.  To be hip, you now had to dress in silk print shirts, tight dress “slacks” and have platform shoes.  I never made it to "hip".  The platform shoes slid on the dance floor allowing you to pull off those “Travolta” dance moves. Another fashion trend of 70s culture was the cowboy hat, no matter who you were or where you lived you had to have a cowboy hat. You might not have worn it regularly, but you had one to pull out on special occasions.  My aunt (who lived in Texas) even bought me one.  I never really wore it though.  I did have an uncle who bought into this fad though.  Someone convinced him that he looked like Burt Reynolds when he wore his cowboy hat.  He even grew a pencil thin mustache to complete the Smokey and the Bandit look!  He was still sporting that babe magnet the last time I saw him, which was some time in 2010.

McDonald's was a big restaurant in many areas, but in some places, the golden arches didn't arrive until late in the 70s. If you wanted to have a meal away from home, it was a mom and pops diner or Burger Chef. If you got to the more populated areas, your choices of eat out restaurants would increase, but there were still far less of them than there are now. In 70s culture you had three methods of listening to your favorite music, number one was the vinyl album, FM radio was starting to overcome AM as the most popular choice of radio. Then you had the 8-track tape deck.  8-track players and tapes were less expensive than albums and turntables, so many people opted for the 8-track. Cassette players made the scene, but not until very late in the decade.  I still remember using my first tape recorder to make an audio tape of my tenth birthday party.  I wonder where that ever ended up?

Entertainment in the 70s

To see a movie you had to go to the theater.  Movies did not make it to TV for many years. The movies you could watch on TV were extremely old.  That's probably why I still picture everything from before 1965 or so, in black and white.  Television has come a long way since the 70s, you had an aluminum antenna that could bring in four or five channels maximum. Then came the rotor box, this handy device allowed you to turn your antenna from inside the home. The rotor box could double your choices of television stations depending on where you lived.  You spun the dial, and listened to the loud "kerCHUNK" sound as the antenna on top of your house magically moved into the best position for the channel you wanted to watch.   Yes,  the 70s were far different than today.   For those of us that grew up in the 70s, we think it was the best of times.  Watergate and the energy crisis were just stories on the news for the most part.  Most people feel that their childhood decade was the best.   It probably has more to do with being a kid than what decade the calendar reads.