Remembering our “golden” past of the 1950s

It’s interesting that even liberals who see everything in the 21^st century as dark, racist and the fault of the GOP, can think of the 50s-60s in Mt Morris, Illinois (or Oregon, or Polo, or Columbus, Ohio) as a time of a golden era. I read a lot of blogs, and that misty, foggy view is common among 70-80 year olds. My husband whose high school was larger in acres and people than Mt. Morris, thinks the same thing. Of course, it’s not true; go through your high school annuals and you’ll see people who were white, but were marginalized because they were fat, or ugly, or low intelligence or unathletic or who never got the help they needed or who dropped out of school after 7^th or 8^th grade at age 16 or 17.

(I think this is 1954, confirmation class Trinity Lutheran for 1957 graduates) 

The U.S. in 2020 is so much less racist, less unfair, with more opportunity and ladders to success for the poor than we enlightened folk of the 50s could have ever imagined. We had devoted, but poorly paid teachers, and today the average hourly wage for a public school teacher is over $67/hour—far more than accountants, architects, librarians, farmers, and muffler repairmen. And statistically, there are far fewer poor and marginalized all over the world. Unfortunately, there’s something about being human – enough is never enough. We’re greedy and ungrateful to God for all he supplies. Slavery is also a bigger trade in the 21^st century than it was in the 18^th yet, U.S. and Europe are expected to take the blame for what happened 300 years ago. Life will never be fair. Some things at the micro-level are better, but the macro tells a more ominous story. And people still use the specter of slavery to grab power as well as to build your smart phone.

The U.S. federal social statistics are difficult to read because they always move the goal, but in 1959, families in poverty in the U.S. were 20.8%, and families headed by women were 49.4% (that was a much smaller numerical figure then). In 2018, the last year for compiled stats, poverty for families was 9.7% and for families head by women 26.8%. https://www.census.gov/data/tables/time-series/demo/income-poverty/historical-poverty-people.html The federal government aid has done a lot to dismantle the economic model of the family, but a lot of economic aid is poured into that mistake, and the female headed households are not the victims they used to be, despite the gap. And as I’ve noted before, I still remember the first time I saw a black man in a TV series (Bill Cosby, I Spy) and the first time I saw a black man as a retail clerk in a major chain (Penney’s, Champaign, IL, early 1960s).

So let’s keep some perspective. And watch for the power grabs of today, much of it happening very quickly in the fog of the pandemic.