generational markers (was "Disney's Man In Space")

In article ,
says...


Mike Flugennock wrote:


So now, I'm wondering what the generational markers are for those of us
who were school kids pre-Mercury, as opposed to post-Mercury -- between
the kids who could only look at books and imagine what rocket ships looked
like, and the kids who had TV's wheeled into the lunchroom so we could
watch the Gemini launches and who knew _exactly_ what a _real_ rocket ship
looked like.


In my case (born same year you were) the markers would be:
1.) Did you demand to your parents that the barber give you a crewcut,
because that's what the astronauts had?

Nope -- I got what was called in my neck of the woods the "West Point"
haircut, because that's the cut that Al Shepard sported. (I know, he
was a Navy man -- go fig.) It was a crew cut with the very front left a
*tiny* bit longer and shaped in to something that, if it was larger,
might have resembled the visor on a baseball cap.

2.) Did you habitually use the term "AOK" when talking?

Nope, I used "Rog" and "copy" a lot, though. And every time I saw
something that was really outstanding, I had a tendency to say "That
view is spectacular!"

3.) Was your school pencil sharpener a plastic Mercury capsule?

Yep, I had one of those.

4.) Did you develop a real fascination with tubes of toothpaste, because
there were tubes just like that that contained _food_ rather than
toothpaste?

Sort of, but I actually got more into taking Tang, some Saran Wrap, an
iron and some paper and making my own drink bags.

5.) Did you ever own a plastic Col. McCauley helmet with a "microphone"
that had a sheet of plastic in it that gave your voice a buzzing sound?

No, never got my folks to get me one of those. (Never got them to get
me a toy Supercar, either... *sigh*...) But I was so desirous of having
a helmet with visor that, in the summer of 1962 when I was six years
old, when my folks were laying linoleum tile in the basement of our new
house, I took one of the boxes the tile came in, cut out a faceplate,
and wore that. Unfortunately, I put it on the handlebars of my bike and
rode my bike off to my friend's house to show him, and decided to take
it off the handlebars and put it on while I was riding. The handlebars
went sideways, and with them the front wheel of the bike. Because my
arm was crossing over my body reaching for the helmet, my balance was
shot, and I fell over sideways, breaking both bones in my lower right
arm. Stuck out through the skin, they did.

So, I've suffered broken bomes indulging my love of space...

6.) Were rubber buckle-up snowshoes a really cool thing, because they
looked like part of a pressure suit?

Actually, gloves were the things I thought were kewl. I would strap a
book bag to my chest (my life support system chest pack), don my thick
winter gloves, and try to use standard household tools like pliers and
wrenches and such to assemble and disassemble things. All the time
wishing I could somehow manage to recreate zero-G.

7.) Did you ever think that Sister Linda, your fifth-grade
teacher....might be a lot of fun in the sack?

Naw... I went to public schools through the end of junior high and then
to the university laboratory high school for high school, so no Sisters
(in that meaning, anyway). But I had a teacher in high school that I
lusted after every moment of every day in my junior year... funny, now I
can't even remember her name.

8.) Did you ever suspect that the Mother Superior of your school might
be thinking the same thing? :-)

See above -- but I know for a fact that the (male) principal at my high
school felt the same way about the one teacher I lusted after. So did
most everyone else at the school.

I just wish she had been one of those teachers who liked the idea of
seducing her brightest students, LOL...

Doug