WHO WE WERE

1961 through 1964

Those were our years. The early sixties – before the dramatic social changes that were about to occur. We were only together at Paschal for 3 years, but the friendships and experiences created a lasting impact.

We were the benefactors of O.D. Wyatt’s honor system and the guinea pigs for Mr. Berry’s foiled attempts to recast the school in his image.

Remember – no tardy bells or hall passes? We ‘ran’ for classes, just like they did in college! There were even teachers, like Mr. Barr, who called us by our surnames. We were far from grown up, but we were beginning to get the feel during those days.

It was a time when girls wore white socks, boys wore no belts, and everybody conformed. You could get a driver’s license at fourteen. It was before the birth control pill and the sexual revolution our younger brothers and sisters experienced. It was before the draft meant much. Until that day President Kennedy was assassinated a few miles away, only the vagaries of the cold war gave us worry about our country.

In 1964 Lyndon Johnson signed the Civil Rights Act. That year Martin Luther King won the Nobel Peace Prize. But we went to classes in a segregated school district where our black contemporaries could only attend Dunbar or Como. Yet most of us were oblivious of the term Jim Crow.

We rode around in cars without seatbelts, the hazards of cigarettes were only vaguely understood, and no one had heard of designated drivers. Gasoline and paint had lead. Soda pop had sugar. Music had a cogent tune but rarely a message. And for all our adolescent anxieties, most of us didn’t have a care.

We read Mad Magazine and maybe sneaked a copy of Lady Chatterly's Lover. We watched I Love Lucy, Leave It To Beaver, The Ed Sullivan Show and Twilight Zone.

Dan Jenkins wrote for the Ft. Worth Press and the Star-Telegram came twice a day.

The TCU theatre had a romantic balcony. A fancy night at the movies was downtown where The Worth, The Palace and the Hollywood bejeweled Seventh Street. (You had to go to the movies, because the movies would never come out on videotape.)

Dinner out was at Kips, Carlson's or Jimmy Dips. The Merry Go Round was always good for a quick burger. The closest decent pizza was at the Pizza Tower near Eastern Hills. The High Hat on Berry Street would often look the other way if you were under 21.  

The world has changed in many ways over forty years. Some are changes we relish; others are things we dread. We may have lost our naïveté but hopefully not our optimism. We admire those ‘newer models’ that are our children and grandchildren, and take stock of what our legacy to them will be.

But for now, let’s reflect on that crazy time from the fall of 1961 to the summer of 1964. It was our exit from childhood and our introduction to adulthood. Let the nostalgia roll!