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Source: (consider it)
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Thread: What are your earliest political memories?
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Jane R
Shipmate
# 331
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Posted
I remember the miners' work to rule and the three-day week in 1973-4. I remember NOT BEING ALLOWED TO READ WHEN THE POWER WAS OFF - because my mother thought it would hurt my eyes. I had a grudge against the NUM for years as a result. I think that's my earliest political memory, though I also remember going to the polling booth with my mother (in the days when children got a day off school if their school was used as a polling station) so perhaps it's just the earliest dateable memory.
Posts: 3958 | From: Jorvik | Registered: May 2001
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Gee D
Shipmate
# 13815
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Posted
The rule here (and I think in the UK) was that a person convicted of felony could not stand or vote for Parliament. I have a recollection that that has changed here recently under some human rights legislation.
My earliest political memory is of soldiers going off to Korea, then of George VI dying. There are vague memories of the Labour Party loss in the Federal election at about the same time. The memory I have is the pleasure a great-uncle had in the victory, as he had some role in the state organisation of the Liberal Party. I also have a very strong memory of the shelling of the offshore islands of Quemoy and Matsu, and the fears of the consequences. An earlier version of the 1962 Cuban crisis.
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Not every Anglican in Sydney is Sydney Anglican
Posts: 7028 | From: Warrawee NSW Australia | Registered: Jun 2008
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Og, King of Bashan
Ship's giant Amorite
# 9562
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Posted
quote:
Originally posted by Off Centre View:
I remember something happening to Gorbachev (arrested or kept under house arrest or something?) because my parents talked about it when we were on holiday.
I was at my first week long sleep away church camp when that went down. We were only 45 minutes from my parents house, but my mother still wrote to me every day, and I still have the letters detailing the world's confusion over what was going to happen.
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"I like to eat crawfish and drink beer. That's despair?" ― Walker Percy
Posts: 3259 | From: Denver, Colorado, USA | Registered: May 2005
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Porridge
Shipmate
# 15405
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Posted
quote:
Originally posted by Dogwalker:
Porridge,
I suspect your parents were on about James Michael Curley, Governor of Massachusetts, Mayor of Boston and Congressman, and three-time felon, according to the linked Wikipedia article.
Aha! That's the guy. And from the dates in the article, it appears the political grudges must have begun early, or been inherited from my grandparents.
(Though I suspect my maternal grandmother was an FDR Democrat. She had a cat named Eleanor Roosevelt.)
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Spiggott: Everything I've ever told you is a lie, including that.
Moon: Including what?
Spiggott: That everything I've ever told you is a lie.
Moon: That's not true!
Posts: 3925 | From: Upper right corner | Registered: Jan 2010
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Timothy the Obscure
Mostly Friendly
# 292
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Posted
The presidential election of 1960. Kennedy and Nixon both made whistle-stops in Ann Arbor, and we were excused from school to see them. I went to both, though I don't remember (and surely wouldn't have understood) anything they said (I was 6 going on 7). Most of the people I knew were for Kennedy, though my father was a Republican (he got over it). He now says that when he got into the voting booth, he started to push the lever for Nixon, and found he just couldn't do it.
I had a friend a year or so younger who made "Nixon for President" signs just because his family were all for Kennedy, and generally made a pest of himself about it.
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When you think of the long and gloomy history of man, you will find more hideous crimes have been committed in the name of obedience than have ever been committed in the name of rebellion.
- C. P. Snow
Posts: 6114 | From: PDX | Registered: May 2001
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Enoch
Shipmate
# 14322
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Posted
quote:
Originally posted by Porridge:
quote:
Originally posted by Dogwalker:
Porridge,
I suspect your parents were on about James Michael Curley, Governor of Massachusetts, Mayor of Boston and Congressman, and three-time felon, according to the linked Wikipedia article.
Aha! That's the guy. And from the dates in the article, it appears the political grudges must have begun early, or been inherited from my grandparents.
(Though I suspect my maternal grandmother was an FDR Democrat. She had a cat named Eleanor Roosevelt.)
Thanks for the link. What a truly dreadful example. Would make a great film, but horrible in life.
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Brexit wrexit - Sir Graham Watson
Posts: 7610 | From: Bristol UK(was European Green Capital 2015, now Ljubljana) | Registered: Nov 2008
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Off Centre View
Shipmate
# 4254
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Posted
quote:
Originally posted by Og, King of Bashan:
quote:
Originally posted by Off Centre View:
I remember something happening to Gorbachev (arrested or kept under house arrest or something?) because my parents talked about it when we were on holiday.
I was at my first week long sleep away church camp when that went down. We were only 45 minutes from my parents house, but my mother still wrote to me every day, and I still have the letters detailing the world's confusion over what was going to happen.
Thanks Og; it was a really confusing time - I don't think even the CIA predicted the old Soviet Union would fall!
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Looking for Authenticity in the Corporate Abyss? Change Your Self, Change Your Workplace, Change Your World: www.corporateabyss.com
Posts: 1685 | From: wherever I may wander | Registered: Mar 2003
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Albertus
Shipmate
# 13356
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Posted
Good Lord! The Ship is full of children! - was my first thought on reading this. Then I started counting and I realised that this all happened 22 years ago.
Me (born 1967): the power cuts of the Three-Day week period (we had a gas cooker and were better off than our neighbours who had electric ones, and for that reason for years I thought a gas cooker was a wiser choice), cartoons by I think Gibberd in the Guardian of Edward Heath and the TUC (always symbolised by a bloke in a donkey jacket with TUC across the shoulders), and for some reason the first politician, other than Heath, I remember is Alec Douglas-Hume, who was Foreign Secretary. I've no idea why, except perhaps that he looked a bit different from all the others.
Posts: 6498 | From: Y Sowth | Registered: Jan 2008
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The Rogue
Shipmate
# 2275
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Posted
I was born about a month before JFK was killed so I don't remember that. My earliest political memories are of Mike Yarwood (British impressionist) doing Ted Heath and Harold Wilson. Also, I remember the power cuts of the 70s. My Mum and Dad made it fun and exciting and we gathered in one room and played word games by candlelight. In other words (although I didn't think of it like this at the time) when someone decided to make a political point by stuffing up everybody else we just got on with it.
I still prefer gas and I suspect that's why.
[ 12. June 2013, 09:19: Message edited by: The Rogue ]
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If everyone starts thinking outside the box does outside the box come back inside?
Posts: 2507 | From: Toton | Registered: Feb 2002
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Jengie jon
Semper Reformanda
# 273
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Posted
I can just remember Watergate, certainly remember the powercuts and the battle between Wilson and Heath. Actually as a teenager was taken to hear Heath at a political meeting, but that was in the 1980s. My Dad referred to him as the sort of old fashioned Tory you could respect. Actually I suspect my first memory is attending a political march. It was a Trades Unions and their banners were out and each group was marching behind the appropriate one maybe even a few brass bands. I do not think they were protesting at anything, rather it was a sort of solidarity parade, it had a bit of the feel of a Lord Mayor's procession. Certainly it was the sort of things that the crowds stood along the route to cheer the marchers on.
Jengie
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"To violate a persons ability to distinguish fact from fantasy is the epistemological equivalent of rape." Noretta Koertge
Back to my blog
Posts: 20894 | From: city of steel, butterflies and rainbows | Registered: May 2001
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Jane R
Shipmate
# 331
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Posted
Albertus: quote:
...we had a gas cooker and were better off than our neighbours who had electric ones, and for that reason for years I thought a gas cooker was a wiser choice...
We thought so too. We had an electric cooker and were reduced to cooking over our open fire. My mother's favourite saucepan was never the same again. After that experience we always had gas cookers, which involved knocking a hole in the outside wall and having Calor gas cylinders in the garden because our village didn't have mains gas.
[ 12. June 2013, 12:29: Message edited by: Jane R ]
Posts: 3958 | From: Jorvik | Registered: May 2001
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Kyzyl
Ship's dog
# 374
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Posted
Being sent home early from kindergarten and finding my mom and a few other moms gathered in our house around our color tv - President Kennedy had been killed. My next full political memory also included an assassinated Kennedy. I came down early one morning and found my father and sister sadly conversing. My sister was going to be voting in her presidential election and was an RFK backer. She and Dad had stayed up to watch the primary returns from California. Saw it all happen live. I also spent a very hot Houston summer gladly watching the Watergate hearings in the AC.
Posts: 668 | From: Wapasha's Prairie | Registered: Jun 2001
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Sir Kevin
Ship's Gaffer
# 3492
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Posted
My first political memory was the Kitchen debates/discussions with Nikita Kruschev.
My most vivid memory was being in my fourth grade classroom when the principal burst in and she was crying. It was 22 November 1963...
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If you board the wrong train, it is no use running along the corridor in the other direction Dietrich Bonhoeffer
Writing is currently my hobby, not yet my profession.
Posts: 30517 | From: White Hart Lane | Registered: Oct 2002
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georgiaboy
Shipmate
# 11294
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Posted
Like Kyzyl above, I too watched the Watergate hearings -- I remember Barbara Jordan particularly. (But I was working nights and dragged the TV out by the pool!)
My earliest political memories are (very vaguely) the radio broadcast of FDR's funeral procession, and being asked to a neighbor's house to watch the Coronation of E2 on their brand-new TV (we didn't yet have one) -- I guess that counts a political?
My first presidential vote was for John Kennedy.
(All of which, I guess, puts me in the geezer class.)
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You can't retire from a calling.
Posts: 1675 | From: saint meinrad, IN | Registered: Apr 2006
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rolyn
Shipmate
# 16840
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Posted
I was born in early 60s and often used to be sat in front of a TV at 6 O'Clock with 2 of my brothers while our parents were out working their farm.
I recall the news read by grey-haired robert dougal with it's grey goo of the Vietnam war/Soviet threat , problems in Northern Ireland, Harold Wilson etc.
My first real awareness of what politics actually meant was when Ted Heath got the boot after the power-cuts and 3-day week in 73-4 .
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Change is the only certainty of existence
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Huia
Shipmate
# 3473
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Posted
One of the earliest memories I have (aged about 4) was shopping for some pineapple with my mother who refused to buy anything South African. She only changer her buying habits when Nelson Mandela came to power)
Then, in 1959 the "No Maoris, no Tour" movement to stop a planned rugby tour of SA by The All Blacks because the South African Government was refusing to allow Maori players to enter the country.
Huia
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Charity gives food from the table, Justice gives a place at the table.
Posts: 10382 | From: Te Wai Pounamu | Registered: Oct 2002
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Palimpsest
Shipmate
# 16772
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Posted
quote:
Originally posted by Enoch:
quote:
Originally posted by Porridge:
... I recall my parents fulminating over a local official who got elected while serving time in jail. ...
That's some achievement. How did he (I assume he) manage that? And what was he in for - corruption? You don't even have a vote here if you're in jail. It's an issue at the moment.
It was probably James Michael Curley Mayor of Boston and Governor of Massachusetts in the days when the Irish Machine ran politics.
His first of two convictions was for taking the civil service exam for postman for a constituent.
Posts: 2990 | From: Seattle WA. US | Registered: Nov 2011
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The Phantom Flan Flinger
Shipmate
# 8891
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Posted
My earliest memory is Margaret Thatcher coming to power in 1979 - I remember it being a big deal that the PM was a woman for the first time. Being 4 years old at the time, I didn't realise that it was a distinct possibility, I thought it had taken everybody by surprise.
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http://www.faith-hope-and-confusion.com/
Posts: 1020 | From: Leicester, England | Registered: Dec 2004
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Sir Kevin
Ship's Gaffer
# 3492
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Posted
quote:
Originally posted by rolyn:
I recall the news....Harold Wilson etc.
I was in London when he became Prime Minister and Barber was Chancellor of the Exchequer. As a young adult, I bought his book,
The Governance of Britain.
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If you board the wrong train, it is no use running along the corridor in the other direction Dietrich Bonhoeffer
Writing is currently my hobby, not yet my profession.
Posts: 30517 | From: White Hart Lane | Registered: Oct 2002
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vw man
Shipmate
# 13951
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Posted
The time J F K was shot.
It was the night my parents went out for yhe night and left my sister who is a few years older than me our own ,the tv programs for the night stoped to have non stop news coverage ,I did not fully understand but I knew it was serious
Posts: 115 | From: Derbyshire | Registered: Jul 2008
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ArachnidinElmet
Shipmate
# 17346
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Posted
I've been racking my brains for a particular first memory, but can't come up with one. It seems more like a gradual progression. A drip feed of mentions of the IRA on news bulletins, Spitting Image, things said by adults around me (grandmother really not a fan of Thatcher) and charity singles (Band Aid etc). The individual things didn't necessary link up till much later though.
Weirdly, I don't remember much about the miner's strike. I was very young, but living in the heart of mining country with a close relative working as a pit electrician, you'd have thought it would have been memorable.
It's amazing how much you pick up when you're young. It makes me wonder what children now pick up and where from.
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'If a pleasant, straight-forward life is not possible then one must try to wriggle through by subtle manoeuvres' - Kafka
Posts: 1887 | From: the rhubarb triangle | Registered: Sep 2012
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The5thMary
Shipmate
# 12953
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Posted
I was born in 1967 and remained clueless about any political stuff until Jimmy Carter, mostly. I do remember some of the neighborhood boys were off, fighting in Vietnam. I guess I lived a rather oblivious life or I just wasn't interested. I wasn't even all that aware of the Carter administration except some of the kids I hung out with taught me a (stupid) song that we all thought was clever and hilarious. It was sung to the Oscar Mayer hot dog t.v. theme. I do remember my mother crying as she watched some political funeral broadcast on t.v. Hoover, somebody, because when she told me, I looked at our Hoover vacuum cleaner and said, "He made our vacuum cleaner?" and she told me to be quiet, she wanted to watch the funeral. I was all of four years old, I think.
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God gave me my face but She let me pick my nose.
Posts: 3451 | From: Tacoma, WA USA | Registered: Aug 2007
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Stetson
Shipmate
# 9597
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Posted
quote:
I do remember my mother crying as she watched some political funeral broadcast on t.v. Hoover, somebody, because when she told me, I looked at our Hoover vacuum cleaner and said, "He made our vacuum cleaner?" and she told me to be quiet, she wanted to watch the funeral. I was all of four years old, I think.
Possibly J. Edgar, because he died in 1972.
Posts: 6574 | From: back and forth between bible belts | Registered: Jun 2005
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L'organist
Shipmate
# 17338
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Posted
quote:
posted by Sir Kevin
I was in London when he became Prime Minister and Barber was Chancellor of the Exchequer. As a young adult, I bought his book, The Governance of Britain.
Think you're getting a bit confused Sir K:
Harold Wilson's Chancellor after the 1964 election was James Callaghan, and it was Denis Healey in 1974.
Anthony Barber was Chancellor for Ted Heath.
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Rara temporum felicitate ubi sentire quae velis et quae sentias dicere licet
Posts: 4950 | From: somewhere in England... | Registered: Sep 2012
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Deputy Verger
Shipmate
# 15876
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Posted
22nd November 1963. No debate, that's my first political memory – and evidently I'm not alone. It was also the first time I remember seeing grown-ups cry.
It was only recently I realised that nearly five years passed between the funerals of JFK and Martin Luther King Jr. In my childish memory they seemed very close together – but they were definitely my first funeral “experiences” - both on the same small black-and-white television. So my sense of politics had a lot to do with assassination.
Later, I was in England and I have very clear memories of the three-day week, working by gaslight (on a manual typewriter) and shopping by candlelight in Spar – the so-called “supermarket”.
In the Thatcher/Reagan years, when the Nuclear Clock, or whatever they call it, was almost at midnight, I was also scared of nuclear annihilation. I thought the “leaders of the free world” were both pretty evil warmongers.
(Who knew I was so close in age to Ken and Sir Kevin? This has been a very revealing thread in terms of the ages of our Shipmates!)
Posts: 475 | From: London | Registered: Sep 2010
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Gwai
Shipmate
# 11076
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Posted
I know I am dating myself here, but I remember the break-up of the Soviet Union. I would have been between 6 and 8. I remember my mother getting a National Geographic about it and saying maybe it would really happen. It was definitely still up in the air then, so I'm guessing this was well before it was all final in late '91. Her excitement that the Cold War was finally ending, maybe, was contagious and I remember a deep sense of awe. I looked at the colors on the map in the Nat Geo, and saw the gigantic'normous country that was maybe going to become so many countries. She mentioned something about the Iron Curtain coming down and I confused it with a literal curtain--I think I was picturing the Berlin Wall*, basically. I remember being fascinated by the August coup too and was seriously disappointed when Gorbachev turned out not to be a simple hero. I loved the drama of his escape from danger in the coup--at least the way I understood the coup at the time--and wanted him to be a simple white knight.
*Actually, I remember the Berlin Wall coming down too, which was probably before my USSR-related memories, but I didn't really understand the implications. I mean I was glad people could go see their family now, but it wasn't real.
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A master of men was the Goodly Fere,
A mate of the wind and sea.
If they think they ha’ slain our Goodly Fere
They are fools eternally.
Posts: 11914 | From: Chicago | Registered: Feb 2006
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Zappa
Ship's Wake
# 8433
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Posted
My parents being apoplectic because some dude called Harold Wilson had become Something Important™. I was a child living in Ghana at the time. It was soon followed by unrelated riots when some dude called Kwame Nkrumah was couped d'etated (or whatever the verb might be).
By the time I became interested in politics I was living on small and shaky islands far, far away, and the Prime Minister, a man named Norman Kirk, suddenly died ![[Tear]](graemlins/tear.gif) . I still thought Labour (later I would move countries again and it would become Labor) were The Enemies of Common Sense and Decency (he was a Labour PM). Now I know that phrase refers to all politicians.
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shameless self promotion - because I think it's worth it
and mayhap this too: http://broken-moments.blogspot.co.nz/
Posts: 18917 | From: "Central" is all they call it | Registered: Sep 2004
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Oscar P.
Shipmate
# 10412
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Posted
Like several who have posted, my earliest memory is of President Kennedy's assassination in 1963. I was in first grade and remember my teachers being upset and telling us to sit quietly in our seats because something bad had happened. A few days later I remember being irritated with my parents because my sisters and I were made to sit and watch the funeral on TV when we wanted to go play.
Posts: 93 | From: Gateway to the West | Registered: Sep 2005
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The5thMary
Shipmate
# 12953
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Posted
quote:
Originally posted by Stetson:
quote:
I do remember my mother crying as she watched some political funeral broadcast on t.v. Hoover, somebody, because when she told me, I looked at our Hoover vacuum cleaner and said, "He made our vacuum cleaner?" and she told me to be quiet, she wanted to watch the funeral. I was all of four years old, I think.
Possibly J. Edgar, because he died in 1972.
I think you may be right and that scares me. Crying about J. Edgar Hoover?! Holy shit, I hope my mother wasn't that right wing! She voted for Jimmy Carter, though... maybe she was just having a bad day or something. Couldn't get to the liquor store or ran out of cigarettes... God, the thought of her crying FOR that vile man... ![[Eek!]](eek.gif)
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God gave me my face but She let me pick my nose.
Posts: 3451 | From: Tacoma, WA USA | Registered: Aug 2007
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Stetson
Shipmate
# 9597
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Posted
quote:
I think you may be right and that scares me. Crying about J. Edgar Hoover?! Holy shit, I hope my mother wasn't that right wing! She voted for Jimmy Carter, though... maybe she was just having a bad day or something. Couldn't get to the liquor store or ran out of cigarettes... God, the thought of her crying FOR that vile man...
Well, obviously, I didn't know your mother, but I'd imagine that a lot of people who mourned Hoover wouldn't have known much about his vile practices, and were merely remembering him by his image of Mr. Competent Law Enforcement.
I know my mother cried for Kennedy, and would still cry for him today. But I don't consider him much better than Hoover, quite frankly. No offense to any Camelot swooners here, but even LBJ referred to Kennedy's meddlings in Latin America as "a goddam Murder Inc.", and felt himself obligated to rein it in.
And I'd be wiliing to bet that Kennedy farmed out at least some of his domestic dirty-work to J. Edgar Hoover.
Posts: 6574 | From: back and forth between bible belts | Registered: Jun 2005
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Timothy the Obscure
Mostly Friendly
# 292
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Posted
More likely Herbert Hoover, who died in 1964. I doubt J. Edgar's funeral was televised, but an ex-president's would have been.
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When you think of the long and gloomy history of man, you will find more hideous crimes have been committed in the name of obedience than have ever been committed in the name of rebellion.
- C. P. Snow
Posts: 6114 | From: PDX | Registered: May 2001
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Stetson
Shipmate
# 9597
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Posted
quote:
Originally posted by Timothy the Obscure:
More likely Herbert Hoover, who died in 1964. I doubt J. Edgar's funeral was televised, but an ex-president's would have been.
Yeah, but Mary says she was born in 1967. And according to this, J. Edgar Hoover's funeral was carried live by the networks. That's mentioned in the 13th paragraph.
[ 21. June 2013, 19:36: Message edited by: Stetson ]
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I have the power...Lucifer is lord!
Posts: 6574 | From: back and forth between bible belts | Registered: Jun 2005
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Timothy the Obscure
Mostly Friendly
# 292
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Posted
Wow. That's kind of freaky. I don't know how I missed it. It would have been a good occasion for a party.
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When you think of the long and gloomy history of man, you will find more hideous crimes have been committed in the name of obedience than have ever been committed in the name of rebellion.
- C. P. Snow
Posts: 6114 | From: PDX | Registered: May 2001
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Stetson
Shipmate
# 9597
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Posted
quote:
Originally posted by Timothy the Obscure:
Wow. That's kind of freaky. I don't know how I missed it. It would have been a good occasion for a party.
My impression, buttressed by the Clint Eastwood biopic, is that J. Edgar Hoover pretty much established a personality-cult around himself. At least according to the film, he was actually called before congress and made to answer questions about why FBI-endorsed comic-books exaggerated his role in the solving of various cases.
So, if there's any American civil-servant who would be granted a televised funeral, it would probably he him.
Posts: 6574 | From: back and forth between bible belts | Registered: Jun 2005
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Anna B
Shipmate
# 1439
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Posted
I remember seeing a poster with the Presidents' faces on the wall of my kindergarten classroom. The newest was Gerald Ford.
A later memory: My father was not a fan of Jimmy Carter, and often ranted on this subject. One day we were all sitting at dinner when he started up. I said, "Dad, I know that you don't agree with President Carter, but he is our President and we should respect him." I cannot for the life of me remember how those words came to me, a third-grader. In any case my father turned the color of a beet and the subject was permanently dropped.
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Bad Christian (TM)
Posts: 3069 | From: near a lot of fish | Registered: Oct 2001
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Stetson
Shipmate
# 9597
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Posted
quote:
Originally posted by Timothy the Obscure:
Wow. That's kind of freaky. I don't know how I missed it. It would have been a good occasion for a party.
Apparently some of the footage of that funeral has survived. Possibly NSFW!(You'll see what I mean right after clicking).
It doesn't say if this footage comes from a TV broadcast.
Posts: 6574 | From: back and forth between bible belts | Registered: Jun 2005
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cygnus
Shipmate
# 3294
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Posted
I vaguely remember Canada getting its new flag (1965), and a couple of years later remember getting a day off school for the Governor General's funeral (Vanier), although we had no TV at that point so I never saw it.
It was the following year that I remember a lot from- I was old enough to understand more, and 1968 was a momentous year. I remember both the MLK and the RFK assassinations, Trudeaumania, and the Prague spring (followed by the Soviet invasion). This one hit close to home as my father is Slovak Canadian. All of these were discussed at school and in the schoolyard, although I was only in Grade 3/4 at the time. I think that's when I became a news junkie and started reading my parents' Time magazines.
Posts: 123 | From: canada | Registered: Sep 2002
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Stetson
Shipmate
# 9597
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Posted
Cygnus wrote:
quote:
I think that's when I became a news junkie and started reading my parents' Time magazines.
Remember the 1970s split editions, with government-endorsed Canadian content? I never quite got the idea of putting CanCon in American newsmagazines. Doesn't that just make them competitive against Canadian-owned publications?
I also recall Jack Davis, of Mad Magazine, illustrating Time covers of that era. He captured the frazzled spirit of the times well.
Swinging across the pond, I think a close second for my earliest memory of British politics would be the trial of Jermey Thorpe, which apparently started right after the 1979 election.
[ 24. June 2013, 16:08: Message edited by: Stetson ]
Posts: 6574 | From: back and forth between bible belts | Registered: Jun 2005
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The5thMary
Shipmate
# 12953
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Posted
georgiaboy: (All of which, I guess, puts me in the geezer class.)
Yes, isn't it about time you changed your name to georgiaMAN? Or, georgiaANCIENT? georgiaHASBEEN? Oh, I could go on and on. All this time I've been thinking you were a young whippersnapper, even younger than me (I just turned 46 on June 18). ![[Smile]](smile.gif)
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God gave me my face but She let me pick my nose.
Posts: 3451 | From: Tacoma, WA USA | Registered: Aug 2007
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ChaliceGirl
Shipmate
# 13656
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Posted
I was about 5 or 6 when I kept hearing the word "Watergate" on TV but I had no clue what it meant.
I was 7 or 8 when I wrote to President Carter and his daughter Amy. The White House send me back lovely booklet that taught children about the president and the White House. I cherished that!
Posts: 710 | From: Philadelphia, PA, USA | Registered: Apr 2008
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The5thMary
Shipmate
# 12953
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Posted
quote:
Originally posted by ChaliceGirl:
I was about 5 or 6 when I kept hearing the word "Watergate" on TV but I had no clue what it meant.
I was 7 or 8 when I wrote to President Carter and his daughter Amy. The White House send me back lovely booklet that taught children about the president and the White House. I cherished that!
I remember some relatives sneering about Jimmy Carter being "just a Southern redneck peanut farmer!". Oh, but was that worse than a mediocre actor from "woo woo" California? Boy, they just went on and on about Carter being a peanut farmer. Hey, it worked for George Washington Carver! I love peanuts!
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God gave me my face but She let me pick my nose.
Posts: 3451 | From: Tacoma, WA USA | Registered: Aug 2007
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Sioni Sais
Shipmate
# 5713
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Posted
I suppose my earliest political memory is of huge US Air Force planes being loaded with Thor missiles that had been operated by the RAF. It was only years later that I found out that this was part of the deal that prevented us all being turned to glass during the Cuba missile crisis.
A year or so later I remember my mum stomping round the house in a bad move because "the Socialists" had got in, at the expense of that nice Mr Heath.
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"He isn't Doctor Who, he's The Doctor"
(Paul Sinha, BBC)
Posts: 24276 | From: Newport, Wales | Registered: Apr 2004
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Stetson
Shipmate
# 9597
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Posted
quote:
Boy, they just went on and on about Carter being a peanut farmer. Hey, it worked for George Washington Carver! I love peanuts!
It would probably be more accurate to describe Carter as a mid-level agricultural businessman, with training as a nuclear physicist.
But "peanut farmer" made for better jokes. And admittedly, brother Billy did not do much to help with banishing the hick image.
Posts: 6574 | From: back and forth between bible belts | Registered: Jun 2005
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Chorister
Completely Frocked
# 473
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Posted
I had to find out the names of the leaders of each political party for homework when I was about 9 years old. I can remember thinking it was something to do with birthday parties at first. ![[Hot and Hormonal]](icon_redface.gif)
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Retired, sitting back and watching others for a change.
Posts: 34626 | From: Cream Tealand | Registered: Jun 2001
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mark_in_manchester
not waving, but...
# 15978
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Posted
I remember (age 5) asking my mum about the Jeremy Thorpe affair. And, to her credit, emerging with some sense that 'some men like to live with other men' - but that it was somehow odd, hard to talk about...
At only a slightly older age, my oldest had read a poem at a civil partnership ceremony. How times change.
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"We are punished by our sins, not for them" - Elbert Hubbard
(so good, I wanted to see it after my posts and not only after those of shipmate JBohn from whom I stole it)
Posts: 1596 | Registered: Oct 2010
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mark_in_manchester
not waving, but...
# 15978
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Posted
Oops, sorry Stetson, you beat me to it. That'll learn me to read the thread more carefully...
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"We are punished by our sins, not for them" - Elbert Hubbard
(so good, I wanted to see it after my posts and not only after those of shipmate JBohn from whom I stole it)
Posts: 1596 | Registered: Oct 2010
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Stetson
Shipmate
# 9597
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Posted
quote:
Oops, sorry Stetson
No need to apologize. Your anecdote was an interesting one. It pretty much captures the way I heard homosexuality discussed by adults in the same era.
I think Thorpe might have been the first public figure I ever heard about being discussed as homosexual, though I had learned about homosexuality itself in the mid-70s.
Posts: 6574 | From: back and forth between bible belts | Registered: Jun 2005
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cliffdweller
Shipmate
# 13338
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Posted
My earliest political memories include my mom as a block organizer for tricky Dick Nixon in '60, and a rousing playground game of tag we played in '64 that was framed as Democrats v. Republicans.
More seriously I remember the principal coming into my 2nd grade classroom to tell us Pres. Kennedy had been shot, and of course the poignant funeral. I remember watching TV coverage of the looting during the L.A. riots and asking my dad why we didn't go downtown too to get a free TV.
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"Here is the world. Beautiful and terrible things will happen. Don't be afraid." -Frederick Buechner
Posts: 11242 | From: a small canyon overlooking the city | Registered: Jan 2008
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