70s/early 80s

Most of us were kids in the 70s/early 80s. What do you remember the most from that era? TV, music, clothes, etc....

In the 70's I remember AM radio was king. Listened to tons of soft-rock hits on AM radio. Nowadays it seems that AM radio is relegated to news and talk shows (or in our region there are several spanish language channels on AM radio).

The 80's clothes and hair styles were just hilarious. Lots of leg warmers and poofed up hair (with tons of Aqua net hair spray) for the girls. And zippered parachute pants with sleeveless "muscle shirts" for the guys.

In order and in a nutshell:
Super 8 video. Rabbit ears on the TV. Skateboarding. Elvis's death. Cheap clothes from K-mart and Thrift stores (we were poor). 8-tracks in my brothers 1st car. Courdoroys(sp?). Getting in trouble. Recording hours of rock onto blank tapes from KMET radio. Video Discs. Mork and Mindy. My first 3 actual cassettes: VH-Diver Down, Kiss-Creatures of the Night, and Peter Schilling-Error in the System. BMX jumping. My first concert= Van Halen 1984. Beta, then VHS. ALF.

and best of all in 1989: SALVATION

How about video arcades (I spent alot of money there), Smokey and The Bandit, big console TV's, Big Macs for less than a dollar, coke in glass bottles, urban cowboys...

corduroy's I hated wearing them to school...people could hear you walking.

and I can't believe I left out Arcade places ! We spent hours and lots of hard earned quarters at those places

Big hair on the pertyful girls.....yummy...I mean WOW!!!

My cousins' Bay City Rollers albums, AM radio, the taboo FM station in town that played all of this Black Sabbath and AC/DC garbage that no respectable person would ever listen to, "Pac Man Fever", oh yeah video arcades, Smokey and the Bandit, The Dukes of Hazzard, the scene from Airplane where the naked woman jumps out of her seat during the turbulence & Barbara Billingsly speaking jive, roller skating parties at school, Queen's "Another One Bites the Dust", Steve Miller Band's "Abracadabra," my fifth grade music teacher calling John Cougar's "Jack and Diane" obscene while praising the virtuous "Physical" by Olivia Newton John, the poster that came with a TV offer of Olivia Newton John's greatest hits, MTV showing videos, the Reagan shooting, the first Columbia liftoff, the Soviet boycott of the Lake Placid Olympics & the US boycott of the Moscow ones, the Ford/Carter election, the Iranian hostage crisis, my Mom's green Plymouth Road Runner, the Six Million Dollar Man...

The 70's-Hot Wheels, 20" bicycles with hi-rise handlebars and 6' sissy bars; The Brady Bunch, The Partridge Family, Gilligan's Island and Gunsmoke on tv; 8-tracks, vinyl records(LP & 45), and later, cassettes,AM radio(WLS Chicago!) and FM album rock stations(WKDQ Henderson, Ky); my first car-a '65 Mustang, and my high school graduation. The 80's- a lot of hypocrisy(mine, unfortunately), alcoholism, drug abuse, my first marriage, LOTS of jamming, tearing up and down the highway on my motorcycle, and discovering that I am indeed, a headbanger. Came home to Jesus in Sept. '90-but that's another decade!

And no one has mentioned the cartoons yet? Warner Bros. was the champion with Looney Tunes (a three hour show on Saturday morning... nice), but there were lots of others.

Sid and Marty Kroft had a lot of great shows. HR Pufnstuf and Land of the Lost were probably the most famous, but they had lots of others that featured well known stars like Lidsville (Charles Nelson Riley), The Lost Saucer (Jim Nabors and Ruth Buzzi) and Far Out Space Nuts (Bob Denver).

Hannah-Barbera and a lot of nice stuff as well. Everyone knows Huckleberry Hound and Yogi Bear, The Jetsons and Quick Draw McGraw; but they had some more obscure things like like Hong Kong Phooey, Wheelie and the Chopper Bunch, Speed Buggy, Space Ghost, Jabberjaw, Clue Club, and my favorite, Captain Caveman. They rolled all of them into one big goofy Olympics style show called the Laff-A-Lympics. Anyone remember that? They had three teams, The Super Scoobies, The Yogi Yahooeys, and the Really Rottens (the villains).

There were others too. Fat Albert was a favorite and the Wonder Twins was okay.

Ha ! Those were all great ! You left out "Grape Ape"

I totally remember the Laff-a-Lympics. And I watched all those shows. Also He-Man (and his whimpy green and orange tiger). How about Heavy Metal the movie.....remember that one?

Grape Ape was cool. I liked the jetsons and the flinstones and scooby Doo the best. (still do )

Quote :

How about Heavy Metal the movie.....remember that one?

Yes. We have it on VHS and DVD as well as the soundtrack. My wife has the girl from the movie poster tattooed on her lower arm.

I watched Heavy Metal when I was like 13 and, though it was entertaining, I thought it was a weird drug trip someone had.

Guilty/Forgiven wrote:

I watched Heavy Metal when I was like 13 and, though it was entertaining, I thought it was a weird drug trip someone had.

Well if you read the comic book it might make a little more sense (oh excuse me they are called "graphic novels" now).

Brokentulsa wrote:

Yes. We have it on VHS and DVD as well as the soundtrack. My wife has the girl from the movie poster tattooed on her lower arm.

Very cool!

Grape Ape - Grape Ape.

Staybrite wrote:

In the 70's I remember AM radio was king. Listened
to tons of soft-rock hits on AM radio.

Back then I mainly listened to the radio while in the car. I grew up on....country music.

Guilty/Forgiven wrote:

Rabbit ears on the TV. Skateboarding. Getting in trouble. Mork and Mindy. My first 3
actual cassettes: VH-Diver Down, Kiss-Creatures of the Night, and Peter
Schilling-Error in the System. BMX jumping. My first concert= Van Halen
1984. Beta, then VHS.

and best of all in 1989: SALVATION

Yep,we had the rabbit ears.I never skateboarded but knew some that did. Mork & Mindy,Nanoo Nanoo. My first 3 cassettes were country bands like Alabama. I didn't have a BMX but rather a Schwinn. Definitely VHS.

brokentulsa wrote:

Smokey and The Bandit,
corduroy's I hate wearing them to school...people could hear you walking.

Breaker for the Bandit, Smokey just passed my back door, now he's knockin' on yours.

I don't think I ever had the corduroy's...thankfully.

messiaen77 wrote:

Smokey and the Bandit, The Dukes of
Hazzard,, the Six Million Dollar Man...

Also Airwolf, The A- Team, Hill Street Blues, Knight Rider ,Street Hawk, BattleStar Galactica, Buck Roger's in the 25th Century, The Incredible Hulk, BJ and the Bear, Star Trek (TOS,TNG), Macgyver, The Equalizer, The Highwayman,



Oh and yeah...I have always enjoyed Scooby Doo!

Now how about some of those movies of the 70's & 80's...Beetlejuice, Ghostbusters, Gremlins, Star Wars, Star Trek, Superman, any of the old Godzilla flicks, Close Encounters of the 3rd Kind, any of the James Bond flicks, Planet of the Apes, any of the Herbie flicks, Back to the Future, Short Circuit, Tron...

How in the world did I forget Airwolf and Knight Rider!

I was thinking last night and remembered a few others.








It's a shame they don't make cartoons like these anymore.

Yeah, the new Scooby Doo ones just don't live up to the originals.

Don't know if anyone else did this as a kid in the 70s, but me and my buddies used to walk over to the apartments and dumpster dive. Found some very cool things, a nice lamp that wasnt even broken (gave to my mom), tons of toys that were perfectly fine.

Again, we were rather poor, so scoring some cool things that people discarded was fun for us.

Late 70s early 80s = Collecting Star Wars trading cards and action figures (also had a used millenium falcon from the swap meet), comic books, Mad Magazine, Cracked Magazine.

Oh man I collect almost all of those original Star Wars figures. I also had an x-wing fighter and a tie-fighter, and Luke's land speeder. I would save my allowance and buy a new figure every 3 weeks (I did that for more than a year).

Brokentulsa wrote:

corduroy's I hated wearing them to school...people could hear you walking.

Oh man I remember that walking down the hall making that "voop voop voop" sound...how annoying.

I collected pictures of moviestars you got by chewing gum.
We went in the break from school to the candy store close by the school to buy the chewing gum and to see what movie star pic there was in.
The double pics you could trade with others.

Corduroy britches + fat chick = FIRE HAZARD!