Reflection Tuesday ~ Grade School Fads Part 1

My husband caught me with a glazed look on my face the other day and asked me what I was thinking about. I told him I was trying to remember what crazy fads we had when we were in grade school and junior high. At first I could not remember anything but then my mind was flooded with memories.

Will you take a walk with me back in time? Some of these fads may seem familiar to my younger readers, not because they were fads during their own school years but because they are now considered VINTAGE. And for my older readers? These crazy fads just might make all you VINTAGE ones smile.

Let me know if you remember any of these! Or, if there are some crazy fads you remember from the same time period then let ME know so I can blow away the cobwebs from my VINTAGE brain cells.

This teeny-weeny-skinny model ushered in the underweight generation, in my humble opinion. She was appropriately named TWIGGY and her face graced the cover of every magazine. Almost overnight our store manequins shrunk three sizes.

Mini skirts began the era of women's liberation. They reached their height of popularity around 1967. Virtually every young woman was wearing one, most as a sign of rebellion against '"the establishment".

At my junior high school we were only allowed to wear our skirts 3" above the knee. If your skirt looked suspiciously short then you were sent to the principal's office where you had to kneel on the ground and a ruler used to determine if your skirt exceeded the allowed three inches. If it was, guess what? A phone call was placed to a parent and you had to go home and CHANGE your clothes. If no parent was home? Tough luck, you had to sit in the school office all day! My how times have changed.

The long-legged look was in. As skirtlines rose in the '60's so did the height of footwear. Fashion was meant to accentuate the leg and boots did exactly that. The shorter the skirt, the taller and tighter the boot.

First we started with Go Go Boots. Does anyone remember Nancy Sinatra singing 'these boots were made for walkin.......? She was the poster child for Go Go Boots. Mine looked great with fish net stockings. Did you ever have a pair of fish net stockings? Fish Nets were my very first pair of stockings.

Then the boot got higher and higher, sometimes even going over the knee. I had a pair of white ones. These were strange boots made of latex or something. In fact, everything seemed to be shiny and plastic during that time. I couldn't wait to get home and pull, or peel, mine off. They made my legs sweat! I was relieved when skirts started lengthening again - my shapeless adolescent calves and chunky thighs didn't look very good in mini-skirts.

Granny glasses were short lived. I had a pair with interchangeable colored lenses to match my outfits. They were also called Ben Franklin glasses. John Lennon wore them. Ahhhh.......John Lennon wearing love beads, yet another fad.

And FLOWER POWER was everywhere. I had FLOWER POWER decals all over my clarinet case.

In the midst of all the LOVE and PEACE of the sixties there was always an underlying fear of nuclear halocaust. Bomb drills were conducted regularly in schools along with fire drills. Fallout Shelters were sold and some people even had them installed in their back yards. Do you remember....the RUSSIANS are coming, the RUSSIANS are coming!

Hope you enjoyed this brief look at the crazy fads I grew up with. Next week - Part 2.