When one mentions “home entertainment”, they often think of electronics. But when I was a child, there was more to it than that. When you really only have 4 TV channels, there isn’t always something on TV that will satisfy the diverse interests of a large family. On such occasions, Mom would troop us all into the living room to do something else. Like what? Here are some things that stand out:
Board Games
Monopoly was a big favorite, as it continues to be today. We also wore out our Parcheesi game, The Game of Life, and Clue. In a family of five children, sometimes the games ended with ugly fights, but most of the time, the games went on for hours before a winner was determined–especially Monopoly.
In the early 80s, Trivial Pursuit became a brief favorite. However, when my Dad won every game, time and again, the rest of us lost interest.
Cards
I hated playing cards growing up, so my mother sweetened the deal by issuing M&Ms in order to bet. It taught us to carefully husband our quantity rather than gulping them all down. We played Crazy Eights, Spoons, and other kid-friendly games with names that I no longer recall. Again, these games often went on long after our usual bedtimes.
Puzzles
Mom would get a 1000 piece puzzle and work on it in the evenings. She kept it on the dining room table under the table pads (I don’t know what to call them–they covered the whole table). We’d work on them night after night.
Hide and Seek
This was a favorite while there were still young children in our house, and we could slip into the smallest spaces. After a while, we just got too old to hide effectively. When before, we could squirm under the bed, after a point, there was a danger of getting stuck, even if you were skinny. And suddenly you realized just how dusty it was under there.
Stargazing
My Dad had a telescope that was old even when I was a child, and on autumn and spring nights, when it was clear, we would often go stargazing in the front yard. We never did this in the summer because the air was thick with mosquitoes.
I remember one time, when I was very young, Dad was excited because there was an eclipse of the moon. Thankfully, it was a clear night. However, I was terrified. The thought of something different happening to the moon was totally out of my realm of experience, and scared me enough to get me crying. However, Dad persevered and got me to look through the viewfinder. At which time, I was so relieved to see the moon that I stopped crying immediately, and didn’t even notice it’s odd color.
Home Movie and Slide Shows
My Dad was an amateur photographer and had an 8mm movie camera and projector, and a 35mm camera. While they were functional (5 kids are hard on things like that), he filmed and photographed us at every occasion and once a year or so, we’d have movie night. I thought of this because I recently toted home all the slides and movies, along with the old movie projector and slide projector. I actually have a projector screen, so we’ll be able to have movie night here as well, once nice dark night in late fall or winter.
Since all this tech is so old, I’ll be sure to have a fire extinguisher handy that is safe to use on electrical fires. (Just kidding–I hope.)
Electronic Games?
We didn’t have any electronic games in the 70s. Richer kids might have, but no one that I ever heard of had one until the 80s. We ended up reading a lot of books. I was a reluctant reader, but was still reading novels regularly by age 11.
Advantages over Modern Tech
I can’t think of any. Why? Because you can still do all of the above today. Home movies and slides are now reborn in the digital sense, and you can easily play both on your TV. It’s hard to see the advantage of the old tech, except maybe in atmosphere. There’s nothing like the smell of an old slide projector burning … something. Dust, I hope. Along with popcorn, it somehow adds to the experience.
When you were growing up, what did you family like to do on a boring Saturday night?
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I came up with the idea for these Time Trips while writing my time travel novel, HIGHWAY TO YESTERDAY. For all the Time Trip posts I’ve written so far, click here.
We did a lot of the same things, though our family’s big card game was Uno. We had a tradition of playing it on camping trips. (Uno makes me think of picnic tables and bug lights.) Probably the biggest thing we did that isn’t on your list is listen to records, and later cassette tapes and (later still) DVDs. My dad loved listening to music, and one song would make him think of another, so he did a fair bit of jockeying. Mom used to read out loud in the evenings, and later I did a fair bit of that too, for my younger brothers. Also, my brother and I played Dungeon a lot. In winter when the wood stove was going, we’d turn out all the lights in the living room, sit in front of the fire with our favorite stuffed animals, and pretend we had been captured by an evil dictator and were plotting our escape. And then we’d glare at anyone who turned the lights on to walk through the room. It really broke the illusion. 🙂
We did play lots of Uno, but that was after I left home, and went home on vacation. As for records, my dad liked Classical, my mother liked her Irish music, and we kids listened to the likes of the Carpenters. We listened to records in our room, on a little white record player.
I remember Dungeon–the board game, right?
Nope, just pretending to be in a dungeon. (We were weird kids.)
Funny! That must be how you honed your imagination.