Flashback in Time! 1969-1972
1969
The summer before we started high school, we baby boomers saw a man walk on the moon for the 1st time on July 20, 1969; that August we saw the now infamous Woodstock music festival take place and the continuation of the “hippie movement” that spawned in 1967 at the “Summer of Love” in the Haight/Ashbury district in San Francisco; the film Easy Rider premiered in 1969; Katharine Hepburn and Barbra Streisand shared the Best Actress Oscar at the Academy Awards making Hepburn the only actress at that time to win 3 Best Actress Oscars; the film version of Oliver! won Best Picture; Wal-Mart incorporated as Wal-Mart Stores, Inc; the pilot episode of The Brady Bunch aired; and the Children's Television Workshop's educational television program 1st premiered Sesame Street
1970
The first jumbo-jet, the Boeing 747, made its debut commercial flight from New York to London; the Beatles disbanded; the average cost of a home was $23,400; the average annual income was $9,350; a gallon of gas was $0.36; the average cost of a new car was $3,900; the Isle of Wight Festival took place in England with 600,000 people in attendace which in 1970 was the largest rock festival gathering of all time - artists included Jimi Hendrix, The Who, The Doors, Chicago, Richie Havens, John Sebastian, Joan Baez, Ten Years After, Emerson, Lake and Palmer and Jethro Tull and more; sadly Jimi Hendrix died later that year and so did Janis Joplin; the first New York marathon was run in New York; Simon and Garfunkel released their final album, and their song Bridge Over Troubled Water won the Grammy for song of the year; the Jackson 5 released "ABC" and "I want you back. "
1971
A ban on the TV advertisement of cigarettes went into effect in the USA in 1971; the world’s first general microprocessor - the Intel 4004 - came out in November 1971; the 26th Amendment became law making it legal for anyone over the age of 18 to vote; the top song was Joy to the World by Three Dog Night; popular movies that year were Fiddler on the Roof, and the Last Picture Show; the price of a stamp was $0.08 and a pound of bananas cost $0.12; the world population was 3,724,000,000; the friendly exchange between an American and Chinese player in the 1971 World Ping-Pong championship prompted Mao Zedong to invite the American table tennis team to China helping to re-open relations for the first time since the Cold War; the first Starbucks opened in Seattle’s Pikes Place Market; there was no known written documentation of the food known as “fajitas” prior to 1971; the cost of a Super Bowl ad in 1971 was $72,000 for 30 seconds - in 2020 that same ad cost $5.6 million.
1972
The first commercially successful video game – Pong – was released by Atari; Richard Nixon made the 1st trip of a US President to Moscow; the Egg McMuffin made its debut; the first scientific hand-held calculator (later called the HP-35) was introduced at a whopping price of $395.00 (a dozen eggs cost $0.52); M*A*S*H debuted - it became the longest-running TV show of all time; the Hamilton Watch Company announced the Pulsar Time Computer, billed as the first digital watch – it cost as much as a new car; the Godfather was released and won 3 academy awards; other popular movies were Poseidon Adventure; Deliverance; Jeremiah Johnson; Duane “The Rock” was born in 1972; George Wallace was shot; HBO launched their first subscription cable service in the USA; the Volkswagen Beetle became the most popular car ever sold when they hit the 15 million sold mark; the artificial heart was invented by Willem J. Koiff; in 1972 optical fiber was invented in the USA; AND……we all GRADUATED from WGHS on June 6, 1972!!!!!!!!
TV PROGRAMS POPULAR in 1972:
The Andy Griffith Show, Here’s Lucy, Smothers Brothers; Gunsmoke, Mod Squad, All in the Family, Mary Tyler Moore Show, Sanford & Son, Hawaii Five-O, Maude, Ironside, Flip Wilson Show, Adam-12, Marcus Welby MD, Bob Newhart Show, The Walton’s, Monday Night Football, Patton
FASHION - What was “groovy” to wear in the early 1970’s:
Mini skirts, hot pants and Go Go boots, maxi dresses, knee socks, tube socks, bright colored and patterned polyester clothes, patchwork and embroidery, bell bottoms, leisure suits and long hair styles for men
SLANG
Outta sight
Keep the faith
Solid
Hang loose
Fuzz
Far out
Groovy
Bummer
Foxy
Can you dig it
Make love not war
That’s boss
Drag
Sock it to me
Boob tube