Sometimes it is said of us older people that we are set in our ways, resistant to change. In other words, we are regarded as old fogies, who live more in the past than we do the present. I suppose all across the years younger people growing up and entering adulthood have had times of thinking their parents and grandparents were out-dated and not keeping up with the times.
While there is some truth in the idea that we older people may at times be slow to change, I think the whole idea of older people as old-fogyish is itself out of date and bordering on foolishness. My general observation is that the older people of today have gone through more change than any generation which ever lived on earth. They have created much of that change themselves. Andeven though individuals may decide at some point that they just wish things would stay the way they are for awhile, most of us can go with the idea that life is movement; time is like a flowing river; and we are always leaving where we have been and moving on toward where we will be.
We have many older people today whose lives began in the early 1900s, when things like automobiles and motor trucks were rare. Telephones were still new gadgets, and might only connect a small neighborhood of people. Paved roads were only to be seen in large cities. Flying machines were a fascinating novelty, just beginning to find usefulness in such areas as delivery of mail, passenger service and weaponry in war. Just 100 years ago, electricity in homes was mostly confined to the cities and to wealthy people. Ordinary folks lit their homes at night by candlelight or kerosene lamp.
A fan was a flat thing you held in your hand and waved in front of your face to make a little cool breeze. Radio was still a new invention, with lots of buzzing noises and blasts of crackling static in stormy weather. Music recording was becoming available in the early 1900s in the form of flat disk records played on the Edison phonograph. Electronics would be yearslater in coming. The idea of carry-about phones had been thought of, but was considered a foolish dream. A large portion of the people in our area lived on family farms, and made their living by cultivating gardens, raising a variety of livestock, cows, horses, hogs, chickens, guineas;
and producing corn, oats, wheat and barley and hay crops like alfalfa, lespedeza, red clover, orchard grass and fescue. The idea of people leaving home every morning to go on to a job was still a strange thing to farm people. Farmers commonly said, “I’d much rather be working for myself than for the other guy!”
I’m remembering when the car companies began offering automatic transmissions. That was shortly after World War II. I was about 9 years old when I saw and heard my first automatic transmission car. I was agin’ ’em. I didn’t see why anyone would need the car to shift itself. I had watched my granddad and my dad shift their cars and trucks for years, and I was pretty sure I could handle it if they would just let me try my hand at driving.
Through the years we accepted the automatic transmission, and began to see some advantages in it. I remember when my Uncle Earl bought a new 1953 Chevrolet, with Powerglide, two-tone yellowand white in color, whitesidewall tires, a really striking car! He and his family lived in Los Angeles. When they came to Arkansas on vacation, he was showing us the car and comparing the traveling they had done in years past. Old-time travelers were accustomed to engines that overheated on long trips, tires that blew out in the hot desert and to mechanical breakdowns, ignition repairs and rebuilding engines so as to continue on the way.
Describing his trip to Arkansas in 1953, Uncle Earl said he just shifted to drive, stepped on the gas, set her on 70 and sailed across the country. What a new day that was! These days we just take it for granted that cars are supposed to go like that. Some old people back there learned how to make cars do that.
Much of the time when we say we don’t like change, we have certain things that we wish could stay with us; or we may have become tired of having to relearn things just to get along. Just buying a phone means a whole new interface and a whole new operating system to learn! But the person who expects to spend a lifetime of continuous learning should fare better in changing times. At least some old people think that way.
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Jerry Nichols, a native of Pea Ridge, is a retired Methodist minister with a passion for history. He is vice president of the Pea Ridge Historical Society. He can be contacted by e-mail at [email protected], or call 621-1621.
Community, Pages 5 on 08/11/2010