Where did Latin go??? If you went to high school up until the late ‘60s it was a subject that most schools required for college prep students. But by the ‘70s it gradually began to fade from school curricula. Latin was my favorite high school subject. It was like figuring out a puzzle. The structure…

If you are a gardener you are probably ready to put the snowy days behind you and spend some time “playing in the dirt.” I have already purchased my veggie and flower seeds and just looking at the pictures on the packets puts me in a happy place! Winter is an ideal time to purchase…

A column that I wrote awhile back compared growing up in the city to growing up in the country. Reading that column caused a friend of mine to take her own trip back in time and she shared her memories with me. As I was reading her email I realized that my early years in…

  Winter memories from the ‘50s and ‘60s My classmate from first grade through high school, Pat Maroney Embree, shared some wonderful winter memories with me from the ‘50s and ‘60s. As I read her email it prompted me to ask a couple of other old friends what they recalled from that era. It was…

If you were a kid in Rutland back in the 50s, how did you spend your winter? I will guarantee you that it wasn’t spent inside looking at a digital device! We were outside for the majority of the day even if was snowing. There is an expression that goes “There is no such thing…

By Mary Ellen Shaw It’s almost Christmas and as I look back I realize how the holiday is very different in today’s world. When I was a child in the ‘50s, downtown Rutland was bustling with shoppers who had numerous stores from which to select Christmas gifts. The windows were beautifully decorated for the season…

Submitted   By Mary Ellen Shaw   The Mountain Times forwarded to me a hand-written letter from a regular reader of my “Looking Back” column. Her name is Ellen Lee Jones. She shared with me what she remembers about her own life when she “looks back.” Ellen gave permission for me to use the details…

  It’s almost time for Halloween and sometimes adults have as much fun as kids on this holiday. Looking back to the 1950s when I went “trick-or-treating” the costumes were pretty simple. Most kids dressed as witches, ghosts, hobos or vampires. Celebrity or movie related costumes were not popular like they are today. Many of…

By Mary Ellen Shaw It seems like our street had more bicycle riders this summer than I have ever seen here. The adults seem to outnumber the children and teens. For most of us our connection to biking begins with a tricycle. When I was a child back in the ‘50s there were about a…

Back in the day where we traveled by car and how we found our way to various places was nothing like it is now. A friend recently told me that without her GPS she would find it very difficult to get from one place to another. We have become a technology dependent generation! My car…

  During my annual dermatology visit the doctor and I discussed how the choices that people made in the ’60s have resulted in skin damage as we age. Sunscreen was not promoted back then like it is today. A popular trend among my high school and college friends was to slit the sides of a…

While listening to a radio conversation between two people hosting a show I heard one of them ask the other what decade he expected to hear songs from when he is told that an “oldie” is coming up. The two hosts were not close in age so one said the ’70s and the other said…

Many things have changed over the course of my lifetime and that is to be expected. However, they seem to be changing at a rapid clip and this senior can barely keep up! It seems like we all used land line phones forever and now the majority of people have cell phones. You no longer…

  I don’t think there is a female among us who hasn’t done something out of her comfort zone simply because she is dating someone who interests her. I definitely plead “guilty” to doing that almost 50 years ago! In fact, I did multiple things that were way out of my comfort zone. Perhaps my…

  How is your garden growing? As gardeners we never seem to be satisfied with the way our flowers and veggies look. I think we are too hard on ourselves! Mother Nature as well as critters alter our plans and give us results that don’t always make us happy. But most of what we plant…