tcassavaugh said:
Thanks for the memories guys.....I'd forgotten the good ole days when i worked the farms for a dollar an hour. Had to help move the out house and had to fetch water for grandma so she could cook us breakfast on her wood cook stove. I still have some Bose speakers I got while on active duty in 75. And i think my first paycheck in the Army in 1970 was somewhere around $120 bucks. My first brand new car...$3000 my first house on a corner lot....three bedroom brick with 2 car garage at Fort Hood.... $25,000.00. While fun to go back, I wouldn't if i could.
thanks for the stroll down memory lane.
cass
Ah, Cass, Army memories.
1969 - Army pay for hubby was $70/month. As a dependent, I received $100.
Our off-base rent was $125 in that military town.
We bought our tv at the local pawn shop for $5.
I was lucky enough to get a job even though the local businesses normally turned down military spouses because we never knew when our spouses would be shipped out. I think I earned $1.10 per hour and the two-way city bus ticket was $.10 (hubby needed the car to get to and from base). I turned down a car hop job at the local A&W because we didn't have the $3 needed for my 'health certificate'.
We bought a Wahl hair clipper set (still have it and still use it on hubby and used it on the kids when they were little) at the local PX for $7.50 because hubby had to get his hair cut every 2-1/2 weeks and it was breaking our piggy bank at $1.75 per hair cut.
Movies on base were $.25 and bowling was $.10 a lane and bowling shoes were $.05 - we didn't go often because we couldn't afford the luxury.
Of course this 'northern girl' had never been exposed to cockroaches and quickly tired of waking up each morning to have one or more of those critters sharing my bed pillow. I learned from the locals to put used motor oil in 3 lb. coffee cans and then set the legs of our metal bed frame inside the coffee cans and tuck the sheets in (military style) so no critters could join us in bed. The landlord tried to control these critters by having a pest control company come through every two weeks, but living in a cement block building there were simply too many places for the critters to hide.
Our first Christmas together in that military town was sparse. Our 'tree' was a pine scented candle placed strategically in the center our coffee table with one gift for each of us wrapped in the colorful Sunday comics newspaper.
When any of our neighbors had a baby (we were all military families) no one put a "It's a Boy!" or "It's a Girl!" sign in their window. They put either "$7.50" of "Free" in their window. You see, it cost $7.50 to have a boy baby circumcised, girls were 'free'.
It was an experience of a life time as you just never knew when the levy came down who was leaving that month and most service men were sent to Nam with very few others going elsewhere. We lived, literally, holding our breath every day knowing what could come but trying to live our daily lives as normal as possible.
Shari
