Each decade defined by the ups and downs

Tom Grout

Published Wednesday, August 6, 2008

Everyone has a decade that they grew up in or one that helped mold who they later would become. I graduated from high school in 1971 so I consider the 60’s to be that decade for me.

Growing up in a small town in west central Minnesota was great. Everyone knew you and you knew everyone else and though at times it may have not been the best situation, there was a comfort level that when you needed help there would be someone there you knew who would be there for you.

As I lived my Opie-in-Mayberry existence, the world was going through some growing pains of its own; some very historic.

I was in music class and was in the band/choir room of the school in Elbow Lake when the intercom came on with a radio broadcast. We were soon to learn that President Kennedy had been shot. Some in the class started to cry and the rest of us sat there in what I guess you would call shock. The event was something that was hard for a 10-year-old to comprehend but I still knew and felt the significance and sadness of it.

For the next few weeks all that was on TV were stories of JFK and replaying the events of those days over and over again. We learned the history of the man, Lee Harvey Oswald, who was arrested as the possible assassin and then we lived through the murder of Oswald by a guy named Jack Ruby.

We only had one TV channel back then so we couldn’t go to ESPN just for a break from it all and even if we could have a break from it we were still glued to the set, we just couldn’t break away. It was one of the most depressing of times as everyone tried to go about their business with this gigantic cloud of sadness over their heads.

Racial tensions rose to a peak with violent protests and peace marches, ending with the shooting of Martin Luther King. When there was about to be a change in politics Robert Kennedy lay dead on the floor of a hotel from a bullet to his head like his brother. The riots and protests outside the Democratic Convention in Chicago are still vivid in my mind as we approach this year’s conventions.

It was in the 60’s we learned that Helter Skelter was more than a song from the Beatles as news broke about the gruesome Sharon Tate murders. We lived through the arrest and trial of Charles Manson and his followers. Who can ever forget Manson’s maniacal eyes that seemed to look deep into your soul?

The most significant event that was going on at the time that affected all Americans and especially the boys in the 60’s was the Vietnam War. Every night on the Huntley Brinkley report we saw clips of what our soldiers were going through, thanks to some brave reporters, and at the end of the broadcast we got the count numbers. It was like a baseball score, Viet Cong 1012; Americans 123.

The war brought on more protests — some turning violent like the shootings at Kent State. Right out of high school young men were being drafted, some burning their draft cards or moving to Canada and others entering the military. I remember a day when one of my classmates was taken out of class and then we learned that his brother, Ricky, had been killed, shot while he was on a helicopter. I had traded baseball cards with Ricky a few years before. The war was suddenly brought home.

I can’t speak for every young man growing up during this time, but it was hard to think of a future other than being drafted and serving in Vietnam. We didn’t talk about it much as we hoped it would be all over by the time it was our turn.

The government then came up with the draft lottery where the draftee’s birthday would be drawn out randomly and put in order. The higher your birthday number was drawn the better chance you had at not being drafted. Now your life became a gambling game. I was lucky, I had a high number.

Each decade has its own history, each with its own positive and negative events. The positive events and memories are important and quite frankly more fun, but we can never forget the negative ones, for those are the ones that we learn from the most.

Tom Grout’s column appears Wednesdays. Read Tom’s sports blog at www.fergusfallsjournal.com.