August 18, 2025 • 10 mins
Buckle up for a groovy time warp as The Strange History Podcast takes you back to the 1970s—a decade where kids drank from hoses, parents smoked in delivery rooms, and seatbelts were just decoration. Host Amy unpacks 25 jaw-dropping things that were completely normal in the '70s but would be downright shocking today. From mercury in classrooms to hitchhiking across state lines, this episode is a hilarious, nostalgic, and sometimes cringeworthy look at the decade that dared to be weird. If you remember Tang, shag carpet, or licking the spoon after making instant pudding, this one’s for you. Perfect for fans of retro culture, Gen X nostalgia, and anyone who wonders how we survived childhood in the strangest decade of the 20th century.
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Episode Transcript
Available transcripts are automatically generated. Complete accuracy is not guaranteed.
Speaker 1 (00:00):
Welcome back to the Strange History Podcast, the podcast where
we dive deep into the weird, the wild, and the
often wonderfully uncomfortable corners of the past. I'm your host, Amy,
and today we're going back, way back to a time
of shag carpet, asbestos insulation, and the Marlborough Man. That's right,
(00:22):
we're taking a psychedelic trip down memory lane to the
nineteen seventies, a decade so packed with oddities and contradictions
it feels like it happened in a parallel universe, except
that millions of us actually lived through it. So put
on your flared genes, fire up the fondue pot, and
get ready to marvel, laugh, and maybe cringe a little
(00:45):
as we explore a long list of things that were
completely normal in the nineteen seventies and would be absolutely
bonkers today. Back in the nineteen seventies, smoke was practically
part of the decor. It hung thick in restaurants, floated
through office buildings, and filled the air on airplanes. You
could sit in a hospital waiting room and watch your
(01:06):
doctor exhale a cloud of Winston smoke between patient visits.
Teachers smoked in the teacher's lounge and occasionally right in
front of the blackboard. Entire family dinners were hosted around
a haze of secondhand smoke, while the kids passed the
ketchup and ash trays in equal measure. And speaking of transportation,
hitchhiking wasn't seen as reckless. It was seen as normal.
(01:30):
Teens with duffel bags and patched up jeans would just
stick out their thumb and catch a ride. Sometimes cross
country Hitchhiking was how you got to music festivals, to college,
to grandma's house. Parents might even offer some friendly advice,
like make sure it's not a weirdo and send you
off with a bologna sandwich in a brown paper bag.
(01:52):
Drinking and driving far more socially accepted than you'd imagine.
A man could finish a six pack on the drive
home from the bowling, and if the cops pulled him over,
the likely outcome was a friendly warning, drive safe, pal,
they'd say, perhaps even tipping their hat as the driver
peeled off half in the bag. For kids, freedom meant
(02:14):
something truly wild. No supervision. You were expected to leave
the house after breakfast and not show your face again
until the street lights flickered on. Parents had no idea
where you were, and most of the time, neither did you.
You climbed trees, dug questionable holes in the backyard, and
rode your bike like evil Knievel over homemade ramps made
(02:36):
of plywood and cinderblocks. Helmets, please. Helmets were for professional
motorcyclists and nobody else. Cars themselves were rolling metal living
rooms with ash trays in every seat. Seat belts were
often shoved deep into the upholstery, unused and unnoticed. Babies
bounced on laps in the front seat, Toddlers lounged in
(02:57):
the back window, and no one thought twice about it.
Family road trips were survival of the fittest, and if
you got car sick, tough luck. Here's a napkin. In
science class, your teacher might casually let you play with mercury.
You'd roll the silvery beads across the desk like some
kind of magical alien goo, then chase them with your
(03:19):
pencil as they broke apart and reformed. No gloves, no warnings,
just don't swallow it. Most kids were latchkey kids. You'd
get off the school bus, unlock the door with the key,
hanging around your neck and fix yourself a snack, usually
something like a peanut butter and marshmallow fluff sandwich washed
down with a glass of tang. Then it was time
(03:40):
for the Brady Bunch or Gilligan's Island reruns before starting
your homework with a pencil sharpened by a loud wall
mounted grinder. Kitchen decor was a fever dream. Everything came
in harvest gold, avocado green, or burnt orange. If your fridge, stove,
and tupperware didn't match one of those colors, were you
(04:00):
even living? And the shag carpet, it was so thick
you could lose your shoe in it. Vacuuming felt like
hiking through underbrush. Television was an instant gratification. You had three,
maybe four channels, and you had to get up and
walk to the TV to change them. Click click, click,
You'd smack the side if the picture got fuzzy, And
(04:22):
when you wanted to watch something, you had to wait
all week for it to come on. If you missed it,
you missed it. No replays, no DVR, no mercy. Doctors
rewarded you with candy. After getting your tonsils checked, you'd
get a lollipop from the doctor, and dentists had bowls
of sugar retreats in the waiting room. Sugar was everywhere,
(04:43):
in cereal, in drinks, in health snacks. You'd start your
day with a bowl of fruit loops and end it
with a tube of pixie sticks and a can of tab.
Lead paint was still coating every toy chest, windowsill and
crib rail and asbestos. That was the miracle material that
(05:03):
kept your house fireproof. Kids could pull apart crumbling insulation
in basements like they were harvesting fluffy white snow. Nobody blinked.
Parents didn't hover, They pushed. If you told your mom
you were bored, she'd say, then go outside and find
something to do. That was the end of the conversation.
(05:23):
You were expected to entertain yourself, which led to hours
of tree climbing, worm collecting, and mildly dangerous games involving
pointy sticks and questionable dares. On Halloween, strangers handed out
homemade treats, popcorn balls, candied apples, even hand wrapped fudge.
(05:44):
Parents encouraged you to take one from Missus Jenkins down
the street. She was known for her chocolate turtles, razor blades,
poison That urban legend hadn't caught on yet. Trust was
still currency in the neighborhood economy. Mascots and advertising were
a wild, unfiltered jungle. Joe Cammell was a cartoon character
(06:04):
designed to sell cigarettes to adults and unintentionally to kids.
Beer commercials aired during primetime TV, and women were always
shown giggling in bikinis while men grilled steaks and drank schlitz.
Ronald McDonald showed up at birthday parties unannounced and didn't
terrify anyone until much later. Roller rinks were like Studio
(06:26):
fifty four for sixth graders. You'd show up in striped
tube socks and short shorts, circle the rink to KC
and the Sunshine Band and hope the DJ called for
a couple's skates so you could hold sweaty hands with
your crush under the disco ball. Everyone had a bowl
cut or feathered hair. You either looked like a mushroom
or a Charlie's Angel. Parents cut your hair in the
(06:48):
kitchen using a mixing bowl for precision. Photos from the
era looked like everyone was auditioning for the mod Squad,
whether they meant to or not. Birthday parties often involved clowns,
full clown painted faces, squeaky shoes, big red noses, and
not the ironic kind. Kids loved them. Nobody thought they
(07:08):
were creepy until much later, when pop culture gave us
nightmares in the form of Pennywise. Dinner was often served
in a metal tray. TV dinners were a marvel meat, peas, potatoes,
and a brownie, all compartmentalized in microwave together or baked
in the oven if your family didn't have a microwave yet.
Tang was served with pride. After all, the astronauts drank it,
(07:32):
and anything the astronauts did was basically gospel. Flying on
a plane was an event. People dressed up, men wore
suits and ties, women wore skirts and heels. You got
a hot meal and a tiny bottle of wine. Even
in coach, the seats were plush, the windows had curtains,
and the stewardesses as they were then called, served drinks
(07:54):
like it was a cocktail lounge in the sky. Women
wore pantyhose with everything under dresses, skirts, and somehow even shorts.
You might be dripping sweat on a summer day, but
if your legs weren't covered in sheer nylon, you were
practically indecent. Phones were tethered to the wall with long
cords that could stretch halfway across the house. Privacy meant
(08:18):
dragging the receiver into a closet and whispering while sitting
on the floor. If someone called your house and the
line was busy, they got a busy signal, No voicemail,
no call waiting, just beep, beep, beep, and try again later.
You take photos on a thirty five millimeter camera and
(08:38):
have to wait a week for them to be developed
at the drug store. Half the photos would be out
of focus or have someone blinking, but it didn't matter.
You slid them into a sticky photo album, wrote the
date on the margin and called it a memory. TV shows, commercials,
even board games, were riddled with casual sexism and off
(08:59):
color joe folks that no one questioned. Game shows like
The Dating Game treated women like door prizes. Ads praised
floor wax and dish soap as the greatest gifts you
could give your wife. Public pools were cloudy, overly chlorinated,
and full of unsupervised children. Lifeguards spent more time flirting
(09:20):
than watching the deep end. If you got a mouthful
of pool water, it was just part of the experience.
Nobody questioned the hygiene, and best of all, no one
knew where you were, and it was glorious. You were
off the grid, truly unreachable. If someone wanted to find you,
they had to drive around the neighborhood calling your name,
(09:41):
or wait until you showed up at dinner time, sunburned,
filthy and thrilled from a day of freedom. It was
the seventies, a time when your mom smoked in the
grocery store, your dad wore socks with sandals unironically, and
you thought riding in the way back of a station
wagon was the pinnacle of luxury transportation. It was unsafe, unsupervised,
(10:02):
and in many ways, unforgettable. If this episode gave you
a nostalgic chuckle, a cringe, or a flashback to your
own bowl cut, be sure to follow the Strange History
podcast wherever you get your podcasts, leave us a review,
tell a friend, or just shout it out your car
window like it's nineteen seventy seven and you've just discovered disco.
(10:23):
Until next time, keep it strange, but maybe skip the
asbestos
Welcome back to the Strange History Podcast, the podcast where
we dive deep into the weird, the wild, and the
often wonderfully uncomfortable corners of the past. I'm your host, Amy,
and today we're going back, way back to a time
of shag carpet, asbestos insulation, and the Marlborough Man. That's right,
(00:22):
we're taking a psychedelic trip down memory lane to the
nineteen seventies, a decade so packed with oddities and contradictions
it feels like it happened in a parallel universe, except
that millions of us actually lived through it. So put
on your flared genes, fire up the fondue pot, and
get ready to marvel, laugh, and maybe cringe a little
(00:45):
as we explore a long list of things that were
completely normal in the nineteen seventies and would be absolutely
bonkers today. Back in the nineteen seventies, smoke was practically
part of the decor. It hung thick in restaurants, floated
through office buildings, and filled the air on airplanes. You
could sit in a hospital waiting room and watch your
(01:06):
doctor exhale a cloud of Winston smoke between patient visits.
Teachers smoked in the teacher's lounge and occasionally right in
front of the blackboard. Entire family dinners were hosted around
a haze of secondhand smoke, while the kids passed the
ketchup and ash trays in equal measure. And speaking of transportation,
hitchhiking wasn't seen as reckless. It was seen as normal.
(01:30):
Teens with duffel bags and patched up jeans would just
stick out their thumb and catch a ride. Sometimes cross
country Hitchhiking was how you got to music festivals, to college,
to grandma's house. Parents might even offer some friendly advice,
like make sure it's not a weirdo and send you
off with a bologna sandwich in a brown paper bag.
(01:52):
Drinking and driving far more socially accepted than you'd imagine.
A man could finish a six pack on the drive
home from the bowling, and if the cops pulled him over,
the likely outcome was a friendly warning, drive safe, pal,
they'd say, perhaps even tipping their hat as the driver
peeled off half in the bag. For kids, freedom meant
(02:14):
something truly wild. No supervision. You were expected to leave
the house after breakfast and not show your face again
until the street lights flickered on. Parents had no idea
where you were, and most of the time, neither did you.
You climbed trees, dug questionable holes in the backyard, and
rode your bike like evil Knievel over homemade ramps made
(02:36):
of plywood and cinderblocks. Helmets, please. Helmets were for professional
motorcyclists and nobody else. Cars themselves were rolling metal living
rooms with ash trays in every seat. Seat belts were
often shoved deep into the upholstery, unused and unnoticed. Babies
bounced on laps in the front seat, Toddlers lounged in
(02:57):
the back window, and no one thought twice about it.
Family road trips were survival of the fittest, and if
you got car sick, tough luck. Here's a napkin. In
science class, your teacher might casually let you play with mercury.
You'd roll the silvery beads across the desk like some
kind of magical alien goo, then chase them with your
(03:19):
pencil as they broke apart and reformed. No gloves, no warnings,
just don't swallow it. Most kids were latchkey kids. You'd
get off the school bus, unlock the door with the key,
hanging around your neck and fix yourself a snack, usually
something like a peanut butter and marshmallow fluff sandwich washed
down with a glass of tang. Then it was time
(03:40):
for the Brady Bunch or Gilligan's Island reruns before starting
your homework with a pencil sharpened by a loud wall
mounted grinder. Kitchen decor was a fever dream. Everything came
in harvest gold, avocado green, or burnt orange. If your fridge, stove,
and tupperware didn't match one of those colors, were you
(04:00):
even living? And the shag carpet, it was so thick
you could lose your shoe in it. Vacuuming felt like
hiking through underbrush. Television was an instant gratification. You had three,
maybe four channels, and you had to get up and
walk to the TV to change them. Click click, click,
You'd smack the side if the picture got fuzzy, And
(04:22):
when you wanted to watch something, you had to wait
all week for it to come on. If you missed it,
you missed it. No replays, no DVR, no mercy. Doctors
rewarded you with candy. After getting your tonsils checked, you'd
get a lollipop from the doctor, and dentists had bowls
of sugar retreats in the waiting room. Sugar was everywhere,
(04:43):
in cereal, in drinks, in health snacks. You'd start your
day with a bowl of fruit loops and end it
with a tube of pixie sticks and a can of tab.
Lead paint was still coating every toy chest, windowsill and
crib rail and asbestos. That was the miracle material that
(05:03):
kept your house fireproof. Kids could pull apart crumbling insulation
in basements like they were harvesting fluffy white snow. Nobody blinked.
Parents didn't hover, They pushed. If you told your mom
you were bored, she'd say, then go outside and find
something to do. That was the end of the conversation.
(05:23):
You were expected to entertain yourself, which led to hours
of tree climbing, worm collecting, and mildly dangerous games involving
pointy sticks and questionable dares. On Halloween, strangers handed out
homemade treats, popcorn balls, candied apples, even hand wrapped fudge.
(05:44):
Parents encouraged you to take one from Missus Jenkins down
the street. She was known for her chocolate turtles, razor blades,
poison That urban legend hadn't caught on yet. Trust was
still currency in the neighborhood economy. Mascots and advertising were
a wild, unfiltered jungle. Joe Cammell was a cartoon character
(06:04):
designed to sell cigarettes to adults and unintentionally to kids.
Beer commercials aired during primetime TV, and women were always
shown giggling in bikinis while men grilled steaks and drank schlitz.
Ronald McDonald showed up at birthday parties unannounced and didn't
terrify anyone until much later. Roller rinks were like Studio
(06:26):
fifty four for sixth graders. You'd show up in striped
tube socks and short shorts, circle the rink to KC
and the Sunshine Band and hope the DJ called for
a couple's skates so you could hold sweaty hands with
your crush under the disco ball. Everyone had a bowl
cut or feathered hair. You either looked like a mushroom
or a Charlie's Angel. Parents cut your hair in the
(06:48):
kitchen using a mixing bowl for precision. Photos from the
era looked like everyone was auditioning for the mod Squad,
whether they meant to or not. Birthday parties often involved clowns,
full clown painted faces, squeaky shoes, big red noses, and
not the ironic kind. Kids loved them. Nobody thought they
(07:08):
were creepy until much later, when pop culture gave us
nightmares in the form of Pennywise. Dinner was often served
in a metal tray. TV dinners were a marvel meat, peas, potatoes,
and a brownie, all compartmentalized in microwave together or baked
in the oven if your family didn't have a microwave yet.
Tang was served with pride. After all, the astronauts drank it,
(07:32):
and anything the astronauts did was basically gospel. Flying on
a plane was an event. People dressed up, men wore
suits and ties, women wore skirts and heels. You got
a hot meal and a tiny bottle of wine. Even
in coach, the seats were plush, the windows had curtains,
and the stewardesses as they were then called, served drinks
(07:54):
like it was a cocktail lounge in the sky. Women
wore pantyhose with everything under dresses, skirts, and somehow even shorts.
You might be dripping sweat on a summer day, but
if your legs weren't covered in sheer nylon, you were
practically indecent. Phones were tethered to the wall with long
cords that could stretch halfway across the house. Privacy meant
(08:18):
dragging the receiver into a closet and whispering while sitting
on the floor. If someone called your house and the
line was busy, they got a busy signal, No voicemail,
no call waiting, just beep, beep, beep, and try again later.
You take photos on a thirty five millimeter camera and
(08:38):
have to wait a week for them to be developed
at the drug store. Half the photos would be out
of focus or have someone blinking, but it didn't matter.
You slid them into a sticky photo album, wrote the
date on the margin and called it a memory. TV shows, commercials,
even board games, were riddled with casual sexism and off
(08:59):
color joe folks that no one questioned. Game shows like
The Dating Game treated women like door prizes. Ads praised
floor wax and dish soap as the greatest gifts you
could give your wife. Public pools were cloudy, overly chlorinated,
and full of unsupervised children. Lifeguards spent more time flirting
(09:20):
than watching the deep end. If you got a mouthful
of pool water, it was just part of the experience.
Nobody questioned the hygiene, and best of all, no one
knew where you were, and it was glorious. You were
off the grid, truly unreachable. If someone wanted to find you,
they had to drive around the neighborhood calling your name,
(09:41):
or wait until you showed up at dinner time, sunburned,
filthy and thrilled from a day of freedom. It was
the seventies, a time when your mom smoked in the
grocery store, your dad wore socks with sandals unironically, and
you thought riding in the way back of a station
wagon was the pinnacle of luxury transportation. It was unsafe, unsupervised,
(10:02):
and in many ways, unforgettable. If this episode gave you
a nostalgic chuckle, a cringe, or a flashback to your
own bowl cut, be sure to follow the Strange History
podcast wherever you get your podcasts, leave us a review,
tell a friend, or just shout it out your car
window like it's nineteen seventy seven and you've just discovered disco.
(10:23):
Until next time, keep it strange, but maybe skip the
asbestos
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