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You are here: Home / Mom Life / Just My Life / My Early Childhood Memories… Growing up in the 70s

My Early Childhood Memories… Growing up in the 70s

October 14, 2010 by Deanna Tousignant 7 Comments

I have a fair amount of early childhood memories, from when I was 2 and 3 years old and on. I look at my three year old daughter now and wonder what, if anything, she’ll remember from her life right now.

Vintage polaroid photo of preschooler with Holly Hobbie playhouse.

Up until I was five, we lived in a mobile home in Essex, a small town about a half hour drive outside of Windsor, Ontario. My husband often teases me that I grew up in a trailer park. It was a little more permanent then that. My dad had built an addition onto the back, and there was a lovely wooden deck for a front porch.  The reception area, when you first came in the front door, was my play room. I had this Holly Hobbie cardboard house that I loved, which took up most of the space and was usually jammed full of stuffed animals, such that I couldn’t actually get inside it. There was a small lip along the inside edge of this playhouse where I used to line up my Red Rose Tea figurine collection.

Vintage Red Rose Tea Figurines all in a row.

One of my most vivid memories is of the day I got the scar which I still have on my face. I was three years old. My mother was pregnant with my brother and she was working on getting the nursery ready. She had lifted me into the crib, and I was sitting in there playing with some stuffed dolls. She left the room when the phone rang. The closet door was open and I could see these trays full of golf balls in the closet, piled with some shiny metal serving trays. I wanted those golf balls! I climbed up on top of the stuffed animals and strained to reach them. I managed to knock the pile out of the closet, just as I fell out of the crib. When I landed the corner of a metal serving tray cut my face, a deep cut along my cheek bone. I was terribly lucky that it missed my eye. I remember it really hurt and I couldn’t stop crying. My mom just kept holding me on her lap and rocking me in this big fire engine red bentwood rocker we had. I remember the hospital had a special children’s room with a mural painted on the ceiling and that I got to hold my mom’s hand as they stitched me up.

Preschooler with her cat, vintage photo from 1978.
Summer ’78

My other most vivid memory from this time is the day I got my cat, Tina. We went to a family reunion held at my Mom’s Uncle Paul’s farm. There were three legged races and potatoes sack races. We got to see horses in the barn. Supposedly I “won” a cat in a potato sack race. I remember climbing under this big wooden front porch and picking out my kitten. She was mostly black with some white on her paws. The entire car ride home my parents debated if we were really going to keep her. We walked in the front door, I saw a can of tuna sitting on the dining room table and I told my mom that I wanted to name the cat Tuna Fish. She wouldn’t go for it. I then promptly came up with Tina Leena Too. I don’t have a clue where the Tina Leena part hopped into my head from, but I do know that in my mind the Too always meant “Also Tuna Fish”.

One of my favourite stories my mom tells from this time is of my imaginary friend “The Big Black Man With The Mustache”. When my mom caught me “baking” a birthday cake for her, by mixing flour and sugar in a pile on the floor it was The Big Black Man With The Mustache’s idea. When I opened the front door and let in not just our cat, but also a strange stray, The Big Black Man With the Mustache did it. My parents had no idea where this fellow stemmed from, and when I was older my dad used to make off-colour jokes about how he used to think my imaginary friend was actually a reference to my mom’s (non-existent)secret boyfriend. In actuality, I remember that he came from the image of Hercule Poirot on the covers of my mom’s Agatha Christie books.

Covers from Agatha Christie novels featuring Hercule Poirot
The Big Black Man With The Mustache

I remember that when there was company, the grown-ups would be sitting at the dining room table, and I would stand at my mom’s elbow waiting for her to pay attention to me. She would draw me these abstract doodles and I would take them away and colour them. Then I would return with the finished picture and stand at her elbow, waiting for her to acknowledge me and for her to make me another picture to colour.

She also used to take the paper grocery sacks and turn them into full body masks. She would cut a bit up the sides for my arms, and cut out eye and nose holes. She would draw characters from TV, like Miss Piggy, or from my story books. I loved those puppet/masks. I had a pile of them. I remember being really disappointed when we moved and the new grocery store offered plastic bags.

Still from G-Force 70s Cartoon
My Heroes: The G-Force

The summer of my fifth year we moved into a three bedroom house in Windsor. For me our move was characterized by minor inconveniences. It happened to coincide with my favourite cartoon, G-Force, being taken off the air. I remember thinking it was because we moved that our TV would no longer pick it up. I was also sad because the cardboard playhouse that I loved didn’t survive. Once taken apart, my parents couldn’t get it to go back together again.

That fall I started kindergarten at the nearby school, which I would attend for the next nine years.

This was around 1977-1980. My favourite TV shows were Mickey Mouse Club, The Muppet Show and G-Force.

This post is the second in a series to record my youth as a gift to my children.

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Filed Under: Just My Life Tagged With: childhood memories, growing up in the 70s

Comments

  1. Karen says

    October 15, 2010 at 1:41 am

    Oh, I'm so glad you included the imaginary friend story. Right now my 4 year old granddaughter has an imaginary family. I chuckle at the stories and that we should write them down. Seeing the character on your mother's book is so sweet, and so typical of a small child. Thanks for a great post that gave me some ideas of things worth recording.

    Reply
  2. Cheryl B. says

    October 15, 2010 at 2:52 am

    Your mother sounds like a very creative lady. I bet you had a wonderful childhood. Enjoyed reading your post.

    Reply
  3. Beth (Elizabeth) LaM says

    October 15, 2010 at 4:23 am

    I love that you won a kitty at the farm, but even more that you were able to keep it and give it such a cute name.

    Reply
  4. Kimberly says

    October 15, 2010 at 11:32 am

    What wonderful memories! It's so funny how our imaginations run wild when we were young! Ahhh to be that young again. I am sure that GGirl is going to love all these stories!PS. I think think the teasing is worse if you come from Harrow like my hubs 😉

    Reply
  5. Ms Bibi says

    October 15, 2010 at 7:33 pm

    I really enjoyed reading this and I think it's a great idea to pass it onto your children so they know where they come from. I love going down the memory lane and remembering my childhood.Thank you for visiting me.

    Reply
  6. Erika says

    October 16, 2010 at 4:38 am

    I, too, often wonder how much my daughter will remember about life right now (she's 2.5). I've had such a hard time recalling details from this age. Every once in a while they come back to me very strongly — a sound, a smell, a sight … the littlest things can trigger the memories – that just doesn't seem to happen when I sit down to write! :)Thanks for sharing your memories!!

    Reply
  7. denise says

    October 16, 2010 at 6:48 am

    just read erika's reply and realized we all three have in common a 2.5 to 3-year-old! :)i enjoyed your very specific memories…i had forgotten about holly hobby! recently i've been into collecting old school toys/books from the 70's…my favorite for my children is richard scarry books…huckle cat, lowly worm…i'll have to include toys/shows/books i liked in future posts…it is neat because many of us from that age can relate and they are also specific for you.it's interesting how your imaginary friend came from something you'd seen…i'm always fascinated by how the mind/our memory works that way…i've been able to locate memories to write about just by looking at old photos…i look forward to sharing this recording journey with you!sincerely, denise from group 3

    Reply

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