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[quote=Anonymous]There is a LOT of idealizing on this thread.

I grew up in the 70s, so there was TV but nothing was really on most of the time, and no video games or internet yet.  I remember being really sad and lonely much of the time.

Adults did not play with you.  Pretty much ever.  Sometimes grandparents would if you had really great grandparents.  Adults would not drive you to see a friend, so you were dependent on whatever houses you could walk to.  If your neighbors were empty nesters or had teens, you were SOL.  Maybe at the height of  the baby boom there were hordes of kids wandering the streets playing stick ball or whatever, but I don't think that was true for most decades.  (My dad, who is much older, had ONE kid in his town.  He walked miles to a school that had a total of 10 kids in the WHOLE SCHOOL.)

I read a lot.  Like a freaky amount.  But, honestly, if you read more than 4-5 hours a day, it gets kind of depressing.  During the summer, the days were really long.

I had a lot of chores, but that was also depressing.  I don't think they were fun chores like milking a cow or picking apples from a tree.  They were depressing chores, like trying to scrub the crap off the bathroom grout.  Or dusting the legs of all the furniture.

Sombody mentioned crafts.  I feel like that was maybe a child of the 80's.  I don't remember any stores like Michael's or Hobby Lobby existing before the mid-80s.  I don't remember anybody getting things like craft kits for their birthday, or working on crafts.  (The only thing I can remember is coloring books, and maybe paint by number sets.)  Most parents weren't buying things like craft sets for kids.  There wasn't really a widespread belief that it was parents' job to come up with things for kids to do.  My grandmother sometimes had me do knitting or such with her, but my mom certainly never taught me anything, and I don't remember anyone "crafting" in the way we talk about today.  Crafts also would have been kind of inconsistent with the adult worldview back then, which was that kids should not make messes in the house.

Someone else mentioned playgrounds.  I don't think I ever remember seeing a playground in the 70s!  Some of the elementary schools had playgrounds, but they were not really fun like the playgrounds nowadays.  They were just basically a metal slide that your legs stuck to, some swings, and maybe some metal thing that spun around if you were really lucky.  Before they invented heavy duty plastics in the 80s or so (and before adults became convinced that it was important for kids to have someplace to play), playgrounds weren't really that much of a thing most places.  (I'm sure someone from someplace fancy like NYC will point out that they had some beautiful playground in Central Park in the 60s....most of America only saw that on Sesame Street.)

I had siblings but they were all older and didn't want to play with me anyway, so not that different from being an only child.  Even if families were bigger, that didn't necessarily make for "instant fun" -- just like today, siblings don't always want to play with each other.  Increasing the family size from 2-3 to 5-8 doesn't really solve that problem.  I spent a lot of time just talking to my stuffed animals.  Or playing board games against myself, which is not actually that fun.  Especially if it's a game like Monopoly.

I remember when Pong was invested.  Kids would spend HOURS just watching the damn dot go back and forth across the screen.  Yes, that's how bored we were.  We were desperate for entertainment.  (I did NOT get a Pong.  I was jealous.)

Anyway, I feel like people are always quick to say "Oh, it was so great before.  No kids were depressed or anxious!  Kids all played together and didn't bully or exclude!  Everyone was creative and came up with fun things to do that didn't involve their parents giving them any help or support to do any of it!"  That's just not the case.  Lots of kids were sad, or anxious.   If kids weren't anxious, why do you think they created Grover?  Or Charlie Brown and Linus?  Those characters were all created to help children who were anxious deal with their feelings and not feel so alone.  When Charlie Brown said "I got a rock," there were a lot of kids out there feeling like they got a metaphorical rock. 
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