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NOTE: Answer has been updated with recent developments and hence split into multiple sections written in different periods… Please consider the respective time period and developments related to each of the section…Original Answer:After many years of negligence towards Pakistan's aggression and a mere spineless defense, India seems to have awoken to the fact that "offense is the best defense"...Modi and his team are working on many parallel things in international politics... Pakistan seems to be simply clueless about how to react to these masterstrokes from Modi...First good move was to invite Mr Nawaz Shareef for swearing in ceremony in May 2014... that showcased to the world that India is open to dialogs and is proactively seeking peace in the region... That negated long standing accusation from Pakistan that India is reluctant to dialogs and is not cooperative...Modi soon made his intentions and direction clear by asking UN observers to leave the Bungalow in Delhi... The UN observers group was formed as a result of agreement between India - Pakistan and UN in 1949... however with subsequent Simla Agreement in 1972, Kashmir was mutually accepted as bilateral issue by both nations and hence 1949 treaty became void..‘No relevance’, Centre asks UN mission to vacate Delhi officeNext shock felt by Pakistan was in August 2014... when it invited separatist leaders for discussions ahead of official dialogue between India and Pakistan...India cancels talks with Pakistan over Kashmir row - BBC NewsNext was the SAARC summit in Nepal (Nov 2014) which not only revived the almost forgotten SAARC movement but also singled out Pakistan who was playing on the Tunes of China... When Pak tried to block India's proposals, all nations except Pak showed readiness to sign the treaties for free road movements, cross border co-operations and infrastructure setup areas, singling out Pakistan... with the danger facing to become irrelevant in the SAARC region, Pakistan was forced to agree on some of the treaties proposed by India... however Pak's proposal to include China as an active member (currently only observer Role) was blocked successfully by India... Pak was again on back-foot...News | Albright Stonebridge GroupThings started to move more rapidly when Pakistan played an old trick of attacking Indian border posts and villages .. a routine practice for last decade or so... to keep the issue highlighted ... however this time they were taken aback by massive retaliation launched by Indian side and soon found themselves burning under the massive Indian attacks which hold no reservations making clear the intentions ... Pak, clearly taken by surprise even tried to pacify things at local level, but India did not respond... it was only after Pakistan's higher authorities got involved India toned down its response..."You may start the firing, but it will be us who will decide when to stop it" or "if you fire one bullet, we will fire 100 in reply"...Ceasefire violations: BSF intensifies retaliatory attacks along the international borderIndia seemed to be on a correction course when it's new defense minister talked about need of deep assets... the statement was widely criticized and hyped by media, however that made intentions very clear...Some former PMs 'compromised deep assets,' Says Defense Minister Manohar ParrikarPakistan was caught in a difficult situation when it was asked by UAE to actively participate in Yemen attacks... the situation was soon capitalized by Modi which enhanced India's relations with Arab world and put Pak in a difficult spot...How India's strategic partnership with UAE will hit Pakistan where it hurts - FirstpostNext was Ufa when Modi and Sharif met and agreed to hold bilateral NSA level talks on issue of terrorism... this was significant since Pakistan has been long stating that no dialog can take place without Kashmir... Nawaz Shareef was highly criticized in Pak media and also received a strong reply from more powerful Shareef (Rahil) ...Pakistan tried to jump all the buttons to push India to cancel NSA talks .. since they did not wanted to take the blame to cancel talks and R Shareef did not wanted to talk on terrorism since that is Pakistan's Achilles's heel...They tried to invite separatists again but this time Modi moved smartly to detain them and put under temporary house arrest... then they played K card again... hoping that India would call off the tasks since Kashmir was not part of original agenda... however India stuck to its stand and made clear that it will stay open to talks as long as they follow the Ufa agreement... left with no other option Pak called off the NSA dialogs accusing India of Flip-flopping and adding new conditions...http://blogs.wsj.com/indiarealtime/2015/08/24/what-the-indian-and-pakistani-media-said-about-cancelled-nsa-talks/http://www.thehindu.com/news/international/south-asia/indiapakistan-national-security-advisorlevel-talks-called-off/article7569679.eceLatest shock came when Pak tried to raise the Kashmir issue at UN... when India gave an unusually sharp and direct reaction to every point raised by Pakistan... Pakistan also seemed to be losing relevance in International politics fast vis-a-vis India...http://www.dawn.com/news/1210207at the same time news of unrest and gross violations of human rights by Pak govt in Pakistan occupied Kashmir surfaced for the first time in international media...Pakistan was caught in its own trap...http://www.rediff.com/news/report/india-fomenting-unrest-pak-to-complain-to-us/20150601.htmhttp://www.thequint.com/india/2015/09/29/living-hell-in-pakistan-pro-india-voices-in-pok-brutally-crushedit will be interesting to see what next master stroke Mr Modi can play, as Pakistan seems to be running out of Ideas and loosing steam fast...EDIT - Thank you for an overwhelming response.. share count already over 1.5 million... uff... !!EDIT 2 -To keep up with the latest developments, some of the points I am adding below...There are many people in India who are questioning the dialogs that took place between NSAs in Bangkok, Modi's visit to Lahore and also Latest Pathankot attacks and its investigation fiasco...Let me first clarify that I am not certified person to talk on Foreign policies... My knowledge is limited to my observations only... hence I could be wrong at places... Suggestions Welcome....Let us check out what happened between India and Pakistan between last 6 months...NSA Meeting in BangkokFirst major change in the policy was the meeting of NSAs in Bangkok... Many in India criticized the move without actually getting the insight of decision... This for me was a major shift in India's diplomatic policy towards Pakistan...Remember Pakistan is a country with 2 parallel Power centers.. 2 Sharif's.. Nawaz is the head of Civilian govt and more powerful Rahil Sharif heads a more hardliner and aggressive unit of Defense forces in Pakistan... Pakistan military has always been very critical of India and wants the relations to become as worse as possible... since that allows them to threaten people in the name of India, show themselves as the need of time and saviors of Pakistan... Also Don't forget the Money factor... when the borders are peaceful, who would want to give more money to army... This was why Kargill happened...Hence after the NSA talks were called off in Delhi, Modi took a bold step and caught everyone off guard... The meeting was arranged in Bangkok, away from media trials and Pak army was almost caught off-guard... This also boasted the confidence of Civil govt of Pakistan who is otherwise dependent on Defense forces for all small decisions as well...This marked a start of era, when India would be dealing separately with multiple fractions within Pakistan instead of a single unit...Message is clear,... Engage with civilian govt... Empower them... Keep military powers in check... Deal with hardliners, off the record... secretly...2. Lahore VisitThe next Major thing was Modi's sudden Lahore visit ... That came as a real shocker to everyone... It was a very clear and bold step from Modi...He killed many birds in one arrow..Pakistan defense forces were totally sidelined in the meeting of 2 leaders... also the bigger shock was they were clueless on how to react, since the relationship and warmth between two leaders and govts was clearly on rise... Secondly this was another major failure of Pak intelligence after Osama incidence... they were completely uninformed, clueless and confused...At international level, this took many by surprise.. Again India was benefited since it was India who took the first step towards better relations...At the same time, Modi played it smart enough not to convert this into any official visit, instead a private one... India kept its cards closed, did not change its stand... still got the credit...3. Pathankot attacksAfter the Lahore incidence it was very clear that Pakistan Military forces and extremists would definitely hit back... security and intelligence was stepped up around routine and usual targets...Pathankot attacks were inevitable, however there were some flaws in its handling... The response was very sloppy and there is a definite scope for improvement in that area...4. Pathankot attacks investigationFor investigation of Pathankot attacks Pakistan sent a team and India allowed the team to visit the place of attacks and also shared the evidence India had collected... Pakistan refused to acknowledge the evidence and instead, as always, cried foul... This was expected...Big question was "Why India allowed Pakistan team to visit?" "Pakistan back-stabbed India again.. so what change has Modi brought ?"Let us analyze who gained and who lost ?After India accepted proposal of Pak team visiting the spot and sharing the evidences with them, there was no other option for Pakistan left by Mr Modi... If they would have accepted the evidence, they would have to accept the fact that terrorists indeed came from Pakistan and would need to act against them.. or at least pretend to do so...In case of India not allowing Pakistan investigation team, Pakistan would readily have got a reason to deny evidence... Instead with this gesture, India stood in positive lights...Now Pakistan is under immense pressure as it is being exposed as a irresponsible and terror-supporting nation... By rejecting the Pathankot evidence, Pakistan once again shot themselves in the foot...At the same time, Modi has got the Global support required to isolate Pakistan...In case of Hafeez Saeed, China came to rescue of Pakistan... but there are limits to how much China can support Pak at international level...China's intentions are to establish themselves as Global power vis-a-vis USA.. but for that it must be accepted as a responsible and reliable nation at global level... In case of Hafeez Saeed, China was completely isolated and its reality was exposed on Global canvas...China has big intentions and hence there are many limitations to how much China can support Pakistan internationally... Nevertheless, Modi is playing very smartly by exposing China as well as Pakistan...International politics is a complex thing... We cannot judge or criticize anyone unless you understand the complete puzzle and inter-dependence of the things... However this needs deep analysis to understand moves and dig out the contextual meanings..Hence no surprise that people and news channels are busy critisizing Modi's actions as a U Turn... Read between the lines and you will start realizing how smartly this man is playing...==========================================================EDIT 3:I had been planning to write an additional section in this article in the wake of recent Uri attacks… Many had raised doubts over the capability of Mr Modi to handle situations like Uri and Pathankot attacks..So here it goes…Modi has been traveling around the world making new friends for India.. with an exception of China, he has already been able to establish a mutual trust and healthy relationship with many nations in the world… For those who criticize him, I don’t even want to say anything.. but for those who want to see beyond his suits and record-breaking flying hours, it is simply amazing to see, how many things he has achieve for India till now, that too single-handedly … He got new friends like Iran and Chabahar port pact was a real masterstroke from him… Even Saudi Arabia, known for its extremist support was lured into a respectable relationship capitalizing on India’s status as an attractive investment destination and falling oil prizes…His visits to Japan, Mongolia and Vietnam were really crucial .. Signals were loud and clear for China and Pakistan…Soon Pakistan started feeling the heat and China was forced to take an awkward position in order to protect its interests in Pakistan… Hafeez Saeed fiasco was a trailor of the difficult questions China would have to face in coming days at international level…On one Side USA decided to stop all kinds of Military aid to Pakistan… at the same time Afghanistan and Bangladesh (both muslim countries) were accusing Pakistan of meddling in their internal affairs…For Pakistan, options were getting very limited day by day… Their economy is on a downward spiral and naturally people are not happy with government… however this time People were also against Pakistani military as it had to act against their own people (read Trained terrorists) in order to get the money from USA… The hardened stand from US and thorough scrutiny of every military action was soon being seen as US interference in Pakistan’s internal matters by Pakistani people…In order to win back the trust of people and also get the fat cheques from US, it had to do something… They soon got a chance to do same…Burhan Wani, a slain terrorist from Hijbul Mujahedin was killed in an encounter in Kashmir… Pakistan did not waste any time to capitalize on the situation… All the separatists and pro-pakistan people jumped in to use Wani’s death as a tool to fuel anti-India emotions in Kashmir… Soon we found Kashmir burning like anything…Curfew was implemented in many parts of Kashmir… Many people took to streets in protest of the killing… Indian government had to ask Military and police to use force in order to keep the Law & Order situation under control… Some people unfortunately lost their lives… and unrest continued…2016 Kashmir unrestPakistan tried its old tried-and-tested formula to raise the issue of Kashmir in the name of Indian atrocities and Human rights at international level… However this time it was simply no match for Modi and team…Pakistan shot itself in the foot by decorating Burhan wani, who was associated with declared terrorist outfit, as a martyr..Pakistan declares Burhan Wani as ‘martyr’; to observe July 19 as black dayModi took an unprecedented step to mention Baluchistan in his Independence day speech from the Red Fort on 15th August…Indian PM Modi's Balochistan comments upset Pakistan | Asia | DW.COM | 15.08.2016Baluchistan was forcefully occupied by Pakistan and Baluchi people are denied their rights in terms of representation and social justice in Pakistani establishments … Though Baluchistan is rich in terms of natural resources, but Baluchi people had always been exploited by Punjabi-dominated Pakistan govt… Baluchistan has long been demanding freedom from Pakistan and seeks to establish itself as an independent country..Modi just hit the bulls eye when he mentioned Baluchistan … It hit Pakistan where it hurts most…Pakistan had no moral basis to raise issue of Indian atrocities in Kashmir when it has been committing more grave crimes in Baluchistan..its double standards were exposed in front of the world community and it was seen as a country which says one thing and acts the other way…Baluchistan separatist movement gathered new steam and Anti-Pakistan demonstrations started in many of the western countries, who are the main decision makers of UN bodies.Remember, Baluchistan comments was not a knee-jerk reaction to Pakistan’s continued provocation effort.. the necessary things were getting in place since quiet some time.. There is a lot of effort required to provide a support mechnism before making such comments..when Kashmir seemed ho have settled down, Pakistan gifted Modi with a Birthday blast…in a routine practice of a decade or so, Pakistanis helped terrorists to infiltrate the military camp of Indian defense forces in Uri sector near J&K… in the attack on military camp, 19 Indian soldiers were killed…2016 Uri attackAfter this unfortunate incidence, enough was enough for Mr Modi…He just gave one public statement “Those responsible for this cowardly act, will be brought to justice”..After the statement, there was a flurry of actions…India isolated Pakistan by using its diplomatic channels, so much so, that no one was in mood to even listen to Mr Nawaz Shareef in UN..India decided to review the water treaty of 1960 with Pakistan which allocated 80% of the water of 6 major river systems which originate in India but mainly flow through Pakistan… Though this step will take time to implement the required infrastructure, the intent was loud and clear…Remember the 1960 water treaty had survived 2 Major wars and Kargil conflict too..3. Pakistan was openly referred to as a terrorist state by many nations…4. India signed agreement with French govt for speedy induction of Rafael jets in IAF…And just when everyone thought that India did well to get Pakistan into lot of trouble using diplomatic pressure and international politics… All hell broke loose for Pakistan…Modi, cleverly hiding his intentions under the blanket of diplomatic moves, had launched a secret mission no one had thought about..on 28th September late night, Indian soldiers crossed over the Line of control and carried out surgical strike in Pakistan occupied Kashmir… Destroying 7 camps and killing at least 40 terrorists…Kashmir attack: India 'launches strikes against militants' - BBC NewsPakistan, clearly taken aback by the strikes was completely confused and unprepared to even put its responses in a single line… While Pakistani military tried to pay down the incidence as a routine cross border firing, PM Nawaz Shareef warned India about any misadventure and said Pakistan will retaliate with full force as it is an attack on its sovereignty …It was a very successful operation considering the fact that strikes were carried out even as Pakistan was on full alert and was anticipating such a strike… Not a single causality was reported from Indian side…The message from Indian Prime minister is very clear…“We are a mighty nation with both pride and responsibility… DO NOT MESS WITH US”…Now I can proudly say that Nation is indeed in safe hands…Yes, there will be retaliation from Pakistan for sure… As it a matter of survival and pride for their defense and govt.. but writing on the wall is clear… Winds are not flowing in their favor…EDIT 4:It has been more than an year since last edit of the answer.. an update is overdue…Last year may seem less eventful than earlier ones, but the impact it has has been more damaging to Pakistan that it had ever been..Modi did something unthinkable even for his standards ..Demonetization struck Pakistan hard than a nuclear bomb..All of the plans of bleeding India by thousand cuts were thrown away down the gutter and Pakistan had to scramble back to drawing board to chalk out a new strategy.. They lost very valuable time digesting the impact of demonetization.. the time was used by Modi to regain control in Kashmir valley and also curb in black economy which was mainly operated by fake currencies and benami accounts..Note ban: J&K sees 60% dip in terrorism-related violence, hawala operations down 50% - Times of IndiaI do not want to debate if it was good or bad for Indian economy, but was certainly disastrous for Pakistan…Soon after gaining some control over Kashmir situation, Modi decided to go all offensive against Pakistan and also China.. Unfortunately for Pakistan, this coinsided with regime change in US.. With Mr Trump in office, it was becoming tough for Pakistan to continue the double game of playing a victim card and diverting the “Anti terrorism” funds from US to terrorists in J&K… China seized the opportunity and pushed Pakistan to accept CPEC…Any normal economist should be able to tell you, how bad CPEC inherently is for Pakistans economy..Pakistan Can’t Afford China’s ‘Friendship’Pakistan was brought under tremendous pressure during the UNSC meet 2016..Old trick and traditional ways of handling conflicts are long gone…We have a new master who is playing with his own set of rules and everyone else is just dancing on his steps…EDIT 5: May 2019Adding a new set of information is really needed now to keep this answer relevant with current developments…Since 2018 beginning lot of water has flown under the bridge… So here is a recap of what happened…2018 began more or less calmly with demonetization halting the funding to terrorists and overall stone pelting activities on a decline.. however not everything was quiet calm behind the curtains… BJP think tank was actually making quiet a bit of movement in background…Firstly BJP Ministers resigned from Mehbooba Mufti cabinet… then BJP withdrew its support to the J&K govt… this was a smart but risky move indeed… They could have lost the complete control of the state administration including Jammu and Ladakh regions… However once again the naivety and stupidity of opposition parties came to BJPs assistance…Instead of reading between the lines and understanding the political complexity, CM Mehbooba Mufti called for reelections by resigning… This was completely unwarranted stunt for gaining publicity… instead she could have aligned with Congress and NC.. but Omar Abdullah was equally arrogant and ignorant…BJP dumps PDP: Mehbooba rues lost opportunity, Omar calls for fresh electionsSeizing the opportunity, BJP suspended the parliament … but there was one problem… the Governor appointed by previous regime of UPA was not in favor of dissolving the assembly..So the assembly was kept suspended and Governor was replaced..Satya Pal Malik To Replace NN Vohra As Jammu And Kashmir GovernorNow they had a governor who was more aligned to central govt than his predecessor. So it was time for action… but they waited till the right time came… Congress, PDP and NC realized their own blunder quiet late and tried to form a makeshift coalition… but Governor getting a sniff dissolved the assembly overnight…Just notice the dates… out of curiosity.. on August 17, Imran Khan was confirmed to be next PM of Pakistan… and BJP Swiftly moved to removed governor on 21st August.. I do not know the relation but cannot be a sheer co-incidence…Now BJP had indirect control over J&K Administration through governor’s office for 1 year (J&K has special provision of 1 year to elect new government as against 6 months for other states)… This gives BJP enough time till next LS elections in may 2019 and Rajyasabha elections in May June 2019… That means by the time of J&K elections BJP will be more strong in RS and expected to be stronger in LS… (if it wins 2019 elections)…2019 Indian Rajya Sabha elections - WikipediaAfter the Governor was removed BJP focused on cleansing of the system and eliminated the moles and sympathizers of separatists/Terrorists in a systematic way.. also parallely security forces launched an all offensive mission to eliminate terrorists…Security forces achieved major success in Jammu and Kashmir in 2018The terrorist recruitment process seems to be hit hard with dual blow of Demonetization and offensive attacks launched by India’s defense forces…J&K: Fewer youth joining militancy in the ValleyDecline in trend of youths joining militancy in J&K: ArmyEDIT 6: May 2019Just as Imran Khan looked to settle as Pakistan PM, Pakistani defense forces felt a need to reassure their position in public opinion and also provide some motivation to terrorists… this time, a CRPF convoy was chosen as target of the terrorists… and deliberately a local J&K recruit terrorist was used to carry out the attack…India paid a very heavy price by lives of 40 CRPF jawans..2019 Pulwama attack - Wikipediaat the same time, out of the media focus and attention, several things were achieved which have long term strategic impacts..Separatist leaders security is withdrawn signifying a drop in their overall importance from India’s point of view..Security withdrawn over Pulwama attacks, separatist leaders say ‘don’t need it’Import duty hiked for all imports from Pakistan…India hikes customs duty to 200 per cent on all goods imported from PakistanMFN status was withdrawn with immediate effect by India…Pakistan’s most-favoured nation status scrappedIndia’s withdrawal of MFN status to Pakistan: meaning and implications – Indian EconomyIndia plans to stop the water flowing into Pakistan by utilizing its share to the full … While it does not have significant impact as of now, what it achieves is, India will have a mechanism and infrastructure in place to divert water flowing into main rivers of Pakistan in future…Pulwama fallout: Government to stop India's share of water flowing into PakistanHowever this time, Modi was in no mood to let go of things easily… He openly stated the will to revenge the martyrs and ask forces to plan retaliation action…Fearing the repeat of Cross border surgical strikes, Pakistan immediately withdrew the terrorists from near border areas to inland of Pakistan (not part of India claimed J&K)…. However everyone was caught wrong-footed when India carried out an Air-force Raid on Balakot Terrorist camp well within the borders of Pakistan… The safe heaven was indeed turned into path to heaven (Hell) by Indian air-force…2019 Balakot airstrike - Wikipediain the heightened atmosphere Pakistan tried to retaliate by carrying out air raids… however it quickly backfired as Pakistan lost one of its F16 and also lost one of their own pilot to Local villagers lynching him to death for mistaken identity …one Indian Mig 21 also crashed and Indian Pilot was captured alive by Pakistan… However Pakistan had realized by then that they cannot simply sustain if India keeps in raising the heat… They tried to de-escalate the tensions by releasing the Indian Pilot as a peace gesture..After days of captivity, IAF pilot Abhinandan returns home from PakNot stopping here, Modi started to build pressure internationally to get Masood Azahar listed as International terrorist… An very long overdue thing which was blocked by China till now…Top Pakistani militant named as terroristIt would be really interesting to see what is the next tactical move by Modi as he is a master of international politics in an unprecedented fashion…I will just say, Indians recognize the sheer intelligence and dedication this man brings and elect him again with even bigger margin this time to be a PM…EDIT 7: 5th August 2019So here is a new overdue update to include recent and perhaps most significant developments for this Topic..After triumphing win in general elections 2019 and completely out doing the opposition parties, Modi trusted his man with the most important job of Home Minister… Amit Shah is a man who gets things DONE and is a real badass…Then started the long overhaul of the J&K state machinery…I have already explained in earlier sections, how PDP and NCP let go the control of situation to Modi by not reading between the lines…This time Mr Shah started on 2 fronts..He strangled the money supply to terrorists happening through hawala racket by the means of J&K Bank .. The CEO was compulsorily retired and soon ACB and tax department raided the bank offices to unearth the wrongdoings..Jammu and Kashmir Bank plunges after top boss' exit2. Security forces went on full offensive against terrorists eliminating them en masse..J&K: 101 terrorists killed, 50 new recruits in 2019 | India News - Times of Indiahowever the biggest shock came when Government today, scrapped the article 370 of constitution by notifying a signed ordinance from President of India..since article 370 is now null and void (also making 35A section of constitution thereby ineffective) true integration of J&K with India’s mainland can now be fast tracked..Government on its part, seems to have done the Legal Homework done as Legal experts say that the decision does not seem to violate the authorities and principles laid down by constitution of India…Constitution expert Subhash Kashyap on #Article370: I can only say, constitutionally it is sound, no legal & constitutional fault can be found in it. Govt has carefully studied the matter. As for the question, if it's a political decision, I have nothing to say on that. pic.twitter.com/FNDbeh6jBt— ANI (@ANI) August 5, 2019For those who are interested to know in detail, any change in article 370 and section 35A by Union Government of India was required approval of the state legislation (J&K Assembly)… However since there is no sitting assembly in J&K when revocation was notified by president, the legislative powers are transferred automatically towards Governor representing the central government…Meaning parliament and President can make the decision unilaterally to revoke article 370 when J&K Assembly is not in session provided it is agreed upon by the Governor…Hence the scrutiny is expected to stand the review by Supreme court, if challenged…And there is a much bigger decision is to bifurcate the state of J&K into 2 union territories… That means, though J&K will continue to be a state, the state government will have much less powers than other full states in India, almost minuscule in comparison to their existing powers..This will mark an end of era of appeasement politics and alienation of J&K from mainland India… The move today will have far reaching impacts in future…KUDOS MR MODI… !!!!56″ Rocks….JAI HIND…

I love this question because there is just so much to talk about. There are literally thousands of technologies that can be traced back to the military funding or military necessity that we now use daily in our everyday lives. That said, I scavenged around the internet for a list of the some my favorite uses that come from direct military research. For that reason, I take no responsibility or credit for writing any of the sections (besides vaccines and refrigerators. You can blame me there if you disagree.) I'm just delivering the information to new readers. You can see all my sources for more information at the bottom.The InternetProbably the most visible product of military research is what you’re using to read this very article. The research, protocols, and basic hardware that became the foundation of the Internet were all developed by primarily military government agencies, beginning with the Defense Advanced Research Projects Agency’s 1962 mandate to connect the computers of the Pentagon, the Strategic Air Command, and the bombproof defense command centers buried deep below Cheyenne Mountain.In August 1962, JCR Licklider’s paper entitled “On-Line Man Computer Communication” described a connected global network, and by October he’d been appointed director of the new Information Processing Techniques Office (IPTO) at ARPA, as it was called back then. His brief was to create a network to connect Department of Defense computers at three disparate locations. It wasn’t until another internet pioneer, Robert Taylor, took over as the head of IPTO and brought in Larry Roberts from MIT that work on building the network began. The first host-to-host connection between PCs on the new Arpanet was established at 10.30pm on 29 October 1969, creating the world’s first fully operational packet-switching network. By December, a four-node network was up and running, the first email was sent across it in 1972, and people started referring to it as the internet in 1973.DARPA research teams came up with the fundamental technologies that made computer networking possible, and when the military computers were successfully linked, the government made the technology available to America’s college system, where it was further refined until it became the preferred distribution channel for all the world’s news, entertainment, and pornography.Although there are many individuals to whom the development of the net can be attributed, without DARPA it simply wouldn’t exist.Internet anonymityI know right? Privacy, anonymity and government agencies aren’t natural bedfellows, but bear with us. Those who care about online privacy will probably have heard of the Tor privacy service, which, when used in conjunction with the Tor private browser, offers possibly the most anonymous method of being on the internet.The core principle behind Tor – namely, “onion routing” – was originally funded by the US Office of Naval Research in 1995, and the development of the technology was helped along by DARPA in 1997. Three years later, the Tor network emerged as a direct result of the earlier DARPA-funded work.So, what is an onion network? It involves adding a layer of encryption for each router node along the path that your data travels, each encryption layer being peeled back one at a time by routers along the way.Each router unpeels a single layer to get instructions on where to send the data packets next, but can’t see where the data packets have come from. None of these nodes knows the origin of those packets, nor the ultimate destination, nor does it have access to the contents of your data transfer.VaccinesModern vaccines probably date back to practices developed during the American Revolutionary War and can probably be traced back even further to ancient Africa. While in Valley Forge, the Colonial army suffered a hard winter. Among problems such as no food, poor clothing and the freezing winter, Valley Forge was wrought with the diseases that run in such camps. Among them a smallpox epidemic.It was seen in those days that one population of Americans had a surprising resistance to various diseases such as Smallpox. This group was the slaves brought over from Africa. According to them, the slaves owed their resilience to a strange practice brought over by the slaves that was said to protect them from the disease. This practice would appear to regular people like you and me to be barbaric at best and to many, looks much more like dark arts and evil magic. This practice involved a practitioner to pierce with a knife the puss ridden whelps of an animal diseased with Cowpox, a relative of the Smallpox virus. With the knife now contaminated with the bovine's infected puss, the practitioner would then wipe the puss against an open wound on the patient's body. This wound was usually a large cut and usually self inflicted for the purposes of the procedure. Now let's go back a few hundred years before our understanding of modern microbiology. This sounds completely stupid. Honestly I have no idea how anyone would have ever thought to do this, or why any doctor in his right might would go for it, but for the Africans it seemed to noticeably work. Perhaps pushed by desperation or lack of knowing any better, Colonial doctors tried something revolutionary, or at least very stupid by conventional wisdom of the day. The Americans gave it a stab.The immediate results were devastating. About 1 in 10 came down with a severe outbreak of a disease similar to the Smallpox virus. Many died. Yet this was a win for the men of Valley Forge. How? Because 1 in 10 is much better than the 1 in 4 that would have been expected to die given no protection from the virus. Considering where we were in history of medicine, this amounted to a medical miracle.Since that time we have come a long way in how we understand diseases and how we make and use vaccines. So much so that diseases like one of the world's deadliest diseases in history, Smallpox has been eradicated completely. Polio went from being a disease that could still take down one of the wealthiest and most powerful people in the world in the 1920's (Franklin D. Roosevelt) to almost non-existent in the 2020's. Thousands of diseases are loosing the battle for our lives and now millions of people who wouldn't be here are. Still there is an important lesson to know from how it all got started and how that applies today. When vaccines were first used in practice that we know of, it came with a 1 in 10 casualty rating. This was seen as blessing because of the very real threat that the disease posed. the 10% chance of getting sick to Cowpox was far better than the 25% chance of dying to Smallpox. That is what we today have to accept. No good thing comes without some risk, but with vaccines the risk of not putting your faith in them is far, far greater than if you do.The Global Positioning SystemWhen you rely on the GPS app on that Android phone to keep yourself from getting lost, you’re using the same Global Positioning System satellites set up by the U.S. Department of Defense starting in 1979. At President Clinton’s behest, the system became available to civilian users in 1996.The GPS, or global positioning system, was originally developed for Air Force and Navy use. Ground-based radio systems like LORAN had been a vital part of sea and air navigation since the Thirties, but the tumult of World War II had shown that a system dependent on terrestrial antennas and command centers was vulnerable to enemy attack. The United States Navy, in great need of an all-weather navigation system practically invulnerable from enemy action, commissioned the “Transit/NAVSTAR” satellite system in the Sixties as an aid to their Polaris-class nuclear missile subs, and the navigational system soon spread to the rest of the American military establishment.Transit was so useful that NATO adopted and enlarged it to form a navigational network named “Navstar-GPS,” a system that the Reagan administration released to the public shortly after a Korean airliner strayed into Russian airspace and was shot down.Between 1973 and 1978, Dr. Bradford Parkinson worked with both military branches to develop the Navstar GPS system, which relies on numerous satellites positioned at staggered points around the earth. The system uses multiple satellites to triangulate users' location and help navigate. It can be very accurate any time of day, anywhere in the world. It is accurate enough for the military, which uses it to guide missiles and track aircraft and vessels. In The technology can now be found in many commercial applications, including airlines, cars and smartphones. In the late 1980s and early '90s, the United States launched a second generation of satellites, which are more accurate than the first. The European Union and China have begun to develop their own independent networks.Today, the technology is so ubiquitous that it’s hard to buy a cellphone that doesn’t have a GPS antenna built into it.Freeze DryingDippin’ Dots, anyone? The technology that’s now used to make freeze-dried ice cream was first used widely during World War II as a way of preserving medical supplies that otherwise required refrigeration.EpipenEpiPens, the auto-injecting syringes that allow you to give yourself a quick shot of epinephrine to stave off an allergic reaction, sprung from a similar device designed to protect soldiers from nerve agents and chemical weapons.In fact, I still remember the rhyme my HAZMAT specialist taught me.ANTROPENETWO-PANCLORIDEDANTROPENETWO-PANCLORIDEDAlright it doesn't rhyme. The military doesn't do good at rhyming, just remember the "TWO". It goes in second, or you die.Cargo PantsBritish soldiers began sporting cargo pants in the 1930s because they offered a convenient way to carry vital military gear like ammunition. American troops adopted them just a few years later, and the general public began to wear them in the 1990s.Duct TapeIn 1942, duct tape was invented for the military as a way to seal ammunition cases so that water couldn’t get in. Soldiers during WWII quickly realized that it worked well for fixing army gear, too. In World War II, Johnson & Johnson’s Revolite Permacell division developed the widely purposable tape most Americans recognize as duct, or “duck” tape. The tape’s ease of use, durability and water-resistance made it useful to seal containers and fix windows and equipment during the war. The basic components of the product is medical tape with polyethylene backing. When used in the army, it was typically green, but after the war, it was used in civilian applications such as construction and repair and became recognizable for its silver-gray color. Several companies now manufacture duct tape, including Scotch and Duck-brand.Gas CansYou know those canisters you use in order to get gasoline to put in your lawnmower? They were initially developed for the German military in the 1930s.JeepThe Jeep has come a long way since it was first manufactured for American troops to use on reconnaissance missions in WWII. Now celebrating its 70th anniversary, some new models of the world’s oldest SUV come equipped with luxuries such as leather-wrapped steering wheels, DVD players, and touchscreen media consoles.Four-wheel-drive technology actually had been around since the turn of the 20th century. By the 1930s, the military needed a scout car that could have speed and versatility in addition to hauling power and all-terrain capacity. The problem was that these two features were mutually exclusive from an engineering standpoint. The first Jeep that made it to battle, the Willys-Overland MB, provided the answer as the perfect army scout vehicle. Its performance in the war was so outstanding that Dwight D. Eisenhower said, “America could not have won World War II without it.” With war hero status, the military buggy had no trouble transitioning into a civilian car, with Americans appreciating the new light utility vehicles. Now, the Jeep brand continues to market itself on military toughness, going as far as joining with the Call of Duty video game franchise to promote its vehicles.ComputersENIAC, the first electronic computer that was capable of being programmed to serve many different purposes, was designed for the U.S. military during WWII. The army paid for the computer to be built so they could use it in their Ballistic Research Laboratory.Microwave OvensOne of the most dramatic technological advantages to come out of WWII was the power and sophistication of radar: beginning the war in the form of giant antenna installations that couldn’t measure distance, altitude, and bearing at the same time and ending it in applications small enough to fit in some of the world’s first guided missiles. While you’re not likely to be using a lot of guided missiles in your everyday life, you’re almost certain to use an accidental byproduct of radar research—the microwave oven.The technology behind the microwave oven was developed during World War II. At the time, the U.S. and British militaries engineered the magnetron, which was the result of research conducted on radio transmission and radar detection. The magnetron produced much smaller radio waves, known as microwaves, and was small and powerful enough to be used in airplanes. Its detection capabilities helped solve the persistent problem of accurately bombing towns. Microwaves' ability to heat food was discovered accidentally after the war in 1945. An American scientist realized that the radar transmitters used by the U.S. Army throughout WWII actually released enough heat—in the form of “microwaves”—that they could cook food. Percy Lebaron Spencer, who was employed at the time by the American defense contractor Raytheon Company, realized at work one day that radar waves had melted a candy bar in his pocket. After confirming that he himself had not also melted and presumably getting a new coat, Spencer determined that the microwave radiation was responsible for heating the candy bar but not the wrapper, and proposed to use this phenomenon to cook foods. This technology was used to construct the first microwave oven within the next 2 years. Eight years later, Raytheon produced the gigantic 1161 Radarange for commercial and institutional use; a further thirteen years of tweaking and tinkering shrank the Radarange’s size and price tag down to civilian levels, selling the new model under Raytheon’s domestic badge Amana. Raytheon produced the first commercially available microwave oven in 1954. Today, microwaves are used in a variety of applications, including in detecting speed, sending telephone and television communications, curing plywood, treating muscle soreness and of course in microwave ovens.RefrigeratorsRefrigeration has existed for many years. At any point where you could stick a block of ice inside a box, you had a working refrigerator unit. It wasn't until World War II that there came a great need to ship massive amounts of food goods overseas for long voyages and, preferably, keep them fresh. With this came the advent of the Freon. The introduction of Freon in the 1920s expanded the refrigerator market during the 1930s and provided a safer, low-toxicity alternative to previously used refrigerants. Separate freezers became common during the 1940s, the popular term at the time for the unit was a deep freeze. These devices, or appliances, did not go into mass production for use in the home until after World War II.Freon usage in refrigeration units also led the way for modern air conditioning.Digital CamerasMajor governments have launched sophisticated spy satellites with super-high-resolution cameras into orbit since the late fifties in order to sneak a peek on each others’ troop concentrations and industrial developments. While the photos from these satellites were priceless in intelligence terms, there was one major technical snag that made relying on them a pain in the ass: the only way to get at these pictures was to grab the undeveloped film canisters that the satellite would periodically poop out, a complicated operation that involved a mid-air snagging of the canister’s tiny parachute as it drifted through the atmosphere.Almost a third of the results of America’s otherwise successful “Keyhole” spy satellite program were lost due to this tricky retrieval program, but the NASA/USAF KH-11 “Kennan” satellite of 1976 put an end to the problem with the use of a revolutionary electro-optical camera that transmitted images in encoded digital format. The fundamentals of the technology are still in use in modern digital cameras, and the updated form of the KH-11 is still a major part of American surveillance technology.AntibioticsPenicillin was first isolated in a usable anti-bacterial agent in 1928 by Scottish scientist Alexander Fleming, but its medical usefulness wasn’t apparent until the beginning of the Second World War. The rots and infectious diseases that plagued the wounded soldiers of World War One were largely eliminated by early antibiotic treatments like sulfonamide and benzylpenicillin. After the war, these antibiotics became a common part of Western medicine, so much so that the overuse of these medicines is now a major health problem.Canned FoodBack when France was an unstoppable military superpower instead of a tired joke about cheese eating, the French government under Napoleon offered an astonishing 12,000 franc reward to any inventor that could create a way to preserve and store lots of cheap crappy food. At the time, France was busy kicking ass throughout almost all of Europe and was seriously considering launching an assault on a completely new and different continent, so the French military was extremely interested in any new developments in feeding a huge number of people as cheaply as possible.Chef and brewer Nicolas Appert happened to notice that food cooked in sealed jars never seemed to spoil, and his discovery was soon adapted to the use of tin cans for preservation. Unfortunately for French soldiers, the invention of the can-opener came a full thirty years after the invention of the can, so troops in the field had to make do with bayonets, entrenchment tools, and sharp rocks in order to eat the carefully-preserved foods within the can.Ambulance ServicesA refinement of the traditional process of carting away the dead and dying to someplace where they would stink less, the ambulance first made an appearance in the Spanish army of the late 15th century. The “ambulancias” more properly referred to the portable military hospitals that followed the troops around, but came to be attached to the wagons and litters that would remove the wounded from the battlefield after the fight had been won.The “flying ambulance” of Napoleon’s army is closer to our modern conception of the ambulance—a two or four-wheeled carriage that would venture out into enemy fire to rescue the wounded and provide basic first aid until the patient reached the hospital camp.The ambulance cart became standard issue for Union troops during the Civil War, and in 1869 former Army surgeon Edward Dalton introduced the first large-scale ambulance service to the Commercial Hospital of Cincinnati. By the end of the following year, the service had answered 1401 emergency calls.SunglassesAviators soon became inextricably linked in the public mind with the classic cool of the victorious American Air Force, as well as the grandiose swaggering of General Douglas MacArthur, who was rarely seen without his aviators. The characteristically dark shades of the aviator sunglasses were at one time necessary for test pilots pushing the limits of the airplane. Today almost exclusively sported by ironic hipsters and extremely un-ironic cops, the classic “aviator” style of sunglasses was invented by the Ray-Ban corporation to protect pilots’ eyes from glints and glares.At high altitudes, a pilot’s eyes could either be severely damaged by the extremely bright light in the upper atmosphere, or they could freeze in temperatures approaching -80 degrees Fahrenheit. In such conditions, goggles with dark lenses and a tear-drop shape were ideal. A design that prevented as much sunlight as possible from reaching the eye led to Ray-Ban Aviator sunglasses, which became standard gear for men enlisted in the military during World War II. Covering as much of the eye as possible and tempered to block up to 80% of incoming light, the original Aviators were essential equipment for fighter pilots and bomber crews who always had to keep an eye out for enemy planes coming out of the angle of the sun.Since the war, Ray-Bans have made prominent appearances in movies such as Taxi Driver and Top Gun, and were famously worn by celebrities such as Michael Jackson.Safety RazorsMany believe that King Camp Gillette was the originator of the so-called “razor and blades” business model (sometimes expressed as “give ‘em the razor, sell ‘em the blades”) as a fundamental part of the disposable “safety” razor concept he had developed in 1903. In fact, Gillette screwed up his launch, pricing blade refills much higher than the public was willing to pay for, and when his patents lapsed copycat companies adopted the sold nearly identical designs at much cheaper rates—a lower profit margin but a steady source of income.Gillette regrouped and started pricing his stuff smarter, but he really hit it big when he snared the contract to supply every American soldier in WWI with a Gillette shaving kit. Practically overnight, the safety razor became an indispensable part of a man’s grooming kit, assuring the success of the Gillette brand up to this day.Tampons, Pads and other Feminine Hygiene ProductsThe biggest problem with war is that it tends to put holes in people, thus encouraging blood to take a scenic stroll through places it's not supposed to visit. Especially during World War I, when the dead and wounded toll hit the double-digit millions. And especially when a cotton shortage made the bandaging of dying soldiers a pain in the neck.In 1914, Kimberly-Clark was a paper mill company that realized you could do more with wood pulp besides just make it into paper. In fact, by carefully mixing and forming the right combination of pulp, you could get a material that was five times more absorbent than cotton, yet significantly cheaper to produce. Kimberly-Clark began selling their new “cellulocotton” to the military at cost, providing the Allied soldiers of WWI with an excellent new material to use for bandaging and sealing wounds, but then nurses began using it also during their menstrual cycle.After the war, Kimberly-Clark found itself in possession of a number of huge factories dedicated to producing cellulocotton, but not nearly as much demand from civilian doctors and surgeons. It looked like a lot of plants would have to close, at the cost of hundreds of jobs and millions of dollars, when one Kimberly-Clark executive came across an odd rumor concerning the Army nurses that had served at or near the front lines of the war.At the time, women’s menstrual pads were cumbersome cloth flaps that had to be washed and re-worn. Many women felt embarrassed by these “sanitary napkins,” partly because it was considered outstandingly rude to talk about anything period-related in public and partly because these early pads were more similar to diapers than the little numbers of today.The war nurses, being practical women, soon ditched their pads (which were a nightmare to keep clean in battlefield conditions) and cut themselves snips of cellulocotton, allowing them greater freedom of movement and comfort. When K-C found this out, they immediately launched the “Cellunap” sanitary napkin and eventually the Kotex (for “cotton textile”) women’s hygiene brand. Initially, according to the company, it struggled to market Kotex due to social taboos. In an effort to sell more of its wadding, the company, using a slightly altered ingredient blend, began producing Kleenex tissues. Kotex ads were unusually upfront about the taboo subject of periods, and often made mention of the product’s military roots and close connection to the military nurses. With a quick re-branding that actually capitalized on their product's origin, and that those nurses LOVED using their bandages during their periods.Meanwhile, cellulocotton has typically been replaced in both field dressings and tampons by newer synthetics like Curlex, although medics today have been known to plunder the female hygiene sections of PXes and supply cars when they’re running short of purpose-designed bandages.A Bunch of Classic ToysIn 1943, naval engineer Richard James was working on a doozy of a problem. Delicate equipment aboard battleships had this way of getting knocked the hell around during high seas. So James was messing around with springs to support the phonogram machines or whatever, when what do you know? He dropped one of the springs. And instead of just sitting there like a punk, the little spring kind of stepped away in a very slinky-like manner.Knowing that there was nothing kids loved more than coiled metal, James figured he just might have invented the world's greatest toy ever. Within two years, James found the perfect metal for his toy idea and scored a $500 loan to build his first batch, which he sold in 90 minutes.While the Slinky was discovered by accident, tons of government dollars worth of research were poured into Silly Putty. Silly Putty was born out of desperation during World War II. In 1943, the wartime rubber shortage was so bad that the government asked private companies to create a synthetic rubber substitute. Japanese forces had invaded rubber producing nations, limiting American access to the material. As a result, the U.S. military requested the private sector to create an alternative for the rubber used in boots and tires. General Electric had a whole team of scientists throw together every chemical they could think of in hopes that it would create something rubber-like. In 1943, James Wright, an engineer with General Electric, developed the putty from boric acid and silicone oil. This squishy mixture proved to have surprising qualities: It bounced and stretched, it would not stick and it only melted at very high temperatures. Things were looking up until someone pointed out that you can't make tires out of something with the malleability of wet chewing gum, even if it can totally copy the newspaper.While the material had no practical uses, it caught-on very quickly as a novelty. It was so useless at replacing rubber that GE tried to send it to scientists around the world in hopes that someone, anyone, could figure out something to do with it. Eventually, a toy manufacturer mentioned that little kids will pretty much play with anything you give them. Silly Putty became particularly popular after Peter Hodgson, who had first marketed the putty for a store in New Haven, recognized that people liked the goo for its unique properties -- it stretches and bounces but can be easily snapped into pieces. Hodgson began targeting children in the Silly Putty ads and selling it in the now-famous egg-shaped container. The rest is history.Finally, there's Walter "Fred" Morrison, the patron saint of hipsters.Fred, like most other college kids in the 1930s, spent a great deal of time throwing around pie pans from the Frisbie Baking Company. But it wasn't until he joined the Air Force that he learned about aerodynamics and he realized he was doing science during those pan-flinging sessions.So, Fred took what he learned about basic aerodynamics from the Air Force and made a prototype of a better flying disc, that didn't have bits of pie crust stuck to it. And instead of tin, he went with plastic. He dubbed his creation the "Pluto Platter," which was ultimately renamed the "Frisbee" and went on to provide hardcore leaping motivation for extreme college kids everywhere.Super GlueDate invented: 1951Super Glue was inadvertently first created by Harry Coover and Fred Joyner, Tennessee-based employees of Eastman Kodak, in 1951. At the time, they were looking to find a substance that could be used as a heat-resistant coating for jet cockpits. But not until seven years later, in 1958, did Super Glue, which did not need heat or pressure for the adhesive to work, hit the market. The product never made its acknowledged inventor, Coover, wealthy. The product eventually had both medical and military uses — it could be used in medical procedures and was used to treat wounded troops during the Vietnam War.***Edit to reflect someone who blocked me's comments which don't really make a lot of sense, especially given that so many answers were already written over a month ago.Are the products worth what the military spends developing it? It depends. Are you talking about Slinkies or the Internet? Are you talking about panty hose or modern aviation? Are you talking about vaccines or antibiotics? Oops. Guess both those last two were worth it. If you think about this rationally, some percentage of everything fails. Even successful projects don't meet their creators best expectations. For example, I heard today that there are places on the internet where you can see naked ladies. I hope no one discovers that. Going beyond that, there are regular failures where projects need to be scrapped and wasted. If you think that private sector somehow doesn't do this, you should check out the Silicon Valley boneyard of startups that flopped, wasting billions of investor capital.Could that money be put to better use? There is no way to answer that. People value different things. You may value healthcare so you would argue that it could have been spent on giving you free stuff. Others may value science, engineering, jobs, technology, or a better world through increases in funding to virtually every field, so they would argue that a person wanting only a few handouts and luxuries doesn't quite a clear set of priorities.Could the private sector have developed it more efficiently? This point shows such a fundamental misunderstand of how the world works. The private sector are who makes all these technologies. The government, whether Department of Defense, Department of Homeland Security, or Department of Agriculture don't do anything as far as directly creating these technologies. They only communicate a need to industries so that those interested try to put out bids to get contracts. The military just provides the necessary start-up funding for projects and incentive for those companies to grow. If not for them, there would be no known need for things like nuclear energy research which led to so much more important things than a bomb.My Sources:Famous Products Invented for the Military10 brilliant DARPA inventions5 Inventions You Won't Believe Came From War10 Everyday Items We Can Thank the Military for Inventing9 Things Invented For Military Use That You Now Encounter In Everyday LifeMilitary inventions hit the civilian marketFamous Products Invented for the MilitaryThanks for reading!For more answers like this check out On War by Jon Davis and follow my blog War Elephant for more new content. Everything I write is completely independent research and is supported by fan and follower pledges. Please consider showing your support directly by checking out my Patreon support page here: Jon Davis on Patreon: Help support in writing Military Novels, Articles, and Essays.

Note: all currency is in 2016 dollarsThey would marvel at our televisions, computers, internet, reliable cars, immodest clothing, and more.Here’s what life was like then. Surmise from this what a 1950’s person would think about America 60 years in the future.One of the things I most notice as I look back is we kids were never bored even though we didn't have, or perhaps because we didn’t have, a TV. We wandered the neighborhood and sometimes into a large wooded park a half mile from our house. We could spend hours in the backyard. We sewed our own Winnie the Pooh dolls, created our own Clue game from memory after playing it at a friend's, wrote poetry, put on magic shows, and more. Our imaginations knew no bounds. On Saturday we would listen to The Lone Ranger and Dragnet on the radio. These shows could be quite violent. I remember once Sgt. Friday of Dragnet said he crossed the plain to get to a crime scene so I pictured him walking across an airplane. The plane lay on the ground because he didn't say anything about climbing over it. Then later in the show he crossed it again but the rains had caused grass to sprout. I visualized an airplane covered in grass. I wondered about this for years before I finally got it.When we did get a television in 1957 it had no remote. That meant getting up to change channels, of which there were only two, and being forced to listen to the commercials. Black and white of course. The modern remote was decades away. Father Knows Best, I Love Lucy, Lassie, I've got a Secret, and Your Hit Parade were some of my favorites. Televisions weren't the reliable self-adjusting units of today. Tubes burned out and the picture might start "flipping" meaning it would move up and return from below over and over. We had adjustments on the back. It was an art to get a stable picture. Don't get me started on adjusting color televisions. You were likely to have to settle for green faces. And they were extremely heavy. Moving larger TVs might take two or more grown men and these sets were expensive costing much more than a modern television set. A 1954 15" color set cost nearly $9000. Screen sizes were no more than 12" and often round at the beginning of the decade but grew. Today’s young people don't know how good they have it. Modern TVs are lightweight, troublefree, and have large screens with beautiful pictures.$5000!I Love Lucy set. I Love Lucy was the biggest show on television and is still fun to watch. The show blazed the trail for all future sitcoms. Ricki's innovations revolutionized how television programs were broadcast. Some of the techniques he pioneered are still in use.Children's programs were fairly unsophisticated with the most popular being The Mickey Mouse Club and the original children's show, the Howdy Doody Show starring Howdy Doody, a puppet. The studio audience was called the Peanut Gallery. There was the beloved mute clown Clarabell who had a horn he honked and a seltzer bottle he wasn't afraid to use, and Buffalo Bob. Clarabell broke his silence on the last show saying "Goodbye Kids". Getting a picture of Clarabell's real face by pesky photographers was an ongoing threat but they all failed.The original Clarabell went on to host the Captain Kangaroo showMeet the Peanut GalleryCaptain Kangaroo had a 29 year runThe upbeat Mickey Mouse Club. On Friday we were sung a special goodby song: M-I-C see you next week, K-E-Y why? because we love you, M-O-U-S-E. The charismatic Annette Funicello (can you find her?) went on to star in a series of Beach Party movies in the 60's and released several successful singles. A single was a single song on a 45 rpm record with a throwaway song on the reverse side.Annette Funicelleo was the first Micky Mouse Club breakout star but not the last as the likes of Britney Spears followed in her footsteps.Britney and JustinAmerican Bandstand, possibly the longest running TV show ever, was on daily for decades hosted by the ever young Dick Clark.Movie serials were popular. They were about ten minutes long and followed a hero from week to week and always ended in a "cliff hanger". I once saw one that left the hero actually dangling over a cliff hanging onto a branch. I was very worried so it was a relief when he saved himself the following week. They played at the Saturday matinees for several decades until television replaced them.All movies opened with a cartoon. The Disney characters along with Woody Woodpecker, Porky Pig, Bugs Bunny, Elmer Fudd, and the ever popular Roadrunner were my favorites. Popeye the Sailor Man was big but not one of my favorites. This was before CGI so each frame was hand painted then photographed.The Tasmanian Devil may think he's got Bugs but he be wrong.Bugs Bunny was an irrepressible smart aleck who was always one step ahead of whoever wanted to eat him. Here he is, once again, about to outsmart Elmer Fudd.The Roadrunner and Wile E. Coyote were favorites that sometimes got a round of applause when they appeared on the screen. The irony is coyotes can outrun Roadrunners and Roadrunners can fly short distances.There was no way to watch a movie at home so theaters boomed. The modern multiplex theaters we have now had not been dreamed up so a movie came to one theater in town and stayed as long as it was popular. You might have a double feature meaning two movies for the price on one. Many movies were still in black and white at the beginning of the decade.Weekends at the moviesOne convenience that was killed by daylight savings is the drive-in theater. These were very popular and convenient. Once I could drive it was great fun loading up the car and going for a romp at the drive-in. A small speaker was hanging on a pole. You would hang it from your window and crank the volume to the desired level.There was also this. Normally it went no further. It wasn't until the 60's that mores began to change.Elvis Presley debuted amid controversy that may be difficult to understand today. He was universally disliked by adults because of his below the waist gyrations but the kids loved him, their crazed reactions to his shows was repeated when the Beatles hit our shores. He was dismissed as talentless but in actuality he was a very good singer with a very good voice. He was a giant who dominated the music scene for a long time. He changed popular music forever.As preschoolers we had a simple little record player that used steel needles. My mother would buy us the needles in little bags for us to change out as needed.There were no battery powered watches. All watches were powered by a mainspring that had to be wound daily. I wound mine first thing in the morning. There were some self-winding watches. It was not unusual for me to have a watch that kept poor time. Watches came in varying qualities from, inflation adjusted, $10 for a watch with just a few jewels to $200 for a good 21 jewel watch. The jewels, rubies, were installed at high wear points to increase the life of the watch. My parents would buy me a Mickey Mouse watch annually although I did get a Hopalong Cassidy watch once. He was my cowboy hero.The white haired cowboy hero, Hopalong CassidyMy first camera was a Brownie box camera passed down from my mother. It was made in the 1930's. It only took eight black and white pictures so I had to be careful. The pictures were excellent quality due to the huge negative. I used it for around 20 years carrying it into the Army with me. The case finally broke so I bought one of those new inexpensive Pentax 35mm imports from Japan. $600 at the PX. German cameras were the standard at the time but the Japanese cameras turned out to be truly excellent. Mine was in good condition when I sold after 20 years of hard use.Cameras don't get much simpler. I had to hold my breath when snapping the picture.Flash photography required the use of a flashbulb, a bulb filled with magnesium. Flashbulbs were around for quite a while. Cameras had a special setting for flashbulbs of around 1/50th of a second. The bulbs would be very hot so needed to cool before being replaced. As the electric flash has become affordable it has replaced the flashbulb on modern cameras so that most young people probably are not even aware we once would stock up on flashbulbs if we were serious camera buffs.At night the fireflies came out so we caught them to put in bottles and watched them light up.Refrigerated air conditioning was expensive. I didn't even know there was such a thing so we didn't miss it even though we lived in the Southwest. 100 degrees was not considered hot.Can openers were awful. The modern sprocket type weren't available so we had to work the opener until the can finally surrendered.Coke and beer cans had to be opened with "Churchkeys" that stores provided for free:Cokes were 6½ ounces and there was no such thing as unscrewing the top. The other end of the "Churchkey" was used for removing the top or you could use this:That cap will take the skin right off your fingers if you try to unscrew itTelephones were primitiveAffordable home answering machines were a long way off as was voicemail so if someone called when you were out the call was not answered. There was something peaceful about that especially since there was no other way someone could get in touch with you so if you left the house no one was going to bother you.Long distance calls were a big deal so were rare. If you needed to call someone long distance you told the operator who would then call down the line so each operator could connect the call until they finally reached the party in question. Then the operator called you back and the call was connected. Next you received a huge bill from Ma Bell, the only game in town. With the advent of direct dial the system was streamlined but operator assistance continued to be a requirement in some areas into the 60's.Because long distance calls were prohibitively expensive and there was no email most communication out of the immediate vicinity was done by letter. It was the only way I had to communicate with "Granny". We kept a stash of stamps and envelopes on hand. If you had a problem with a retailer who wasn't headquartered in the city you had to work it out through the mail. Everything was slower. At Christmas I had to sit down to write thank you notes and get them in the mail. This was still my MO on staying in touch into the 90's even though long distance calling was more affordable. Email?Payphones were a nickel and rotary because touchtone hadn't been invented. They could be found almost anywhere.All phones were rotary and had to be supplied by Ma Bell. You couldn't install your own phone or even buy one. They were all black. Ma Bell sent out a technician to hook up the phone wherever you wanted. If you wanted two or more phones you paid extra every month. Long distance rates were high and subsidized local service so that local service was affordable. Ma Bell was reliable and took care of things. It was one of the best companies in the world for service but being a monopoly it was eventually brought down resulting in the profusion of options we have now. Phone numbers came with a prefix. We lived in the Lynwood area so our phone number was Ly1-2345. Smaller town might only have the last five digits: 12345.Direct dial was introduced in the 50's but wasn't available everywhere, some places still did not have it well into the 60's. It was a huge deal. We no longer had to have an operator connect us but long distance remained expensive.Touchtone was introduced in the 60's making it easier to dial the long numbers. Playing tunes with the touchtone numbers such as "Mary had a Little lamb" was a popular pastime for a while. People would publish the numbers to press to play a song.Mary had a little lamb:6,5,4,5,6,6,6,5,5,5,6,9,96,5,4,5,6,6,6,6,5,5,6,5,4Besides pencil and paper there were two ways to do calculations. An expensive and bulky mechanical calculator or a slide rule. I opted for pencil and paper and was good at doing arithmetic in my head. We were a long way from the handheld digital scientific calculators that replaced the slide rule. I once worked as a repairman at the Monroe calculator company. Adding machines were our main product. They were all gears and levers.Pull the handle.Cash registers were also manual.Toy cars were steel with rolling rubber wheels and that's it. You might have a sheet metal wind up toy that could move but no battery operated or radio controlled cars. I once had a windup bulldozer that fascinated me but I dropped it and it wouldn't work anymore.We could buy balsa wood airplanes for a dime that would glide when tossed but not well. I once made a plane with a rubber band motor that would fly but it kept running into things.We spent a lot of time with our View Master. We could click through stereophonic pictures of various landscapes. Ours was a much older version of the one in the picture but the 3-D realism amazed.Lionel trains were a popular postwar item. I loved the one I got. It was solidly built of metal with realistic detail. It had a working headlight and pills I could drop into the smokestack that produced puffs of smoke. The only problem was the track would tend to slide on the linoleum floors.I went through all the normal childhood diseases. There was mumps, whooping cough, measles, chicken pox, and maybe some others. Once I caught something that laid me out for weeks but I didn't die. The fear of polio, we didn't know what caused it, always hovered around the edges of our lives. There were 20,000 or more cases annually. Articles about this dreaded disease were ubiquitous. Salk's invention of the polio vaccine in 1955 was HUGE!FDR was a Polio victimSome people were so paralyzed they couldn't breath and spent their life in an "Iron Lung" in order to stay alive.Cigarette smoking was ubiquitous. It wasn't seen as the health risk it is today and at the beginning of the decade cigarettes generally weren't filtered. By the 60's filtered cigarettes were the standard. 50's cigarette ads would offend us and even seem irresponsible today.The 5 & 10 cent stores, Woolworth's and Kress, were popular. They had a lunch counter for snacks and sandwiches. The stores were filled with neat stuff. Outside of Sears and JC Penney this is where many of us shopped. If we went to a shopping center it was just a line of small stores or what we call a strip mall today. In 1962 a covered mall came to our town. We were blown away as we walked through it. It's still in existence.Woolworth lunch counter. It could get crazy at lunchtime.Automats were around for a long time. I saw my first one in New York and thought it amazing. You view your selection through little windows, put your money in a slot and open the door and remove your lunch. I was amazed at buying a pie and seeing a hand reach in from behind and replace the one I just bought.Sears was a force to be reckoned with and a forgotten item may be the Sears Catalogue that arrived by mail. Its hundreds of pages was great fun to peruse and an American staple. There was little you couldn't buy including a car, the Allstate. The Allstate was a rebranded Kaiser Henry J. and very basic but essentially a good car.At one time Sears even sold prebuilt house kits. The precut materials along with instructions were shipped to you to be put together by the contractor of your choice. They were of excellent quality. Many are still with us today and are considered desirable because of their quality.Sears began as a catalogue company selling to the homestead frontier market in 1886. Farmers and their the isolated families lived near small towns. With the advent of reliable train service it was possible to order whatever you needed from Sears knowing you could trust the Sears name. When it came in the farmer might hook up his buggy that he bought from Sears ($25, $700 now) and drive into town to pick it up.There wasn't a lot you couldn't get at Sears. Your car could be serviced, repaired, and Allstate batteries and tires were for sale. The Allstate brand insured quality. At one time or the other Sears sold appliances, clothing, guns, luggage, watches, musical instruments, tombstones, typewriters, tools, cameras, toys, baseball mitts, bicycles, motor scooters, pianos, horse drawn sleds, shoes, boots, jewelry, well pumps, insurance, the list is nearly endless. If the farmer needed it or his family wanted something they would look in the Sears catalogue. I once bought a motorcycle jacket through the catalogue and it arrived by mail. I drove Sears scooters for years. I even owned a Sears cowboy hat. All were excellent. If Sears sold it you knew it was top quality.The scooters were rebranded Cushmans and Vespas.The 1953 Henry J Allstate car. White sidewall tires were the thing back then but hard to keep cleanThe rebranded 50cc Vespa was a reliable and fairly quick scooterYou supplied the land and the builder, Sears provided all materials and directions. Each piece was stamped with a number so you could find it on the plan. Sears stopped offering them when WWII broke out.Can you believe it? Cradle to grave, Sears was there.After 130 years Sears is struggling to keep up with the times.Banker's hours is an expression that refers to the 10am to 3pm hour the banks were open to the public back in the day. After 3:00 you were out of luck. The industry had been heavily regulated since the depression and this mean few, if any, branch offices. In my town there were no branch offices so all banks were downtown with the traffic congestion and bad parking associated with that. We could mail in checks but cash meant a trip downtown. In the 80's the regulations were largely lifted and the frenzied competition for your money began.Although there were oil company and department store credit cards there were no general use cards available to most people. BankAmericard (Visa) changed that in 1958. Now anyone could go in debt and we've been on that ride ever since.An odd fashion statement of the time was the veil woman sometimes wore formally. Unlike the MidEast veil it was see through. I once saw my mother wearing one.We used pencils in school. The only pens in general use were fountain pens which were filled from a small bottle of ink called an inkpot. You stuck the tip in the pot and pulled a lever to suck the ink up. Someone created refills that could be popped in making the fountain pen portable. Ballpoints were coming online but the pencil still reigned supreme. Paper Mate came up with a dependable and affordable ballpoint pen sounding the death knell for the fountain pen then Bic invented the long lasting disposable ballpoint that took its design from the pencil. With it's clear plastic barrel you knew how much ink you had. The pencil began to settle into its current secondary role.A Paper Mate innovation so you wouldn't be caught with a pen that wouldn't write. By the way that pen cost $18 in 2016 dollars.The 1950's was the decade of the Ballpoint pen. The first retractable ballpoint pen was introduce in 1949. Ballpoint pens had a long history of development with countless failures along the way primarily because of problems with the ink. Paper Mate, followed by Bic, finally marketed a workable pen.These were around for a whileAs ballpoint caught on such standard desktop items as the blotter became obsolete. The blotter was needed to dry up fountain pen smudges. Fountain pens were needed for signatures since pencil could be erased. You had to allow your paper to dry before folding or stacking it. Refillable they could get quite fancy but most of us had to settle for strip of blotter paper. Turning out a smudge free letter or report could be a challenge.BasicDeluxeReports were done in pencil and if it was a “term theme” that meant doing your research at the library. I had to take a bus into town and spend the day at the library. We would go through the card catalogue that had every book in the library cross referenced. A report might involve perusing several books, making notes on 3x5 cards, organizing them then writing out the report. The internet changed everything.In college I typed my reports. An invaluable skill I learned in High School. Since the home computer hadn't been invented there was no other way to turn out an attractive looking report. Now it's easy, then it could be laborious. It would take me three attempts to turn out something with a finished appearance. Typing a twenty page report over and over...you get the idea. If I decided add a sentence on the first page then the whole report had to be retyped.I picked this office machine up at a thrift store, it was an oldy but a goody. It took me through my University years and I carried it with me all over the country as I moved about. Then I scored this one:The IBM Selectric. The typewriter reached its epitome when IBM came up with this beauty. Its rotating ball replaced the strikers. If you accidentally hit two letters at the same time on a manual they might jam on the page when the strikers both met. I got years out of this beauty until it finally died in Dallas. I never had one better. My computer with a printer changed all that. My first 386 computer was $4000 and my Dot Matrix printer was $800. What's a Dot Matrix you ask?Make a mistake? I went though many bottles of this:The modern ambulance with its abundance of lifesaving equipment and trained paramedics hadn't been dreamed up yet. Ambulances were made by Cadillac and looked like colorful hearses with windows. I went to a hospital in a green one after a scooter accident.Ether was the preferred anesthetic for operations and it was an unpleasant way to go under but it worked. It's what they used when my tonsils were taken out. Because of the lack of pain killers they fed me ice cream several times a day. They must have scheduled all the tonsillitis cases for the same day because there were a bunch of us in the ward and we all cheered when the orderly rolled in the cart full of ice cream. I was very excited telling my mother about my good fortune.After my scooter accident all I got for the pain was the occasional aspirin so I writhed.Steam locomotives were still pulling trains so if you lived on the "wrong side of the tracks", meaning the prevailing winds blew your way, any laundry drying on a clothesline was doomed should you lose the mad dash to get it down. Diesel trains were making inroads but steam was not obsolete.Steam was much more powerful but you could gang together diesel locomotives until you had enough which is why you will see several locomotives pulling a train. With steam if you needed more power you built a bigger locomotive. They could be ganged but it was undesirable. These locomotives could get massive, 85' long, 132' with the tender, and weighing considerably more than a million pounds. Steam is suited to pulling trains but is high maintenance and expensive to operate compared to diesel.As diesel became more prevalent the union insisted the obsolete jobs remain so a diesel locomotive would have a fireman even though no coal needed to be shoveled into the boiler fire. Reader's Digest got into the act writing outraged articles about "featherbedding". Out of Steam“Big Boy”, the largest steam locomotive of all time. That’s how trains were pulled over the RockiesTwenty-five "Big Boys" were builtThese behemoths were capable of pulling a WWII destroyer along with a train of boxcars over steep mountains like the Rocky Mountains by itself.I remember sitting in class being introduced to Dick and Jane who were to be my friends for a long time as I learned to read. See Dick run. See Jane run. See dick and Jane run. Run, run, run. It worked.A few people were still using washboards but washing machines were taking overWashing machines worked okay but there were very few dryers so clothes were wrung out with the motor driven wringer on top of the machine. The clothes were then hung out to dry. A friend of mine had his thumb severely crushed when it got caught in the wringer. Then came the ironing. Since we didn't have a steam iron the clothes had to be sprinkled with water. A cork with a top with holes in it could be bought and put on a coke bottle for sprinkling. Washing clothes was a major ordeal. Cotton clothes, artificial fabrics hadn't been invented, had to be bought oversize because they shrank when washed until "Sanforized" cotton was introduced.Our sewing machine had to be pumped by foot. It seemed to work fine but what do I know? The machine folded down converting the unit into a flat table.Although the concept had been around a long time the dishwasher didn't take off until the 1960's. Until then we stood at a sink and handwashed with our bottle of Joy, something I still do.Joy introduced an automatic dispenser for a while. It would give just the right amount of detergent.The modern coffee maker with it's timers and filters was a long way off. Most people made coffee in a percolator. Maxwell coffee grounds (Good to the last drop) were poured into a basket and placed in the pot. The boiling water was forced up the tube in the middle and spilled onto the top of the basket. I was fascinated with watching the water beat against the glass stopper as it slowly turned brown.The soles of shoes were leather and would wear out before the uppers. Heels had to be replaced and holes would appear in the sole. It was a nuisance. I'll take today's Nikes with their rugged soles and care free uppers over the old leather shoes that required frequent polishing. If you wanted a high gloss you wet a cotton ball and used that to apply the polish. In the Army we called that "spit polishing".Even Adlai Stevenson, presidential candidate, wasn't immuneYour average car basic with a manual shift. It didn't come with a heater, air conditioning, radio, or power steering. Most, but not all, had turn signals. Turn signals were standard by the end of the decade. If your car didn't have turn signals you were required to stick your arm out the window to signal your intent.Failing to signal might get you a ticket.Power steering was introduced in 1951 on some luxury cars. Manual steering effort was substantial. I heard a couple of women saying they wished they had power steering. I asked what that was and they told me it makes steering easier but were unable to tell me what that meant. Cruise control was first installed in 1958 but was also a luxury item. Very few cars had cruise control. Automatic transmissions had been developed but were out of the range of many car owners and might only have two speeds, modern cars have at least four and some have eight. Modern air conditioning was introduced in the 60's although primitive systems were available in the 50's.We got our first car with a radio (AM only) and heater in the 60's. The radios were all vacuum tube so required a minute or so to warm up.Besides having a heater our new car could go 70 mph! Even faster downhill. 70 was the Beetle's top speed.Cars didn't have seatbelts. They were beginning to show up by the end of the decade but were resisted by many. Ford introduced them as an option in 1955 but they weren't popular. The thinking seems to have been that Fords must be dangerous or they wouldn't offer seatbelts. A popular scenario was what if you end up in a lake and couldn't get free. I thought that was silly. How often do you end up in a lake? I got it right away and always wore mine, thank God. I had an accident in which I might have died without it. Reader's Digest published articles detailing accidents in which someone's life was saved. Because they actually saved lives so were eventually accepted.Cars back then had steering wheels often with horn rings that could easily impale your chest. Without a safety belt I would have merged with my steering column. As it was I bent the top of the steering wheel over 90 degrees. Before belts people often were severely injured by their steering columns, chests were crushed and passengers went through the windshield. People would be thrown out of their cars to slide down the street or bounce around the interior slamming into one another or hard interior parts. Dashboards were metal and less forgiving than modern dashboards. Airbags, what?Many cars had vacuum operated windshield wipers that operated using the engine vacuum. Electric windshield wipers were catching on through the 50's and became the standard in the 60's. Vacuum operated wipers, although better than nothing, were quirky and didn't operate well under acceleration. In a downpour I periodically let up on the accelerator allowing the wipers to speed up so I could see.Cars often didn't come with side mirrors unless you went upscale. When they had mirrors they were often just on the driver's side. If you wanted a mirror on your basic car you had to add it yourself. I purchased aftermarket mirrors and added them to some of my cars. They were hard to adjust. You usually loosened a screw to adjust the mirror which might go out of adjustment as the screw was tightened.No mirrorsAftermarket mirrors. Adjustment screw is facing the front of the car.Windshield washers were almost non-existent. I didn't even know such a thing existed. White sidewall tires were ubiquitous.Cars were not reliable. They were pretty well worn out by 60,000 miles. Speedometers only went to 99,999 miles. I only saw one car break a 100,000 and it was very tired. By 60,000 you might have gone through five sets of tires and even more tuneups. A tuneup required new plugs, points, and maybe even more. Tuneups needed to be done every few thousand miles. Most people didn't do it as often as needed so the car's performance suffered. I did a tuneup on a friend's car that was barely running. It ran like new afterwards. I was a hero. I tracked my gas mileage and when it began to fall I did a tuneup. They were simple to do if you knew how and took an hour. The points had to be carefully set and the timing adjusted using a timing light. I bought the necessary equipment and saved a lot of money doing my own. The carburetor was a beast best avoided by most DIYs. I learned to overhaul them but there were pitfalls galore for even the best mechanics. I got so adept at tuneups I set up a mobile tuneup business and made a few bucks.Chiltons published an excellent service manual for all American cars. Everything you needed to know about doing your own work on a car was in them along with valuable hints such as how to "power tune" an engine and all the specs you needed to do a tuneup. They would tear down an engine and then tell you how to do it, step by step, complete with photographs. In later years they no longer took these extra steps so I stopped buying them.By 60,000 miles you might have made some repairs and replaced shocks and brakes a number of times. Drum brakes were high maintenance. They required periodic adjustment so the car wouldn't pull to one side or the other when you stepped on them. It could be tricky. Modern disc brakes are superior in every way except peddle effort.Engines quickly wore out and began burning oil on top of the oil they invariable leaked. Roads back then would have a black streak down the middle from all the oil the engines put out. Motorcyclists were cautioned to not drive in the center of the road because of the oil slick. A car spewing white smoke was a common sight, sometimes it came out in clouds. "Ring and valve jobs" were commonplace and a part of owning a car.Engine oil was crude relative to today's oils. It was a "single grade" meaning there was a difference between winter and summer oil. "Multi-vicosity" oils changed that so we could use a single oil both winter and summer.Multi-viscosity, 10W-40Single-viscosity, 30 weightDetergent oils also changed things. One problem owners faced was the development of "sludge" on engine parts. This gooey substance is acidic and can ruin an engine. It is one reason for prescribed oil changes. Detergent oils suspend foreign products in the oil and protect against sludge buildup. In the 50's this was a major concern. Articles were written educating people about the phenomenon.Sludge buildup can happen to modern engines but is no longer the common problem it was in the 50's.Modern oil has played an important role in allowing today's engines to develop so much power and last so long. Synthetic oils are even better and an economical choice if you plan to keep your car. The 40,000 to 70,000 mile expiration date for your engine is a thing of the past.Upholstery was generally cheap plastic and would begin tearing and splitting before the end of the useful car life. There was a market for aftermarket seat covers.Those who could afford it traded in their car every two years. A car loan was generally for two years. A new car warranty might be for six months and 4000 miles. Cars frequently came out of the factory with problems so the warranty was important. We bought a car that had no oil in the transmission. A friend bought one with none of the chassis bolts tightened.There was a big market for retread, or recap, tires, they were good for maybe 5000 miles. The modern radial tire, a European innovation, didn't begin to catch on in the US until the 70's. I remember a Sears display of a radial tire that pitched rubber after 40,000 miles. I could barely believe it, nobody would because everyone knew it was impossible for tires to last that long. Sears jumped on the Radial bandwagon right away and was an important retailer for these modern tires.Willys (Jeep) got into the new car market after the war trading on the Jeep's wartime reputation. We owned two of their station wagons. They weren't bad. I once noticed our Jeep had 40,000 miles and commented. My mother told me that it's been a good car as we rattled down the street. The car was near the end of its useful life.This is what our second Willys-Overland Station Wagon looked like. It had a single seat in the very back which was my favorite. The flathead four cylinder engine could propel it to upwards of 60mph on a flat road but it slowed down on hills. It was the first American station wagon with an all metal body. 60 or 70 was about all most cars could do. Upscale cars with their V8s were much faster. A modern Honda tour bike has considerably more horsepower than your 1950's basic car.Modern paint can last for years but back then paint would begin to "oxidize" and fade after a few months so people needed to wax the car. People would drive to the lake and spend the afternoon rubbing wax on and then off leaving a protective film.There is a story of a policeman driving to work when a Cadillac blew past him at 85. He floored it and got up to 70mph. He caught the guy at a light and gave him a ticket. His engine blew up a couple of days later.There was an amusing song about a Nash Rambler that outran a guy in his Cadillac.Nash also made a subcompact in an age in which the Beetle was the popular small car. It was a neat little car and got around 30 miles per gallon. It could hit 60 in 30 seconds. Most modern cars will hit 60 in fewer than 10 seconds.BMW was not yet the automotive powerhouse it is today. In the 50's it began marketing its version of the isetta in the US. Competition with the Beetle killed it.Vespa also got into the minicar craze in the 50's with a cool little car powered by a two stroke rear engine. My mother had one. It was a true, fully equipped car. We both liked it although I had to install a right side aftermarket mirror on it. For its size it was quick and it was easy to drive. My mother took my sister and friends swimming once. My sister told me as she walked by a mother and son she heard the woman telling her son "You saw them all get out of the car".My mother got hers up to 70 onceHowever the smallest American car had to be the King Midget. A couple of war veterans began marketing them in 1946 and was in business until 1970 when the new owners mismanaged the company into bankruptcy. They sold for $5000 in today's money. I owned one. Mine, a later model, had an air compressor engine, a 2-speed automatic transmission, and was peppy enough to hold its own in traffic. At 8½' it was the same length as a decked out Harley-Davidson which weighed almost twice as much as this 500 pound package.Engine in back, feet in front, no trunkThe VW Beetle began making inroads into the America market. There was a hunger for inexpensive and reliable cars. Compared to the big, thirsty, unreliable American cars it filled a need. We were all sensing something was rotten in Detroit. The phrase planned obsolescence entered the vocabulary.At $17,000 with a 1200cc engine that got 30mpg the Beetle filled a niche and provided a warning shot across the bow of the bloated American car companies that they ignored allowing the Japanese to come in later and blow them out of the water.The Harley Davidson twin was the king of the road. Big, comfortable, and with an engine the same size as a Beetle it reigned supreme. It leaked oil and kept the owner busy working on it weekends but it was a labor of love. It was all the police drove. The earlier ones had controls that would confuse a modern rider including a hand-operated stickshift for the transmission complete with a pedal operated clutch and a manual timing control. Note the stick shift on the right side of the tank and running board for the feet. Running boards were infinitely more comfortable than a foot peg particularly on a long trip.Manual transmissions were about all most people could afford and the shifter was not on the floor like they are nowadays, it was on the column. There are jokes that the best anti-theft device you can have is a stickshift but there was a time when everyone could drive a three speed manual shift car.The little 8 ball on the steering wheel was nicknamed the "suicide knob". They were a popular item for helping people to steer. They are still available but are not legal everywhere. They can be dangerous.You would leave the car in first gear when you parked. The engine would stop the car from rolling. When you wanted to drive away you would push in the clutch, start the engine, let out the clutch, and go. If you forget to step on the clutch and turned the key the car would jerk forward.Before refrigeration you might be able to cool your car with one of these. The air would enter the car through wet pads and in dry country would provide some relief. We had one of these during a cross country trip but I didn't notice any difference.The triangular "wing windows" were an important part of ventilating the car. You could adjust them to divert air into the car. It was a big help.The only dependable way to make your way about town was with a map. If you were going across country it was even more essential because this was the age of the state highways. Gas stations were generally a dependable source of maps.AAA was another source and they would plan your trips for you with a customized "Triptik" in which the trip was unfolded for you from one page to the next. I've ordered a lot of these in the days before GPS.Since the miracle of GPS I haven't owned a map. The GPS took me from door to door on my last cross country trip which included many stops in between.I owned a stack of these.AAA Triptik. For the frequent traveler these alone made the membership worthwhile.I'm in loveSchwinn was the most popular bicycle brand. Bicycles were heavy and had a single speed. They sometimes came with a "tank" and might have a horn inside. You stopped by pedaling backwards to engage the brake.The horn button is the silver button on the tank. They weren't shy about packing on the weight back then especially JC Higgins.Here's another. Note the whitewall tires.There were special bicycles for girls with a gap in the frame for her skirts. A boy wouldn't be caught dead on one.The "English racer" was lighter than American style bikes and had brakes that clamped on the wheel rim that worked much better than the American style. Some had three speeds.Lights were ineffective battery operated affairs with a short battery life. They did little more than hopefully alert a car driver to your presence. "Generator lights" would take care of the battery problem but the lights were still dim.The wheel turned the generator but also added a substantial drag so was tiring.Automobiles aside trains and buses were how you traveled long distances, if you crossed the ocean you went by ship. I've done all three and spent many a night on a "sleeper" train in a fold down bed. I especially like ships, crossing the Atlantic twice on one. I loved the rhythmic pounding of the engines at night. We spent a night on board a ship in the New York harbor when a hurricane came through. I was impressed by the huge trees that were lying around next morning.Although not the first commercial service, Pan American had been flying the Transatlantic route for a couple of decades with the Clipper flying boats, the Boeing 707 paved the way for affordable long distance air service in 1958. It was fast, traversing the ocean in less than 8 hours vs more than 20 for the Clipper, and reliable. In addition you could carry on a conversation with your neighbor, something you couldn't do in a piston engine plane.This? 180 mph for 20+ hours to Europe spending more than $10,000?Or this? 6-8 hours at 600 mph for a few hundred dollars?The home entertainment system consisted of a vacuum tube AM, no FM, radio with a 4" speaker and a tube record player. Primitive Hi Fi and stereo was just catching on in higher priced systems. The long play LP 33⅓ record was introduced but most pop music was 45 RPM with one song on each side. Teenagers might have a stack of 45's. By the way it took a while for vacuum tubes to warm up, perhaps a minute, so when you see someone in a movie turn on an old radio and it comes right on...didn't happen. Instant on is the result of transistors followed by printed circuits.Transistors made their debut in the late 40's. The Japanese developed them into a commercially viable item with Sony introducing the astounding portable radio that could be carried in a pocket in 1957. I got my first one in 1963. This product was an unbelievable departure from what we were accustomed to.This was how teenagers built their collection of favorite songs. There was one song on each side. Usually the other side was a throwaway. At the modern equivalent of $8 a record could be a sizable investment. LPs were closer to $40. An adapter could be bought to push into the large hole so it could be played on a 33⅓ record player. Record players generally had three speeds 78, 45, and 33. 45's were 7" and 33's were 12". A full album could be recorded on a 33. The 78.26 was mostly obsolete in the 50's and had a playing time about the same as a 45. My mother had a collection of 78's.This was the solution to playing all those 45s. We all had these record changers that we could stack our records on. At the end of the song the tone arm returned to the side, a new record fell and the tone arm set down at the beginning of the new record automatically. What more could you ask for?Recording music is easy now and we can download from the Net but back then there was no practical way for the average person to record music. Commercial tape recorders were available but were too expensive for the average person. Tape recorders didn't come into their own until the 60's after problems with the tape itself were solved although the late 50's had some showing up. Hi Fi stereo also came into its own in the 60's with the advent of affordable amplifiers, tape decks, record changers, and separate speakers. With the availability of high quality components you could build your own system.My dream speakers were the AR5. Acoustic Research made some of the finest speakers in the world and at $2000 a pair was within reach of the serious audiophile.10" woofers. I picked up a pair at a thrift store at a ridiculous price. They didn't know what they had.In the early 60's Sony introduced one of the first affordable home use tape recorders, the Sony 500, if you call $2000 in current money affordable. It was a nifty unit with speakers that folded in to make a compact portable unit. The amplifiers were vacuum tubes, not transistors. I bought one, subscribed to a tape club, and began building a collection of prerecorded music. The nice thing about the unit is I could record records from a record player. Never before had I dreamed of such a luxury.This folded into this!I built my own system and an amusing incident resulted. I recorded some piano music and because of a miscalculation I had a long lead time before the music began. Friends were over and my 3 year old daughter sat at the piano to pretend to play. We forgot I had a tape on and just then the music began and to all appearances my daughter suddenly could play professionally. One of my friends was actually shocked into standing up staring at her open mouthed. We were all stunned until the reality sank in when my daughter stopped "playing" to check out the sudden stir of activity behind her. See what Acoustic Research speakers can do for you?Postage was 3 cents, for an extra 2 cents you could have your letter air mailed which was considerably faster. Otherwise it was sent by train which might take a while if it was going across country. If you sent it ground to another country it went by ship and could take weeks. When I was in Germany a friend mailed a letter ground from Japan. It arrived three months later.Now all mail is airmail.If you didn't have enough postage a stamp for the amount due was put on the letter and the recipient had to pay to get his letter. This practice came to an end because people were mailing their bills without postage and the bill collectors were spending a lot of money paying the postage due. Today it's no stamp, no service.Of interest but off subject is one of the most valuable American stamps is the upside down or inverted Jenny stamp issued in 1918. Somehow the stamp slipped by inspectors and a single sheet was sold. The buyer, realizing what he had, asked for more but the clerk instead tried to get it back. The buyer refused and examples now go for hundreds of thousands of dollars.Long distance driving was more difficult as cities were connected by two lane state highways. These highways would go right through a city. Signs would guide the traveler through the city streets, traffic lights and all, and back into the countryside. On the highway one might get stuck behind a slowpoke unable to pass for miles and miles as a dozen cars stacked up. There were other hazards. We once topped a hill and suddenly found ourselves barreling down on a farm tractor doing perhaps eight miles an hour while we were doing seventy. It was close.Eisenhower launched the country into the modern interstate system in the fifties and it was a huge project. Lives were disrupted as the right of way would mean old family dwellings being torn down to make way for the freeway. Rockwell did a touching painting of a family watching their family home being destroyed. Entire towns died as the traffic they depended on was rerouted.Some construction workers would haul mobile homes behind trucks as they moved from city to city attempting to minimize disrupting their children's lives.The interstate had an unexpected side effect as a small industry, relative to today, over the road trucking, took off. Trains were no longer the only way to move large quantities of goods between cities. The problem was the interstate was not designed to handle so much weight creating unanticipated maintenance issues.A typical 1950's semi.