re: The Good Old Days in Baton Rouge

This thread makes me feel sorry for the kids growing up today. So many memories.

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Former member

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My Dad was a founding member, started back in the early 60’s.

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I don't. Are you confusing that with Leo's?

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Leo’s had both, but for a short time, FFP had one.

This thread has brought back similar memories for me, but not of Baton Rouge, but Metairie and Biloxi. Very similar.

Growing up in the suburbs of Metairie in the 1970s wasn’t bad at all. Bikes brought us everywhere-- the lakefront’s linear park was always cool to ride to and there always seemed to be something new to find along there: lagoons, new parks, a rope swing on a tree. In 1970’s Metairie there was still a lot of undeveloped land and empty overgrown lots to ‘explore’ and make tree forts in, where we hid the Playboy and Penthouse magazines we sometimes found. Schools were okay -- elementary schools actually taught us things, and although middle school/junior high covers a generally traumatic time of life-- the start of cliques and being ‘cool’, physical maturity, discovering the opposite sex, etc.-- all in all, it was an okay time.

And then when school was over, then it was a GREAT time. As soon as school was over I'd turn all my Toughskins blue jeans into cut-offs and go spend probably two months in Biloxi shuttling between my two grandparents’ homes. One set lived down near The Point about a couple of blocks from the beach, the other set lived near Keesler about three blocks from Back Bay, so I was almost always on the water: fishing, sailing in a little sunfish sailboat, swimming off a pier, flying kites. Had a lot of cousins to hang with as well as two teenage uncles on my dad's side. I rarely wore shoes and often was shirtless. I got tanned as hell and my feet were well-callused and almost black on the bottom most of the time. About the only time I got dressed or cleaned up (which only meant throwing on a t-shirt and those old tire-tread sandals) was if we went out to eat at Baricev's or Rosetti's, or went to the mall, or more likely when we went and saw all those 70s summer movies (often with my cousins at the Surfside)-- Star Wars, The Deep, Grease, Orca, The Spy who Loved Me, Moonraker, etc.

Maybe it’s just me getting older, but it does seem that things were much simpler then. Race relations in particular weren’t so bad -- at least up until the end of disco, there seemed to be no schism between black and white radio or songs -- you could jam on both Stevie Wonder and Steve Miller. Compare that to the almost completely segregated radio scene today. Back then, both black and white kids seemed to realize that we were moving towards a better time, and for the most part, we were ‘coming together’ -- we had all been going to school together since the earliest grades, even if we didn’t live in the same neighborhoods. Nowadays, that doesn’t seem to be the case-- there seems to be nothing at all but separation and divisiveness.

Good '70s remembrances as a kid (in no particular order):
- Riding bikes to Smith’s Records and Tapes in Lakeside Mall, looking at the ganja-smoking Bob Marley albums and cool zodiac posters.
- Putting together model kits of ships, planes, tanks, super-heroes, monsters, cars, spacecraft, and Shogun Warriors, then hanging some of them from my ceiling.
- Riding w/ my dad & sister down from Hattiesburg to Biloxi, pulling over off the highway to swim at Red Creek and then stopping at Lott’s Country Store to get a snack and soda.
- 25¢ comic books: in Metairie at K&B, and in Biloxi 4 blocks down from my grandparents at the Li’l General.
- Football games in Miss Nancy’s empty yard next door w/ other neighborhood kids.
- Fireworks with my cousins at our grandparents' in Biloxi on the 4th and New Year’s Eve -- and plans for all kinds of firework contraptions: exploding blimps, planes, homemade rockets.
- Watching reruns of Gilligan’s Island, Jonny Quest, Speed Racer, Batman, and The Brady Bunch nearly every day after school.
- Weekend crawfish boils at my family's house on the covered back porch, w/ tons of guests coming over, and all the kids running wild and playing ‘blubber monster’ outside in all the front yards.
- Over-abundant Christmases, with bikes, action figures, games, model kits, gas-powered planes, toy railroads, and more.
- Playing frisbee and throwing the football on the one-block street around the corner (less car traffic).
- Junior high dances in the gym, with faux-silk shirts, neck chains, & slacks being the dress of choice; slow-dancing and dancing "The Bump" with various girls.
- Dropping a dollar at The Fun Arcade nearly every day after school in junior high.
- Countless Friday nights at Pelican Bowling Lanes, then later Friday nights alone engaging in mischief (while parents were league bowling).
- Weekend camping trips to Lake Ramsay, Money Hill, Buccaneer State Park, Flint Creek Water Park in Wiggins, & Gulf Shores.

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Was he part of the Strain Road crew? Last name Tassin or Crank

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I remember those men. My Dad was the service supervisor for GSU.

Not BR area, but Mom and Dad built a house and moved us out in the country when I was 10 and my brother was 8. Didn't go out to eat much so when we did it was a special treat. Went to the Mall in Alex to watch movies. Got in trouble with Mom for "wasting" $5 in the video arcade.

Helped Dad in the garden and work cattle during the summer. Got Honda 80s so we could ride the dirt roads and go squirrel or deer hunting after school. Dad would honk his truck horn when it was time for us to ride home. Travel baseball didn't exist, so we just played Dixie Baseball in the summer against teams in our Parish and then onto the All-Star tournaments in Alex or Pineville.

Showed steers, breeding cattle and hogs for 4-H so we had to tend to them throughout the year. Spent a week at 4-H Camp each summer. Was able to wander freely at the State Fair & Livestock show in Shreveport each fall and the LSU Livestock Show & Rodeo each Spring. Wandered throughout Parker Coliseum during the livestock shows and went to each night of the rodeo. We'd always end up getting pizza from Past Time and might go to Mike Anderson's if we could get a reservation.

Would spend a week in the Summer with my grandparents (around Pitkin or in Kinder). We were either picking Sugartown watermelons with my dad's parents or swimming in the irrigation ditches with the neighborhood kids in Kinder. My grandmother hated when we did that.

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Muffuletta’s Tamales

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Was that the place on North Blvd?

Funny looking roof?

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A month of Octoberfest weekends at St Isidore with open air card and dice games

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St Isidore alumni here. I went there 80-86 I think. K-5.

This is what worked for me. Find a piece of worthless hunting land with small amount of high ground. Put metal building on it with fridge, small tractor, and couple go carts. Build a tree house with the kids (that can also be used as hunting stand ). Bring kids out there and set them free riding go carts, playing in bottoms, target practice off tree house, and you sit back at the metal building sipping on couple beers. It took them awhile to understand freedom. Damn poor kids never had freedom and didn't know what to do with it....but now as soon as I release them, I won't see them again for 2 hours.

I brought a small piece of my childhood to them kids and it makes me happy. I also have a cool drinking camp .