If you played in the street and remember yelling "car" You had an awesome childhood.

[Andy Asaro]

Very common until the late 70's or early 80's out here in CA. Used to walk to school a few miles and walk anywhere in the city without any creeps bothering us. Now all that has changed dramatically. Not good.

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[wisconsin]

I truly believe I grew up in a golden time period. Staying out until dark when were were 6 or 7 even. We used to get on the train in the early and mid '70's and head to the much, much bigger city next over and hang out for the day. My mom would drop me off alone to play hockey on a river with other kids we never knew.

Now, I wouldn't let my grandkids walk around the block alone.

[olddaddy]

For summers I remember going out of the house about 9am , maybe coming home for lunch, had to get home for dinner then in the house when street lights came on at age 7/8. What I did and where I went would baffle any younger person now a days. Now when my grandson comes by me, he has to stay on my property or can only ride his bike within my eye sight. its a strange strange world we live in master jack.

[Inner Dirt]

I think there is the same percentage of creeps there always were. The population has doubled since we were kids, so first there are twice as many creeps. Also with the leaky border and illegal immigrant rights, the explosion of gang membership helped by such, people that would have been locked up 50 years ago are let loose on the street. Combine that with today's media coverage where every bad deed against a child gets air play, people are informed how bad it is. 50 years ago a person would have no idea a child was abducted and killed 3 states over.

[PaceAdvantage]

Some guy drove straight up in front of my house when I was a kid and asked me to come help him find his lost dog by a creek down the block from my house.

This was back in the 70s

"They" were around back then, trust me.

If my mother hadn't come running out of the house yelling "who are you talking to?" I might not be here today.

I'm sure some on here would be pleased with that, but I'm kinda glad I didn't get into that car (I don't think I would have...but it might not have been up to me at some point).

[PaceAdvantage]

need to put a limit on some things around here...that is one of them...sorry

[Cuffdaddy]

Originally Posted by PaceAdvantage

need to put a limit on some things around here...that is one of them...sorry

Not a problem.

[woodbinepmi]

Originally Posted by PaceAdvantage

Some guy drove straight up in front of my house when I was a kid and asked me to come help him find his lost dog by a creek down the block from my house.

This was back in the 70s

"They" were around back then, trust me.

If my mother hadn't come running out of the house yelling "who are you talking to?" I might not be here today.

I'm sure some on here would be pleased with that, but I'm kinda glad I didn't get into that car (I don't think I would have...but it might not have been up to me at some point).

We hear about that kind of stuff every day because of constant news and social media, back then you had 30 minutes of local news and 30 minutes of national news. If you didn't see that then you either read in the newspaper or heard it by mouth, but it happened back then more than we realize.