I remember when neighbors looked out for each other

Barneyhill

New Member
I remember when neighbors looked out for each other and they helped discipling each other's kids. That's right I was born and spent my childhood on a street named Jefferson street in in my old hometown of South Bend Indiana. I was raised with my grandparents. They knew and befriended everyone on the block. Those were the days neighbors talked and got along with each other very well and they also served as extended families they helped to watch out for each other's children and yes they had permission to spank us if we were caught doing bad things. If your neighbor spanked you did your mom or dad get mad? Hell no! in fact if you got whipped by a neighbor he or she would step over to your house and tell your parents you got a spanking and explain why they had to do it.

Sometimes if what you did to get a whipping from your neighbor was bad enough your parents would give you another spanking. Did it hurt us kids no in long run it helped to build us into better people in our later years. I remember summer nights neighbors gathering around on our porch laughing and talking while we kids ran across lawns down dark alleys without fear because way back then crime was very low and as a child you felt safe. And we would be so happy to see grown folks getting along so well.

I suffered from occasional bouts of acute bronchitis'
One summer's night a neighbor couple came to sit with my grandmother and they prayed over me because my attack was more severe than usual I will never forget that they spent most the night with us in prayer.
It's amazing how well many American city neighborhoods were similar to ours. How well people related to each other. No matter what race they were they took time to share and communicate with each other on a positive and effective way.
All of us kids respected the older people around us. If they angered us we didn't talk back to them in a disrespectful manner. In our later years when we grew up, we remembered and praised the adult neighbors who watched over us yes and spanked us when it was needed, We knew they helped to make us better people.
Those days have long passed. Neighborhoods are different now.
My daughter called me 3 years ago and told me on her street two young boys got into a fight. A mother of one of the boys angrily walked down the block and threatened to shoot the mother of the boy her son was fighting.
Later I went to visit her she walked me outside to her next door neighbor's house and showed me how the kids on her street stuffed rags into her neighbor's down spout and had knocked down one side of her back yard wooden fence. And she showed me video she took on her cell phone showing two young neighbor boys picking up and smashing her neighbors flower planters.

Oh lord have things changed!!!!!!


Now you can understand why I praise the days of the early 1960's I am thankful to have had the privilege to live in a time when Americans practiced the fine art of living in harmony with their neighbors.

 

Things have changed for sure, and not for the better when it comes to neighbourly realtions, but thank goodness they haven't changed in this country to where people get threatened with guns for the actions of their children... ..yet!!
 

Last edited:
I remember those days Barney. It was exactly the same where I was raised. All the neighbors knew each other and looked out for each other. That included making sure we acted right and respected our elders. Yes times have changed and not for the better.
 
The two places we live still have some of that neighborliness but there are sure some neighbors that we don't get along so well with. Of course, there is no "spanking" but we do look our for the children who live here. It has been fun to watch the grow up and leave home for college.
 
I was blessed with a lot of grandparenting. Squabbles within the neighborhood, they insisted on hearing both sides. Problems at school though and I had equal problems at home. Respect for teachers/authority was a must.
 
I remember the days when I was a child and a neighbor saw me acting up and they would correct me if my own parents were not there. I thought nothing of it. I was always taught to be respectful to them and listen to them and if I didn't I would sure have a handful of problems to deal with my parents found out.
 
I was a kid in the 40's. If one of our neighbors had struck either me or my brother, my Mom would have been all over them. Maybe your neighborhood was different.

Don
They would never hit me or any other kid. They just would correct us if we were doing wrong and we for the most part would listen which seems not to be the norm with kids today.
 
@Barneyhill : " .......laughing and talking while we kids ran across lawns down dark alleys without fear because way back then crime was very low and as a child you felt safe."

Uh, no, I certainly wouldn't feel safe in your old neighborhood, knowing that an adult, other than my mom or dad, could haul off and smack me for some perceived offense I had just committed.

Actually, I'm very glad I never lived in a messed up, physically abusive neighborhood like yours!
 
I remember those days Barney. It was exactly the same where I was raised. All the neighbors knew each other and looked out for each other. That included making sure we acted right and respected our elders. Yes times have changed and not for the better.
You know terry when I look back at those times I wonder was it all real. It's like looking back at a dream Those were really great times. people were different because of the values that were passed to them from the generations that were born and raised in the earlier part of the 20th century.
I try to explain to my daughter how neighborhoods were structured back in my childhood I don't think she believes me because of time frame she lived as a child. Nothing like what explained in my thread remotely exists now in the 21st especially in the current city I live in.
I don't know why American neighborhoods took a turn for the worst the past 30 years or so.
Maybe a sociologist could explain these changes to us.

I forgot mention in my thread there were no such things on our street as deadbolt locks. We didn't have to burn porch lights and home security lights didn't exist nor burglar alarm systems, Our front door was made of wood and all we had was a hook lock and we would sleep with the front door wide open without porch lights on hot summer nights. All our neighbors lived the same. Unbelievable isn't it?

if can get any worse than what is now it's time to build bomb shelters and prepare to move into them!
 
With Halloween and Trick or Treating coming up I remember back when I was a kid and went Trick or Treating in my neighborhood as a child and it is so much different than what it is today. There were so many neighbors who invited the children into their homes for hot cider and cookies where I lived and the amount of homemade goodies I got as treats outweighed the other store bought candy. Today this would never happen and each year you have to worry about the candy being tainted with drugs and other things.
 
@Barneyhill : " .......laughing and talking while we kids ran across lawns down dark alleys without fear because way back then crime was very low and as a child you felt safe."

Uh, no, I certainly wouldn't feel safe in your old neighborhood, knowing that an adult, other than my mom or dad, could haul off and smack me for some perceived offense I had just committed.

Actually, I'm very glad I never lived in a messed up, physically abusive neighborhood like yours!

Yeah, I don't see how beating on kids (your own or someone else's) equates to neighbors "looking out for each other".🙄
 
Last edited:
"Gee but all those times were great. Everybody pulled their weight. Those were the days."

I think you're looking at the past with rose colored glasses. Weren't there burglars in the 60's? We've lived on a quiet suburb block for over 50 years. I can't remember anyone on the block getting burgled. One house has a burglar alarm sign in their yard. They're newcomers.

Yes, there are bad neighborhoods. There have always been bad neighborhoods. Some companies make big money promoting fear, and local news is quick to spread it. We lock our doors at night, but so did my Mom.

Don
 
I never understood beating kids and never used that on my two children. There are many other methods of punishment that seem effective and have worked for me without laying a hand on my children. I feel being firm and using teachable lessons in the punishment are the way to making a statement with children.
 
These ruminations on the good old days, in utopian neighborhoods, are, surely, wishful thoughts, after the fact.

In truth, I wonder how many kids, in that "whack 'em for their own good" neighborhood, as above, were scarred, forever, by the physical abuse meted out by parents and neighbors!

Also, the internet didn't exist, back then. Privacy could, in fact, be maintained. Those who expound on the safety of their old neighborhoods, and the idyllic lives they led, as kids, have no idea what actually was going on, back then, behind the closed doors of their neighbors.

Our species has always been prone to violence and despicable acts. You might remember your old neighborhood as a safe, wonderful place. Good for you. The reality of that neighborhood was something totally different, I can almost guarantee.
 
"Gee but all those times were great. Everybody pulled their weight. Those were the days."

I think you're looking at the past with rose colored glasses. Weren't there burglars in the 60's? We've lived on a quiet suburb block for over 50 years. I can't remember anyone on the block getting burgled. One house has a burglar alarm sign in their yard. They're newcomers.

Yes, there are bad neighborhoods. There have always been bad neighborhoods. Some companies make big money promoting fear, and local news is quick to spread it. We lock our doors at night, but so did my Mom.

Don
There may have been thieves that broke in homes in the 60's but no one ever bothered my family home or homes of neighbors if anyone's house was invaded I certainly would have heard from the grown ups. Nothing like that would be whispered about. We didn't burn front porch lights back porch lights Because it was a good street and would you believe neighbors didn't have air conditioners, all they had were the metal blade fans that didn't cool them enough on hot summer nights. Families would sometimes spread coverings on their front porches and sleep outside all night without fear.
I don't recall hearing anyone mention they were attacked in way while sleeping on their porches. Haven't you heard about this is how some families cooled themselves back then?
Throughout my life I even was told that some neighborhoods in cities like Chicago was so peaceful on summer nights families would sleep on sheets in Grant Park.
These people weren't wearing rosy glasses they were just recounting an real experience from their young years. I got to hear this from people who lived in Chicago because my current city is only 35 miles away from there.

You don't understand why I look back at those times the way I do. I live in Gary Indiana and it is a crime ridden and sorely lacking in brotherly love. I live just the opposite of what I did in my old hometown South Bend. We have to burn lights front and back and on our big yard all night. I have window alarms mounted on my back door window panes and have bars and window alarms on my back bedroom windows because thieves once used our central air unit as a ladder to try to break in our home.

I have a lock bar under my backdoor knob to block entrance of any thief.
Someone recently stole the driving way gates from our fence another worry for me!!
And the spirit of neighbor helping neighbor just doesn't exist. Nothing like I remember as child in South Bend on Jefferson street back in the early 1960's. On my current block it's each man for themselves. You have to look out for yourself.
It is not looking back at those days with rosy glasses it's someone who looks back at wonderful peaceful times compares it to their current moment and wonders dear God what went wrong.
 
Last edited:
Well, I lived in a friendly and safe neighborhood and I do remember it fondly. No parents ever disciplined anyone else's children beyond a little well-deserved yelling. It was great growing up and feeling safe, and knowing I could knock on any door on the block if I needed help with anything. So yeah... it was the "good old days" to me.
 
So, Barney, what's keeping you in Gary, Indiana? Why can't you move? Why is there the connect in your mind between your present situation and spanking neighborhood children in the past? Or, are you just into spanking?
 
Barney - It sounds like you live in a place with a high crime rate, and that's unfortunate. But, not everywhere is like that. There are still neighborhoods where people live peacefully and even help each other out. Pepper says why don't you move. But, that's not always economically feasible. When times are tough, the crime rate goes up. And, times are tough in a lot of places. I wish you well.

Don
 
Well, I lived in a friendly and safe neighborhood and I do remember it fondly. No parents ever disciplined anyone else's children beyond a little well-deserved yelling. It was great growing up and feeling safe, and knowing I could knock on any door on the block if I needed help with anything. So yeah... it was the "good old days" to me.
You too! great if we could organize a "Good Old Days"
 
No rose colored glasses here and my mom could give all of us looks and we knew to straighten up. This included visiting kids! If we did not she would threaten to get a switch and we certainly did not want to feel that sting on our legs. And if we were at other houses we were expected to behave and respect the parents there.
 


Back
Top