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by Richard Sain (Author)
The San Fernando Valley has changed dramatically since I was a kid - as most places have. There are no more horse ranches or orange groves to be seen and many of the places I used to walk past on my way to Robert Fulton Junior High School and Monroe High School, such as the General Motors Plant on Van Nuys Boulevard and the Broadway Department Store, no longer exist. The building that housed Food Giant Market and then Ralph's Market was also erased by time.In my mind, I remember what the streets and structures and landscapes all looked like as I was growing up through the 50's, 60's and 70's. I felt compelled to capture that period of time on paper so others could reminisce along with me. Leaving behind a permanent record of that era, was also important to me. As I revisited the San Fernando Valley through the miracle of the internet and Google's streetscapes, I felt like Doc Brown in the movie "Back to the Future". So much of the world that I grew up in has been lost. It is hard to reconcile the images that I retain in my mind with the reality that exists today. This troubling dichotomy reminds me that time waits for no one. We all have memories that we carry with us and cherish no matter what age we are. We all cling to whatever good times and interesting places we have experienced. But, as time progresses, the distance grows between what has past and what exists today. This can be particularly baffling to older folks. So, we should be patient when we hear an older parent or grandparent talk about the way things used to be. Those memories of what "used to be", even though they may have occurred decades ago, are still fresh in the minds of many older people.So, no matter what age you are, step into Doc Brown's time machine with me and cruise back down Van Nuys Boulevard during the mid-1950's when nearly all the cars on the road were built by GM, Ford or Chrysler, when TV used to only have three major channels - ABC, CBS and NBC, when kids played outdoors from morning till night in the summer months, when all electronic devices actually had to be plugged in, when there was no fast food and moms stayed at home while dads went to work, when moms prepared fresh food for dinner and everyone ate at the same time around the dinner table, when there were no personal computers or internet, when teenagers listened to music imprinted on vinyl records, when stereo music didn't exist, when washing machines had "wringers" you had to run your clothes through after they were washed, when people hung up clothes to dry outside, when we had incinerators where we burned our trash, when families went to see movies together in "drive-ins", when nobody had credit cards... Sheesh! Can you imagine?
