Frequent comment-leaver “Caustic Man” alerted me to this short video from the ’50s that serves as a nice follow-up to our last Joe College post. In it a group of high schoolers are asked about clothing, and one kids says how they try to ape the college boys.
That may still go on today, though when it comes to clothing it’s usually hard to tell high school students from college students, and college students from adults. — CC
David Hoffman’s YouTube channel is chock full of amazing videos.
Yes, we called them Levi’s, no matter what brand
they were, and probably wrote that with a lower-case “l” and no apostrophe.
@Dutch Uncle – yes, and everyone used a hoover to clean their house, did a bit of hoovering.
What strikes me above all else is the poise and maturity of the panelists, their fluency and elocution. I’m sure there would have been some preparation prior to filming, but still, head and shoulders above today’s offering.
As for that college look, my mother would often comment back in the day, that I looked like “an American college boy”. Which was, presumably, a very good thing.
I love how he busts past the boys when he starts talking about getting in trouble for using the telephone too much. “I’m sure that wouldn’t be true for the fellas.”
By the by, the speech patterns weren’t lost on me either. It seems to me that it takes a few years into college for young men and women to start speaking with a degree of confidence and clarity these days. In many cases much longer than that. True, the environment of a casual classroom is very different than a filmed interview. And I’m sure that amongst themselves these high school kids form the 50s talked more casually. Nevertheless, they clearly had the ABILITY to speak in a clear and confident way. On the other hand, I suppose it’s possible that these students were chosen for their speaking ability and that they are not true representatives of the way high schoolers talked back then. Indeed, I can well imagine that the more eloquent of high schoolers today could match their abilities.
Levi’s 501s back in the day you had to know math to buy the correct size.
Sweet jacket on the blond boy sitting on the right.
I wouldn’t think these reasonably well-spoken kids would show up similarly educated contemporary London secondary school kids.