...and where she stops, nobody knows.
I'm referring to the world.
Continuing a glimpse into yesteryear from the previous post, I can honestly say that I know very few (hardly any, really) of the names of today's celebrities, musicians, athletes, or television shows. The young people today live in another world, one I don't recognize. I suppose it has been ever thus.
Kiki and Brittany at the ultrasound place were not familiar with Murphy Brown, Candice Bergen, Edgar Bergen, or Charlie McCarthy. I wonder if they have heard of Captain Kangaroo? Joan Baez? Bennett Cerf? Dorothy Kilgallen? Arlene Francis? Garry Moore? Durwood Kirby? Bill Haley and The Comets?
The list could go on and on.
There wasn't enough time to tell Kiki and Brittany about Bess Myerson, Henry Morgan, and Betsy Palmer on I've Got A Secret or Bud Collier (who was the voice of Superman on the radio) on Beat The Clock or Peggy Cass and Orson Bean on To Tell The Truth or Martin Landau and Barbara Bain on Mission Impossible or Luciano Pavarotti or Arthur Godfrey or Little Anthony and The Imperials. It's a pity.
On the other hand, shifting the shoe to the other foot, I didn't know my parents' world either. Who in the world was Ish Kabibble? Francis X. Bushman? Ed Wynn? Bix Beiderbecke? Eddie Cantor? Wendell Willkie? Bruno Hauptmann? Winnie Ruth Judd? Jean Harlow?
Their list went on and on too. As I said above, it has been ever thus. I would bet dollars to doughnuts that Socrates (circa 470-399 BC) and Plato (circa 427-347 BC), children of different generations, also viewed each orher across a vast gulf of mutual incomprehensibility, shaking their heads all the while.
I'm not being fair to Kiki and Brittamy. I am not part of their parents' generation. I'm part of their grandparents' generation. The gulf is wider than I thought.
It takes some careful thinking to recognize that things have changed throughout our lives. Compounding that is that you and I have been exposed to different things as we live in different places. I didn't know many of the names you listed and I think I'm older than you are.
ReplyDeleteHi, Red, and thanks for commenting. It did occur to me while putting this post together that readers in the UK and Canada and Australia and anyone who didn't grow up with US television might not know a lot of these names. Rather provincial of me, I realized, but by then the die was cast and I was committed to completing the post. But surely you have heard of Luciano Pavarotti, the Italian opera singer?
ReplyDeleteI believe you are a little older than I am, but not by much.
There's not much that we don't get from American television or anything else American. Yes, I'm very familiar with Pavarotti.
ReplyDeleteOr as Aristotle said, “[Young people] are high-minded because they have not yet been humbled by life, nor have they experienced the force of circumstances.
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They think they know everything, and are always quite sure about it.”
Emma, thanks for the Aristotle quote. I knew that he had said something on the subject but couldn't remember what it was.
DeleteAs an Aussie and a generation down from you, I remember Murphy Brown & Candice Bergen. I never watched it though, it was on commercial TV which rarely plays in mum & dad's house.
ReplyDeleteI also know about Pavarotti and Jean Harlow.
There's no chance of me keeping up these days, too many platforms: tiktok, you tube, TV, instagram etc etc all have their own stars
kylie, I don't know much about the stars of your generation either. I am an old fossil. A relic from another era.
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