“It Was Not All Peaches and Cream”

By kiki

"It was not all peaches and cream" No, the '40s and '50s were not all peaches-and-cream. And nobody knows that better than me. A Chicano barrio kid growing up in a segregated town (Simons Brickyard, Montebello, CA.) attending a segregated grade school (Vail Elementary). Nevertheless, most of us growing up in the Brickyard had a happy childhood. But, of course, we knew that we had to stay within our boundaries, and we did. Was that the right thing? Of course not, But we lived in those times, and most of us came out okay despite the flaws in society. Sure, we had, like in any other town in any different decade, some dopers and alcoholics in our community, but we didn't have movies where parents couldn't take their young children. Or so many gun massacres etc. 

We felt safe playing our football/baseball games in the open fields of the Brickyard. We didn't need to lock our doors, much less put bars on our windows…For all the flaws in our '40s and '50s society, and yes, those decades had many flaws, I wouldn't trade the decades of the '40s and '50s for the times we live in nowadays to grow up or to raise children.