Post here if you didn't have air conditioning in your home when growing up

[Pryderi]

I believe corn syrup and air conditioning are responsible for obesity.

[Randall Flagg]

1. I don't remember back that far.

:)

[AsahinaKimi]

40. welcome to DU!

and the lounge!

[AsahinaKimi]

41. dupe

[Kali]

2. had it in Phx growing up, no place else we ever lived,

don't have it now.

[texanwitch]

3. I didn't.

Didn't go to a a/c school until I started high school, that was in 1970.

We did get a window unit at the house in Houston around 1968.

[Pryderi]

5. *gasp* did you have to, "go outside and play"? :P

[texanwitch]

7. Yes.

We had window fans, worked well.

I don't really remember being that hot.

On the farm it wasn't that bad in the house, lots of breeze.

[CaliforniaPeggy]

4. Nope, no air conditioning...

Hell, we had a floor furnace...

[Brickbat]

6. I did, but my mom never turned it on unless it got over 90. I do not have AC now.

But that's because I live next to a giant air conditioner now: Lake Superior.

[kwassa]

8. Did and didn't.

The house didn't. The parents bedroom had a window unit, because my dad had terrible hay fever in the late summer. He would disappear into the room and watch basketball.

[tabbycat31]

9. we had one small window unit

that's what i have now, but i have 2 window units. I don't need central a/c

ETA I never went to a school with a/c. I was born in the 80s

[Patiod]

77. We had a unit in my asthmatic mother's room only

And we turned it on when the air quality got really bad, as opposed to when the HEAT got bad. We forget how crappy air quality was during the late 60s/early 70s - I remember inversions where you could almost taste the smog.

I'm back in the same house for now (long story), and used a ceiling fan most of this (admittedly cool) summer

[Luciferous]

10. We didn't have air conditioning until I was 12 or 13

We also never had cable (they still don't) and we had "no TV week" once a month... my husband thinks my family is weird :)

[Arkansas Granny]

44. That's the age I was when we got indoor plumbing. Now, that was a luxury!

[AlienGirl]

53. Never liked that mad dash through the cold to get to the outhouse either!

I wouldn't use a chamber pot because that was just icky.

Tucker

[Roon]

58. My Grandfather told me that when he was growing up

sometimes in the winter the outhouse would have frost on the seat. That must have really SUCKED!!!

[Arkansas Granny]

62. Not to mention that the breeze that blows up through the hole is one of the coldest

you'll ever experience.

[AllieB]

11. Window units in the bedrooms when it got really hot.

Otherwise we used fans.

[Broken_Hero]

12. I had no AC when I was growing up

but, I'm from Alaska.

:)

[kentauros]

13. We had it in the sixties.

But I didn't start gaining weight until the mid to late 80s. HFCS is more likely a factor than a/c. For instance, I like the heat enough that I will sit in my sauna-like car in August, windows up, doors closed, just to "warm up" from the insanely cold office buildings I've worked in. Yet, I'm still overweight ;)

[Texasgal]

14. I'm in Texas..

we window units although I never remember it being so hot!

[Skittles]

64. old fucks really feel the heat

yes INDEED :7

[Pryderi]

15. UHF vs VHF and changing the channel by getting out of your chair...ahh the

good ole days.

[Mugu]

26. Party lines for the telephone. n/t

[Pryderi]

27. Hell yea! I didn't pay for it, I had to ask if I could use the line!

[Mugu]

32. Remember having to listen to the number of rings to tell if the call was for you? n/t

[Roon]

59. I have a friend who is only 60-years-old

but growing up in rural west virginia they still had the crank phones. Her number was something like, three longs and two shorts.

[bikebloke]

51. That's why people had kids.

A remote on legs.

"Hey, Johnny, change the channel."

[bluesbassman]

16. Does a bowl of ice and forcing my little brother to wave a piece of cardboard by it count?

Rank has it's privileges. :)

[dana_b]

17. only fans

but I sure as hell have a/c now!! It gets up over 100 degrees here regularly during the summer and I refuse to sit around and sweat all the time.

Corn syrup - I'm with you 100%.

[NNadir]

18. It was worse than that.

I lived in a upstairs room in a Cape Cod when I was a kid. It was over the kitchen and the windows were tiny.

Nobody in my house knew the laws of thermodynamics and so my mom bought a swamp cooler device for my room, into which we would pour ice from the refrigerator. The cooler was cheaper than an air conditioner, and in any case we could have never installed the air conditioner in the window anyway.

Of course, the refrigerator would heat the kitchen when it made the ice, making the room even hotter.

When I learned the laws of thermodynamics I understood why I was continuously covered with sweat in summer until I moved out of that house.

I sure felt like an idiot for going down all day for ice for that swamp cooler.

[hunter]

19. Nope.

And in the winter my dad was extremely stingy with the heat. Whenever the furnace was on I think he could feel in his bones every single second he'd worked to pay for it. If the furnace came on in the night, maybe because my mom had set the thermostat to 55 F, he'd come out and turn it down no matter how cold it got.

In the summer we were just hot, even if it was 100 F and so smoggy our eyes burned.

[The Velveteen Ocelot]

20. Not until I was about 12, and that was just a window unit.

[bigwillq]

21. Window units

but not in every room. We now have Central Air.

[snailly]

22. We had window units in the upstairs bedrooms

It was 150 on the ground floor and -10 in the bedroom. I liked our bedroom very much.

[westerebus]

23. No ac in our first home.

The apartment we lived in had a coal furnace in the basement. The folk's house had an oil fired furnace with radiators. Again no ac. The house was either to hot or stone cold in winter. Fans in the windows for the summer.

[rurallib]

24. We had a window unit when I was @15. I think it was a decoration.

Best I can recall we turned it on only when we had company - which was never. I can remember it running once.

[1gobluedem]

25. I didn't and still don't

There are only about six days in the summer when I really, really miss it. I have ceiling fans and lots of shade trees.

[bookworm65t]

61. Me too!

:hi:

[wickerwoman]

28. Nope.

But I grew up in Seattle in the 80s when 85 degrees was a "scorcher" and only happened every few years. And I was overweight by 9 or 10, but I think it had more to do with eating potato chips for dinner every night.

We also almost never turned the heat on, but it only snowed a few days a year and we had a fireplace and a woodlot full of fallen branches behind the house so we usually went that route.

[Lydia Leftcoast]

29. We didn't have air conditioning

I still turn mine on (a wall unit in the apartment) only when the heat is absolutely unbearable. I think people who turn on their air conditioner when it's only 75 degrees--and some people in my building do--are silly (unless they have respiratory problems)

[JanMichael]

30. I lived in a couple of houses with no A/C.

And several with window units.

[johnnie]

31. We didn't

We also lived a few blocks away from the slaughterhouse. I can still remember that smell on hot August nights with our windows wide open for some "air".

[Ikonoklast]

35. Marks and Sons, DiCillo's, Earl C. Gibbs...

and, of course, Stadlers, the rendering plant, the smell of which, once smelt, I defy anyone to ever forget.

We would sometimes stop in on the way downtown and pick up beef carcasses at Marks on the way to work, and throw them in the back of the van we rode in.

We would put brown butcher paper down on the floor, throw them in, and put more paper on top of the beef quarters and sit on them for the ride downtown.

Used to work at the old New Central Market, E. 4th and Bolivar, just about where home plate is now in the Jake.

[johnnie]

38. I lived on 60th and Denison

What was the plant over there?

[XemaSab]

33. I had no AC growing up

Mind you, I grew up in the Bay Area, but I never had AC. :D

[Skip Intro]

34. I remember when we got ac, but oddly, not not having it. I blame TV, vid games and fast food for

obesity. And advertising within and without all those things...

[RushIsRot]

36. I grew up in Louisiana in the 50s with no A/C. We did have an attic fan and

that helped to stir the hot, humid air a little. When it is both hot and humid, a fan doesn't do much good. To be effective, a fan must cause your sweat to evaporate and the humidity prevented that.

When I went into the Army at Ft. Polk, LA, the barracks had one fan, and it didn't help much. I remember many of my buddies going to sleep in a pool of their own sweat every night. Their pillows even soured.

[asdjrocky]

37. We had what was called a water or swamp cooler in one room

But we never stayed inside in the summer time.

And we drank out of the hose and we road in the back of pick up trucks and we road bikes with no helmets and we liked it.

[AsahinaKimi]

39. we had a box fan.

And a spritzer bottle filled with water. But only on hot Fall days. Most Summer days in San Francisco are fogged filled. So while its 108 in Concord across the bay, its only 65 here in the city.

[ccinamon]

42. central texas late 60's - window fans only

it was so hot and we only had 2 fans for the whole house...no breeze to speak of...lots of sleepless night and washrags in (barely) cool water...lots of ice water and kool-aid!

[hippywife]

43. Not until I was

13 and we moved into a new house. I remember sweltering away many nights in an upstairs bedroom shared with my four sisters and how unbelievably hot it was.

[Arkansas Granny]

45. We had no air conditioning when I was growing up. I know it got really hot,

but I think we were acclumated to it and it didn't bother us as much as it does now. We didn't have A/D at school either. We just opened the windows when it was warm.

[sarge43]

46. Grew up in Michigan. We don't need no stinkin' AC. Central heating on the other hand. n/t

[HipChick]

47. We'd be lucky if if got hot enough for that..

[Bertha Venation]

48. no a/c. n/t

[mnhtnbb]

49. No a/c.

[Silver Swan]

50. We didn't have air conditioning when I was a child

And we didn't have very good heat either--an old coal furnace with heat openings in only two rooms.

I didn't have air-conditioning until my second apartment when I was 23 in 1969. I then lived in air conditioned comfort until 1977, when we moved to an old house that didn't have it.

So once more I didn't have air conditioning from 1977 until I got a window unit in 1999.

[AlienGirl]

52. There was a time we didn't have electricity or indoor plumbing, actually.

Never had AC.

Tucker

[femmocrat]

54. We didn't have AC until a few years ago.

No one had it when we were growing up. I remember when they first air-conditioned theaters and you would freeze while watching a movie! We didn't have an air-conditioned car until the early 1970s.

And--- they still don't have air conditioning in most of the schools here! ugh!

[old mark]

55. We did not have it till the '70's, by which time I had my own home and

AC.

I think the obesety is more due to the terrible proliferation of junk food and quick and prepared food choices we all have, and a lot of it is due to spending too much time online.

My fingers are thin.


mark

[Roon]

56. I grew up in LIttleton Colorado

During the summer it was hot during the day but at night it cooled down very nicely and we could run our attic fan and blow out all the day's hot air. Then during the day we would seal up the house and close the curtains and the house was bearable until like 2 or 3 PM.

When I lived next door I had a swamp cooler that kept it nice and cold during the summer. But some tweaker tore it apart looking for copper and I had to go without a couple of years. The unit was on the nort side of the house..and 2/3rds of the house is covered in shade for most of the day it was bearable...but by late afternoon into early evening, it got pretty hot, but not hot enough to where I was in agony. I just stripped down to my shorts.

[Demoiselle]

57. I grew up in a farmhouse in the country.

We had fans. Lots of open air around. And I swear it didn't get nearly so hot in those days.

[Chemical Bill]

60. Never...

but we had corn syrup. :shrug:

Bill

[Skittles]

63. not in England

and I had to start a coal fire for heat :D

[Kaleva]

65. Didn't have it at home when growing up.

[elshiva]

66. From my birth (1981) to 2000, I lived in an AC less house.

I was obese most of the time. My obesity has a lot to do with fear of being seen in public and food addiction. This is because I was around people who made fun everything I did including the way I breathed. Still, have problems with this, if I'm absolutely alone I have trouble controlling what I eat. I think I would be obese even without the corn syrup.

[zanana1]

67. Never had it as a kid and didn't miss it. nt

[Zomby Woof]

68. From ages 8-11, no A/C

Lived overseas in a VERY hot and humid summer climate, where it topped 100°F at times. We made do with fans indoors, and loved using the sprinklers outdoors (we had well water, so no concerns about waste and no bills).

No central heat during the cool and damp winters either, with the only 3 sources of heat being the fireplace and portable butane heater during the day, and our electric blankets at night.

No TV (incompatible with the electrical current, even as we had a transformer in the house for all the other appliances), and went without a phone for the first 6 months there (our landlord had the line laid in the ground from the street to our house on her dime, knowing my dad required it for being on-call 24/7 for his job). This was in the mid-to-late 70's. We had books, games, and Armed Forces Radio (FM 96) for entertainment.

[donheld]

69. No not where I grew up

[bamacrat]

70. Grew up in Alabama with no air.

Nor did we have central heat. Managed to survive.

[csziggy]

71. Nope - no AC in Central Florida

The kids' bedroom was the best one for summers, though - it was at the end of the hall and had windows on three sides. We did have a window fan so we had cross ventilation. My grandmother's house didn't have AC either but she had a ceiling fan and big wide screened porches.

No central heat in our house either, just a kerosene floor furnace. We could not afford to heat the bedrooms or rooms we didn't use much, like the dining room or living room. Dad's office didn't get heated, either so he sometimes worked with heavy coat and gloves on. I have no idea how he did drafting like that! We'd all put our school clothes on hangers over the furnace and dress in the hall next to it on cold mornings.

The church we went to was not air conditioned either until they remodeled it in the early sixties. The elementary school I attended was not air conditioned - just had great big windows on one side and a row of clerestory windows at the top of the wall on the other for cross ventilation.

[mzteris]

72. not in Georgia or South Alabama...

Though mid-Georgia was hotter.

We had an attic fan and a ritual of all windows open at night. Close the ones on the east side in the morning (and the curtains), then open them and close the ones on the west side.

Worked pretty well I guess. Though we didn't know any different so it wasn't a big deal.

[quakerboy]

73. I challenge your unfounded assumption

I didn't have AC until I was 24. I didn't have TV until I was 17, and I didn't have cable TV until I was 24. I didn't own a videogame system until I was 28. My family did not ever eat out except once for your birthday each year until I was late into my teens. Soda was also a rare treat (more likely on a monthly basis, when I could collect enough allowance) until I was well into my teens. And I was obese the entire time.

I do recall sitting around doing nothing because it was quite hot. It gets hot, I get lethargic, stop moving, and attempt to find the position that affords me the most surface area to disseminate heat. If anything, its HEATING that is responsible for obesity, given that it relieves you of the necesity to burn fuel and move about to stay warm.

You probably have something when it comes to corn syrup though. Cutting regular soda from my diet has been one of the best choices ever.

[madmom]

74. Didn't have air conditioning until about 6-7 years ago, I'm 56.

[unpossibles]

75. nope. We had a window unit in the dining room

but seldom used it. We also had an oil furnace and lived in the sticks, so our house tended to be cold in the winter also. The bright side of it is that temperature extremes don't tend to bother me so much, and in fact I dislike overly heated or air conditioned places.

[Brother Buzz]

76. Only an idiot would install an air conditioning unit in my childhood town, Mill Valley, California

Summer afternoons, I would don a sweater when the fog rolled in, sometimes a jacket.

[amyrose2712]

78. No oscillating fans either. Just a rickety box fan sometimes ..

put in the window to blow the hot air around. But try to make me live without it now!

[Tikki]

79. Saa..Whomp..Coo..leers..

...in the desert are, like, useless. At least they were in the desert where we grew up.

The Tikkis
p.s. everybody has refrigerated air conditioning there nowadays and scratchy throats.

[Dyedinthewoolliberal]

80. Never had it

or color TV for that matter. Grew up in Michigan. Of course after I left the nest the folks did get a color set, but never AC'd the house.

[argyl]

81. Didn't have AC until I was 16. Rode my bike,played sandlot ball in Central Texas summer heat.

Never knew it was too hot to go outdoors back then and neither did my friends.In my classes there was usually one kid who would be considered fat. Most kids were whip thin.This was way back in the mid 60's.

[Deep13]

82. We never had it at home or in the car.

I think it's TV, video games, instant communication and a bunch of other things that make staying indoors more fun than going outside and running around.