This post will be a second serving of vintage shots with cars and people from the ’60s and ’70s. In this series, the cars are obviously of interest, but the fashions are too. After all, they truly highlight how life went from serious and formal to laid-back and casual. Attire and attitudes on these range widely, from the traditional to the outgoing. It is quite a mixed selection.
Related CC reading:
I like the cute ’70s girls in photo #7, along with the mismatched mags on the muscle car. Those rear tires are meats.
Also like the “plaid on plaid” guy in the next shot, with his hidden-headlight Mopar (at least I think it’s a Mopar). You don’t mess with around with Jim.
I bet you meant photo #8!
Wow you got that right, my mistake. That older lady looks a bit stern…
I’m not a fuselage Mopar expert, but I think Plaid Guy is standing in front of a ‘69 or ‘70 Chrysler 300.
Appreciate the Mustang convertible image. Had one almost identical, same color scheme. I think that color scheme was relatively rare. It seemed like they were all red, “secretary” light blue or white.
See a good # of black ones, at car shows. Could be the black paint is not always the original color though.
Love the two GM wagon family, ’65 or ’66 Pontiac Safari and Opel Kadett.
’65 Pontiac
I love these photographs. Also, I would wear either outfit in the first photo in 2024. Literally today. Sharp pinstripes on that Grand Prix.
I’m really digging that white’63 Impala! It’s the spitting image of the one Dad bought used in 1966 that’s the inspiration for my screen name.
The “early 50’s” Chevy, parked on the street caught my eye. Makes the “63” look “ultra modern”!
Beautiful people wearing circus fashions straight from the Barnum and Bailey collection. Just last night, my drinking buddies and I were discussing to the young guys how absolutely hideous fashions were from this era, and laughing uncontrollably. We couldn’t believe the ugly clothes were wore.
You just don’t know how uncomfortable clothes can get until you are wearing 100% nylon polysester bikini briefs under 100% nylon polyester flared slacks while trying to walk in 4″ platform dress shoes made of vinyl, rubber and sweat. It’s a shock we could still have kids after what stress torture we put our genitalia through.
The reason these fashions aren’t back in style is because, today – most people in this age group are 40 pounds heavier, or more.
On the good side – some of those cars look nice.
Have you been to Walmart lately? Disgustingly fat people in pajamas or sweats or worse yet Spandex. The guys in the picture you posted are too well dressed for Walmart. At least the guys pictured put some thought into their wardrobe. The Walmart crowd couldn’t be bothered.
I recently watched Boogie Nights again and the clothes you describe are perfectly and – from our perspective today – hilariously celebrated in Mark Wahlberg’s Dirk Diggler scenes once he hits the big time as a porn star and goes shopping for clothes: “Well, this is, um, like, imported Italian nylon…”. You had to be there.
Jesus. I forgot about the nylon underwear. I have photos from 78 that show my two brothers and me wearing polyester pants so tight you can see where the circumcision scars are. I was 14 and my mother let me go out like that. Oh, and we were wearing Qiana shirts…
You win the Comment of the Day!
Naturally, my eyes homed in on the red Volvo 544 in the background of the Impala and Hawaiian shirt guy. But more than the cars or the surroundings, it’s the older people in these photos that really look like they’re from another planet. I mean, my wife and I are probably close in age (now) to Ed and Evelyn in front of the Chrysler in the second photo, or the older couple posed with one of the Edsels yesterday, but these folks, with their coats, ties, dresses, handbags … it was another era. We don’t exactly look like the young folks either, any more, but I have a beard, my wife has long hair she wears down, and we still wear jeans or shorts, plaid shirts or T shirts, etc. Keep posting these Rich, makes me feel young 😀
Yup, lots of cute 70s girls. Sometimes I do miss Jr. High and High School.
As for the cars, I have to go with the dual wagon folks from North Carolina (the Opel and the Pontiac). The guy with the bike in that picture is channeling one of the characters from Breaking Away (the movie). https://www.imdb.com/title/tt0078902/ A wonderful movie that captures being a teen in the mid to late 1970s.
Notice anything ‘off’ about this photo? (#4 in this article)
https://i0.wp.com/www.curbsideclassic.com/wp-content/uploads/2024/05/f5fb9f7130207988091cb66015a394a2.jpg?ssl=1
[img]https://i0.wp.com/www.curbsideclassic.com/wp-content/uploads/2024/05/f5fb9f7130207988091cb66015a394a2.jpg?ssl=1[/img]
LOL I immediately noticed that as well. At very first glance, I was thinking it was a baseball pitcher’s ‘set’ position. But I’m pretty sure, your ‘off’ suggestion is correct!
Daniel M.
No.
The scale of either the car or the three young ladies in front of it is what seems off.
Either they seem too big, or the car too small!
It’s one of those cheater scaled-down Chevelles that Smokey Yunick built for NASCAR. But the young lady in the middle does look like a basketball player.
They’re standing up on the curb and a couple of feet in front of the car. Looks normal to me.
But yes, the kid across the street looks like he might doing something inappropriate.
People seemed so consistently laid back in the 1970s, compared to today.
Case in point. My parents retired in August 1975, and moved to the country, near Ottawa. A farmhouse outside Perth, Ontario. They hired Boyd Moving, a major Ottawa mover, who supplied a single axle International Loadstar with a large semi-trailer. Much to my parent’s surprise, when the movers arrived in Perth, they stopped for an hour at the Perth Hotel bar. Before proceeding for the next ten kilometres to my parent’s new home. To unload, my family’s prized possessions. We had no idea, how much they drank. Or if the driver was sober. My parent’s just bought us kids treats at the local Mac’s convenience store, sitting in my dad’s gold 1969 Ford Ranch Wagon, while we waited on the movers. Imagine, movers doing that today!? My mom and dad were shocked, but remarkably patient. It felt more than a bit, like a Cheech and Chong movie. The driver appeared pretty square, but the other two movers, were hippies to me. They did good work in the end, but the whole scene seemed so… casual. lol
https://boydmoving.com/
That’s a great story! I can’t imagine how much outrage that sort of thing would generate today, on so many different levels.
My last moving day was incredibly stressful, even with sober movers. Kudos to your parents for being so laid back – or at the very least giving the impression that they were.
I was always extremely observant as a young child. The hippie movement was still having a great impact on society. Plus, people were generally not nearly so uptight back then. I recall, we all actually laughed in the car, at the movers stopping for a drink. It did seem a bit funny. We were caught off guard, almost like a wildcat strike. We agreed, it might make them do better work. lol
People generally had simpler lives, and took life in stride. In fact, as my dad was leaving their past home, he backed his Ranch Wagon into the clothes line post, and broke his left tail light. We drove to Perth, that afternoon in August 1975, with a broken tail light. We just laughed about it, that night.
There was a TV program that debuted in 1974, called Movin’ On, starring Claude Akins and Frank Converse. Excellent show. It really did portray truckers in a positive light. In fact, the lead mover we had from Boyd Moving, looked a lot like a recurring character in Movin’ On, played by Art Metrano. I do think my parents were okay with it. As drinking as a part of life, was much more socially acceptable back then.
The kid in the background in photo 4 looks like he’s having a great time. Had to enlarge the photo to make sure he was wearing pants
The guy with the 71 Chrysler 300 could have been teenage me in the early 80’s. Loved that car!
Even over here, life was more laid-back and somehow more social, then.
We could never pull it off with quite the same panache, though. The US WAS totally and utterly cool.
And I still have an aversion to synthetic materials…
Mind you, in the late ‘eighties, I loaded a hired Ford Cargo with furniture and then stopped off at a pub for lunch & a beer before driving it 200 miles to the destination. Things were still relatively normal…
Probably only the last 20-30 years that the world has been gaslight into insanity.
Smokey and the Bandit came out in 1977, bell bottoms, street freak mods, CHiPs, and etc.
I’m getting a serial killer vibe from couple in the next to last picture with the gold ‘73 T-Bird.
And there’s a whole “Raising Arizona” thing going on in that last picture with the early second generation Camaro.
Bottom Photo:
I have a feeling the Camaro didn’t last too long with the arrival of the baby. Either a sedan or wagon was the replacement.
Reminds me of my brother. He had a ’67 Cougar.
Once he got married, it was traded in for a ’70 green Ford Galaxy 500 sedan.
1970s camaros and babes..totally cool….I had a 1966ss chevelle in 1972..4spd 396…and ripping down the road.with mag wheels..rj.tennessee
The Stearn older lady with the white Chevy, is probably just back from Church, and is in no mood for pictures.
I had that exact white ’63 Impala. Non-SS with 283 as indicated by the small wide V emblem. Ermine white with black cloth bench seats.
Love the fawn color on the Chrysler New Yorker in the second picture.
The second picture of the elderly couple reminds me of my mother’s oldest sister and her husband. The didn’t have any children and did a lot of traveling all over the country. The were also partial to chrysler products. The third picture of the white Impala sport coupe with the red interior is identical to the one my sister bought new that year. She kept for quite a few years and it still belongs to someone in the town where she lives