Riding in the back of a cattle truck, guns from the supermarket, and smoking to win a car; Bad things people used to do that seemed perfectly normal at the time.

Examples of past social behviour had me thinking late this afternoon.  When we are reminded of examples of how people behaved in the past, it is amazing to think humans have survived as a collective race and as individuals. 

Last evening, I had a great Father’s Day conversation with my Father on the telephone.  My sister had taken him to the rodeo in Milverton Ontario that afternoon as a gift.  Dad grew up on a farm, and was young during the years when westerns were still really popular in film and on television.  He really enjoyed the show, as did the rest of the family.  Dad reminded me of a couple of years ago when an individual near Milverton faced a significant traffic-related fine for transporting several people to the rodeo dance inside a horse trailer behind a pickup truck.  The good intention behind the idea was to give a few people a ride to town and reduce the possibility of drinking and driving.  The big problem was though that driving people around in a horse trailer is dangerous and as a result, against the law.  Dad said it wasn’t much different than when he was a kid though and they would go to the fair in the back of my grandfather’s cattle truck.  Grandpa had a small cattle hauling business and he was usually hired by farmers to drive cattle to and from local agricultural fairs where they had been shown.  Dad, his sisters, and likely some cousins and friends would ride in the back of the truck while grandpa drove into the grounds.  The folks at the gate never checked inside the back of a truck.  They’d stay quiet until Grandpa was through the gate, and then get out once he parked at the livestock barn and go off and enjoy the fair for free.  They likely weren’t the only people who did this.  

Today I was looking at old Montreal newspapers from September 26 and 27 1968.  Those who know the contemporary history of Quebec should remember that it was on the 26 that Daniel Johnson, the Prime Minister of Quebec, was to officially open the Manic-5 hydroelectric dam.  However, Mr. Johnson suddenly died before the ceremony took place.  As I was looking through old editions of La Presse and Le Devoir, I noticed other examples of behaviour that would completely unthinkable today.  Does anyone remember Miracle Mart and its related store, Miracle Food Mart?  Both were part of the former Steinberg chain of supermarkets that once dominated in Quebec and much of southern Ontario.  Miracle Mart was basically like the Superstore format that Loblaws now has in various forms, or like Walmart’s Supercentres.  However, in September 1968, Miracle Mart was openly advertising a sale on shotguns and rifles in a full-page La Presse advertisement.  To a contemporary Canadian, especially urban ones, the thought of picking up a 12 gauge and tossing it in the cart with the groceries would be a deplorable act.  Canadian Tire, in an advertisement a couple of pages on, was advertising ammunition in large print with photos of the packaging that diminished the advertising for motor oil and anti-freeze.  Advertisements like these would never appear in major, big-city daily newspapers today.  There was also a half-page advertisement encouraging smokers (and in 1968, there were a lot of them!), to smoke Players in order to enter a contest to win a 1969 Chevy Camaro.  So, it was possible to go to Miracle Mart, buy a package of cigarettes, win a Camaro, buy a gun with the groceries, and then stop off at Canadian Tire on the way home for some bullets.  46 years later, smoking is on the way out, and laws control who, how, when, and where people can buy guns and ammunition.  Now if only someone would do something about text messaging while driving or walking across a busy street.