The 1960s was an era of growth: women found their voices, the fashion industry became
more colorful than ever, and music changed in ways nobody could have imagined.
It was a time of innovation - and these are the things 1960s Americans just couldn't live
without.
Prior to 1960, the most effective and popular form of birth control was the condom.
Not only did they prevent pregnancy, but they also minimized the risk of contracting sexually
transmitted diseases.
Still, condoms could be inconvenient, and would sometimes break or come off.
Luckily, a new form of contraception was right around the corner.
When the FDA approved a drug to ease menstrual problems in 1957, it was never intended to
be a contraceptive.
But it actually did prevent pregnancy, causing an awful lot of women to suddenly report severe
menstrual disorders.
Known as Enovid, by 1960, the FDA had finally recognized the drug as an effective way to
stave off pregnancy.
It quickly became commonly called "the Pill."
Within two years, 1.2 million women were taking the Pill as it exploded in popularity.
But the drug remained controversial, largely due to the Pope's views on family - and the
reactionary groups who charged Planned Parenthood with, in their words, "committing genocide."
For those reasons, the Pill remained illegal in several states even as it rose to become
the most popular method of birth control.
And then, in 1969, Barbara Seaman's book, The Doctor's Case Against the Pill, revealed
such risky side effects as blood clots, heart attacks, strokes, weight gain, depression,
and even "loss of libido" - which kind of defeated the purpose of the Pill in the first
place.
Enovid was discontinued in the U.S. in 1988, and today has been replaced by a number of
more effective contraceptive pills.
Many, many different musical genres can trace their roots to the 1960s.
For one, there's the British Invasion, which revolutionized rock thanks to the Beatles,
the Rolling Stones, and the Who.
But the decade also saw a huge rise in the popularity of a number of other genres, including
Motown, psychedelic rock, and folk.
Put them all together and they made for one groovy scene.
The Beatles, of course, were especially prolific.
Within months of their 1964 debut on the Ed Sullivan show, Beatlemania had swept the country.
The movement represented a whole new way to love music, and resulted in the band being
swarmed by hordes of teenage fans.
"They don't wanna mob you, they just want to speak to you.
What do you think of this?
Do you want to talk to them?"
"Well, have you ever tried talking to about 200 people at once?"
The way we listened to music changed, too.
Phillips introduced the first cassette tape in 1963, which was also the year that Learjet
inventor Bill Lear premiered the 8-track tape.
Now, music lovers could listen to their favorite bands and songs without having to lug around
vinyl records and a turntable.
It was the beginning of a portable music revolution - one that's still going on to this day.
The Rolling Stones' 1966 hit "Mother’s Little Helper" was about a housewife who pops pills
to help her manage her busy and often hectic day.
As Mick Jagger once explained:
"It's about drug dependence, but in a sort of like spoofy way."
But the Stones' song was actually disturbingly close to reality.
Valium, which made its first appearance in 1963, was prescribed to manage anxiety - and
quickly became one of the most commonly prescribed drugs of all time.
Drug manufacturers had actually been researching anti-anxiety pills since the late 1800s, but
many of them contained highly addictive opiates.
It was hoped that Valium would change that.
Spoiler alert: it didn't.
Even so, big pharma continued marketing it as safe, and falsely insisted it was nearly
impossible to overdose on valium.
Over a 10-year period, the drug was prescribed to 59.3 million patients.
The primary target market was women, many who were harried housewives assigned to domestic
duties at home.
It's little wonder that Valium became a favorite release from the anxieties of raising children
during America's baby boom years, doing all of the shopping, cooking and cleaning, and
managing the household budget meted out by husbands.
With no escape in sight, women were basically drugged into submission.
One advertisement blatantly explained: "You can't set her free, but you can help her feel
less anxious."
It's a little-known fact that the art of tie-dye actually first became popular in America way
back in the 1920s.
It was cheap and easy to do, and remained popular during the poverty stricken years
of the Great Depression.
Music trends were heavily involved in reviving the fad during the 60s, when stars like Jerry
Garcia rocked their tie-dye on stage - and inspired others to follow the fashion.
Before long, a whole new wardrobe was born, complemented by the other stylistic flourishes
of the 60s, such as faded jeans, countrified skirts, and sandals.
In time, tie-dye clothing became a symbol for those opposing the Vietnam War, as well
as a more general rebellion against societal rules.
It also spurred a new generation of simplicity and true country living.
Wearing tie-dye became hip among the younger generations, who became a kind of spiritual
extension of writer Jack Kerouac's beat generation of the 50's.
The only real difference was that, rather than beatniks, these people were known as
hippies.
"We're doing the hardest work in the world, because we're growing.
We're trying to change."
Composed mostly of young people, hippies fought the suppression of society by developing their
own culture and way of living.
It was an attempt to become a kinder generation, with many going vegetarian, using natural
methods for medicine, practicing free love - and, of course, doing a whole lot of drugs.
Now, let's say you happen to be one of those hippies, and you've just smoked something
that makes you feel like you haven't a care in the world.
What better way to enjoy it than to lay around for a while, watching a lava lamp?
Surprisingly, this creative, unique lighting device was actually invented in 1948 by a
man named Edward Craven Walker - after he saw a cocktail shaker full of colorful liquids
boiling on a stove at a pub in England.
But it wasn't until 1963 that Walker perfected his creation.
The lamp's glowing innards, housed in a long glass vase on top of an electrical base, were
made by combining a water-based liquid with a wax-based liquid and carbon tetrachloride.
Walker began marketing his "Astro Lamp" in 1963.
After Ringo Starr allegedly bought one, Walker sold his manufacturing rights in the U.S.
in 1965 - and a hippie icon was born.
In 1963, Kodak released the Instamatic, a revolutionary camera that was so user-friendly
that even a child could use it.
The camera quickly became popular, as people across America started photographing family
events, holidays, weddings, and more.
After years of having to thread the film across the back of the camera, you could now just
pop a totally enclosed film cartridge into the back.
Then, all you had to do was point and shoot; the camera did the rest.
The real beauty was that the film was 35mm, making for clear, beautiful pictures.
And another great thing about the Instamatic was that it could be carried in a pocket or
a purse, especially after Kodak added a built-in flash.
Soon enough, grocery stores, pharmacies, and photo shops had begun setting up film departments
where consumers could drop off their film to be developed.
You not only got as many prints as you wanted, but also negatives in case you wanted copies
at a later date.
Even now, using an Instamatic is seen by photographers as a pleasant and favorable break from today's
more complicated cameras.
In the early '60s, the fashion industry came out with two remarkable ideas.
The first was the miniskirt, which showed up as early as 1962, when the Billings Gazette
in Montana reported that a skirt eight inches above the knee was in production.
Two years later, Frenchman Andre Courreges introduced Go-Go boots, a new line of boots
which extended all the way up to the knee - and happened to complement miniskirts quite
nicely.
Women loved them and men admired them, but it soon occurred to the ladies that they were
still being treated like sex objects.
But objectification wasn't the only problem faced by women in the '60s.
During this decade, the average housewife spent 55 hours a week keeping house.
Any money she earned was considered property of her husband.
Those seeking divorce had to prove why their husbands were unfit, and the 38 percent of
working women in 1960 were mostly relegated to menial jobs.
Betty Friedan's book, The Feminine Mystique, is credited with helping women realize that
they were victims of discrimination.
In 1966, the National Organization for Women was formed - which, along with the civil rights
movement, was one of the foremost liberation movements of the era.
It might seem like an insignificant advancement at first, but portable calculators became
all the rage during the 60s.
Prior to that, most people were stuck using pen, paper and mental arithmetic to do their
counting.
Enter the ANITA in 1961, which was the first electronic desktop calculator.
But the ANITA still weighed in at 33 pounds with heavy wood and vacuum tubes; hardly convenient
for lugging from desk to desk.
The first transistorized calculator, which didn't use those tubes, became a hit at the
1964 World's Fair.
Soon, desktop calculators had proven fairly popular in the tech industry.
But there was more coming.
The most significant advancement of all was when a Texas Instruments tech and his co-workers
invented the first hand-held calculator.
The inventor, Jerry Merryman, later said:
"Silly me.
I thought we were just making a calculator, but we were creating an electronic revolution."
The first prototype proved so important that, today, it's on display at the Smithsonian.
Merryman died in 2019, but generations of his creation remain in just about every desk
drawer in the country.
They might be lumpy, bumpy and a little hard to get out of, but bean bag chairs made a
real splash in the 60s - beginning in 1968.
The brainchild of three Italians, this new chair was about as modernistic as you could
get.
They called it the "Sacco.”
Consisting of tiny beans sewn into a large leather pouch, the Sacco soon became a quirky
staple of living rooms everywhere.
The only downfall was that the tiniest hole sent beans, and later little styrofoam balls,
scattering across the floor.
And although it was intended to have a pear shape, the Sacco actually looked like a funny
lump when it was unoccupied.
To the hippie generation, however, that wasn't much of a problem at all.
Yes, the bean bag chair was a big hit for young people who just wanted something to
flop down on.
It soon became its own status symbol, which allowed the Sacco - as well as the cheaper
knock-offs it inspired - to remain popular into the 1970s.
After two or so decades of languishing as a fad of the past, the bean bag even came
back, and is a consistently popular feature in teenagers' bedrooms to this day.
Perfume goes back a long, long way.
Ancient Greece was the first to begin producing liquid perfume.
Much later, Italians began making "eau de cologne" for men, and especially in the days
before deodorant, this scented stuff was highly popular.
By the 1960s, fragrances had become something of a status symbol - and, in that decade,
a whopping 77 new perfumes and colognes were introduced.
It was also the first time that fragrances were manufactured for both women and men.
The number of new fragrances is far too long to list, but popular brands among the ladies
include Yves Saint Laurent, Dana's Tabu, Tigress by Faberge, Prince Matchabelli, and Wind Song
— to name but a few.
Men, meanwhile, wore English Leather, Old Spice, Canoe, Brut, and Aqua Velva.
Some of the scents commercials also became accidental classics — such as Hai Karate,
which generated arguably some of the most infamous commercials of all time.
"Hai Karate oriental lime - with indispensable instructions on self-defence in every package."
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