Hometown Innocence Lost: Childhood Memoir of a Small Town Baby Boomer

Growing up in a small mid-western town during the 50’s and 60’s was a memorable experience. The 50’s were a time of post World War II/ Korean War economic prosperity in which there was predictable day to day activity and an unchallenged sense of societal norms. The 60’s started out as what everyone thought would be a Golden Age, but beginning in 1963 a series of unsettling events would occur over the next 7 years that would turn the decade into one of most chaotic decades in U.S. history. While my small town hometown of Elmwood would be spared from some of the chaos at the national level it would not be spared from it all, not to mention that the town itself would experience heretofore unimaginable events. The two decades could not have been more different. Both national and local events of the 60’s would change the psyche of the townspeople forever. The exit of the 60’s decade would leave my little hometown and the nation as a whole with a sense of a loss of innocence.