Interesting Information from the Era Presentations:

     I must say I had a hard time deciding on what three things to write about as there was a wealth of very interesting information from this project. Of course my mind gravitated towards the 1980’s because they brought back nostalgic memories of my childhood. But I also found the information from the 1940’s to be very interesting. In fact some of the information from the 1940’s connected me back to my childhood too. No I was not a child in the 1940’s but what struck me was the information about Tupperware beginning to be sold in department stores, I never knew it was sold outside of the home. It took me back to when I was a kid and I would go along with my mother to someone’s house for a Tupperware party. She would buy a few pieces but I always remember I wanted her to buy a lot, as most of my friends seemed to have more Tupperware than we did. My mother really did not like plastic though, she preferred real dishes instead. I do remember we did have this really cool lime green jello mold that she would use to make homemade cranberry sauce with on special occasions. I wish I still had it.

     Another interesting fact from the 1940’s that really resinated with me was the WASPs, the Women WWII pilots. I do remember reading about this before but for some reason this time when I heard the information it had a stronger impact on me. I thought to myself,  “Wow how progressive for the times”. And How wonderfully courageous of these women to step up and be there for our country. It then made me ponder how many women pilots there were in the 1950’s, 1960’s, etc. Therefore I had to look this information up myself and found out that yes, there were women pilots out there but it would not be until 1973 that a United States commercial airlines hired the first female. And in the same year the United States Navy allowed women to train as pilots. In fact Britain and Canada were a head of the US in hiring the first female to fly for a commercial airlines.

     Ok back to the presentations.  So lets talk about the 1980’s. Yes! This presentation brought back so many memories. The Rubik's Cube, which to this day I still cannot get all the colors to match up. MTV, well we did not have Cable until later but I do remember being  excited to watch this when I would spend the night with a friend. So many great videos! The Pretenders, Dire Straits, and in 1984 Prince and the Revolution put out Purple Rain the album and the movie. The one fun thing I forgot about that this presentation reminded me of was the pass time of going to the arcade. Either we would go shopping at the mall and while we were there would be allowed to go play in the arcade for a bit or we would get dropped off to meet up with friends and picked back up a while later. I really like the game centipede. It had a roller ball that you used to move around with and then a button for shooting down the centipede. Something I did not realize was that in 1982 Tony Hawk at the age of 14 won his first proffessional skate board competition. I did not really hear of him till a bit later. One more thing before I wrap this up. The IBM computer and Oregon Trail that was the game everyone loved to play on the computer. 

     I really enjoyed this activity. I loved learning about the different era’s and it is interesting to me to see how all of it is relevant to the field of occupational therapy. So many great inventions. So many great moments. So many great leaders. Whether they were in the official world of OT practitioners or in the world that OT aims to work with. From food storage containers and video games to women fighter pilots. Everything around us can be used as an influence to help shape who we are and what we do. It really is an occupational world.