Those Were the Days

This past weekend, we were poking through one of the countless antique establishments in central Wisconsin and I came across an edition of the Milwaukee Sentinel dated July 4, 1976.

I can place myself exactly on that day – not only because of the Bicentennial, but because it was a little more than a month before we were married.  I was on the east coast visiting family that Holiday weekend, but am confident that the Sentinel edition I found lying on the antique store shelf is identical to the copy delivered to my in-laws’ stoop on the morning of July 4, 1976.

I was first struck by the size and weight of the paper – a paper, mind you, that was only one of two major daily papers then published in Milwaukee (the other being the Milwaukee Journal; the papers thereafter merged into the Milwaukee Journal-Sentinel) — at a time when America had a limited number of national nightly news telecasts (CBS, NBC, ABC, PBS – no Fox) and regional network affiliates broadcasting local news.

Amid the Sentinel’s extensive reporting about Bicentennial celebrations and a section on the Founding Fathers’ declaration of our independence, I saw little reference to politics.  By that holiday, former GA Gov. Jimmy Carter had clinched but not yet formally won the Democratic Party’s 1976 presidential nomination, while President Gerald Ford was locked in a tight contest in which he ultimately defeated former CA Gov. Ronald Reagan for the Republicans’ presidential nomination.

I well recall that there were sharp policy differences among the candidates, but there was no indication that any of them had any reason to worry that our republic would come to an end if one of their political opponents prevailed.

Later that year, Mr. Carter narrowly defeated Mr. Ford.  When Mr. Ford lost, he left.  Four years later, Mr. Reagan defeated Mr. Carter.  When Mr. Carter lost, he left.

Although many parts of American life are better today, obviously many need attention.  We cannot go back; we can only hope to make tomorrow better.  Even so, as I looked over the old edition of the Sentinel, the theme song of perhaps the most renowned television comedy series of all time – which on that long-ago July day had just concluded its fifth consecutive season ranked at No. 1 in the Nielson ratings — actually came into my head: 

Those Were the Days.