From a bygone era

As we all get older, we tend to remember certain things from our past that are either obsolete, no longer true, or no longer exist today. Oftentimes, if we tell what we know about these things to a younger audience, they'll be like "wha?" and probably not understand what you're talking about.

What are some of the things from when you were younger-perhaps back during your childhood-that have since gone away or changed dramatically? If you remember something that someone else has brought up, you can discuss whatever you remember about those points as well.

 

Not to mention the "Please Rewind" labels on VHS cassette rentals (and probably also Betamax.)

I actually have a couple of rotary phones in the house, which I bought at thrift stores at varying points in time. Back when I was a baby, I had a toy rotary phone car (not Fisher-Price, I don't think) that I played with all the time.

Anyway, here's some of my memories:

• The "Two Thumbs Up" movie criticism trademark of Gene Siskel and Roger Ebert (both RIP.)
• Cartoons dominated Saturday mornings on traditional (antenna) network television.
• Gasoline was $1/gallon, with crude oil averaging around $20/barrel.
• School districts still had some gasoline-powered buses, typically GMC or Chevy conventionals with the 366 Chevy Big Block V8 engine, and automatic transmissions (Allison AT540 and AT545) that screamed and whined during acceleration. Some buses were even stickshifts (manual transmissions). Nowadays, any school bus still in use that isn't diesel will either be CNG (compressed natural gas) or propane autogas.
• Most homes, including mine, didn't even have computers, let alone Internet access. School computers were mostly Apple IIe's, as well as some DOS-only PC clones with custom shell programs. The few Windows machines in use had Windows 3.1 and later Windows 95. I can also remember when web sites/Internet URLs were unheard of in advertising.