This Day in the Life in a 1950s Small Town film from 1952 shows how postwar America taught kids about work, community and civic values.
Vintage school & education
Discover old-fashioned activities for kids from the ’60s that still inspire fun, creativity and imagination today — no screens required.
Some of the most iconic 80s school supplies have been revitalized for a new generation (assuming they ever went away in the first place). Here are some of our sentimental faves that you can buy new even now!
Look years back at teachers, students and old school classrooms from more than a century ago, and see what education was like back then.
Take a nostalgic look back at the Presidential Physical Fitness Award, the school tests, badges, and certificates that defined PE class from the 1960s to 1980s.
The life of Helen Keller: In her own words, and through the eyes of a visitor Helen Keller’s name is one that most Americans learn
Old playgrounds were risky, thrilling and full of sharp edges — see how kids from the past played hard and (mostly) survived.
See how vintage library checkout cards and due date cards kept libraries organized for decades — a simple system that made borrowing books easy and fun.
From pretty in pink to bold in black, teen girls put a lot of time and money into finding just the perfect now-vintage 80s prom dresses. Here’s a look at more than a hundred of the styles available back then!
Find out how to make some sweet vintage Easter egg crafts for spring – everything from bunny-decorated eggs to lacquered lace eggshells.
Do you remember Shrinky Dinks? They were DIY crafts that could be made by coloring on a plastic sheet, cutting out the various shapes, and then shrinking them down using heat.
Who remembers these popular vintage Fisher Price baby toys from the 70s and 80s — iconic, durable and full of fun. Check out our nostalgic collection!
Between Saturday morning cartoon shows, animated Schoolhouse Rock was on TV from 1973-1985. Here’s a Grammar Rock classic, Schoolhouse Rock: A Noun Is a Person, Place or Thing!
College costs in the ’50s and ’60s were significantly lower than today’s — see how tuition, room and board compared after adjusting for inflation.
Look back at what antique school supplies looked like back in the 1800s, along with popular teaching materials from the Victorian era!
A Trapper Keeper was a binder/portfolio that came in a wide range of colors and designs, and kits in the ’80s & ’90s loved them. See which ones you remember!
The old-fashioned Dymo label maker was easy to use and affordable – which meant that these colorful plastic sticky labels used to be seen almost everywhere and on everything.
Revisit the ABC Afterschool Special episodes that shaped our childhood! We’ve listed every one of the vintage TV movies, along with photos and dozens of promos and full-length videos.
100 million erasable pens (82 percent of them disposables) were sold in 1982 alone. The two top movers were from Eraser Mate and Scripto – here’s a look back!
The distinctive style of 70s prom dresses marked a move from the structured elegance of the 1960s to a more relaxed, romantic aesthetic. Take a look!
Millions know ‘Say, Say, Oh Playmate’ – also known as ‘Playmate’ – but few today know much about the rhyming song & hand clapping game. Find out more here!
Sesame Street started in 1969 as a daily TV show for preschoolers, featuring a street filled with puppets and humans who told stories, sang and danced. But it became so much more than just a television program!
The incorporation of more advanced features into portable machines marked a new era of convenience and accessibility, and these compact and user-friendly manual typewriters became more versatile and efficient than ever before.
Leland Stanford, Jr University in California – now known just as Stanford – was created to honor a young boy’s death. His parents so grieved his loss, they put millions into creating a college in his name.
These vintage Thermos ads from the 1950s, 60s and 70s feature designs so iconic, you might find the ones you used to have!
A box social, sometimes called a box supper social, was an old-fashioned way for communities to connect, share a meal and raise money for local
The chance to take a trip through the aisles of Toys R Us in the 1990s is over forever, but you can join us in reminiscing with this collection of the toys and games kids wanted back then!
Billions of 80s stickers were collected by millions of kids – and appeared on everything from binders to books, cassette tapes to sticker collection albums. Do you recognize any of these vintage stickers?
For years, curious kids have loved experimenting with vintage chemistry sets and science kits like these with countless things to explore!
The old VTech PreComputer 1000 from the 80s was a small 3-in-1 computer ‘teacher’ that helped kids learn touch typing and basic computer programming – plus had a 3500-word dictionary, and knew more than 1000 facts
Remember these classic Fisher-Price preschool toys, like the vintage corn popper, colorful xylophone, music box TV and chatter telephone?
Judging by audience response to PBS new children’s show, Zoom may turn into the kind if household word television hasn’t heard since the halcyon days of Uncle Milty.
What better use to make of those big, clumsy cartons that once held ar new refrigerator or range? Make a fun toyland for the kids with these creative DIY cardboard box fort & playhouse ideas!
This easy-to-make vintage cardboard dollhouse is a project that can grow with your children! Here’s how you can make it – along with tips for cute ways to decorating the little play house.
Hopefully, these vintage 1970s Playskool toys, dolls, ride-ons and more will bring back some happy memories! They may also remind you of a simpler time, when most toys were joyfully kid-powered.
From just the trailer, it seemed like just another John Hughes movie, but ‘The Breakfast Club’ was something different. For many ’80s teens, it was more real and more relatable. Find out why here!
How does an author become an author? For S E Hinton, the choice was easy — she wrote her first book, ‘The Outsiders,’ as a teenager, when she couldn’t find anything that she wanted to read.
See clips of past Civil Defense films from the ’50s & ’60s, plus how to make a bomb shelter, what to stock, and more details from the Cold War era.
What were vintage school and scout fundraisers like years ago? Here’s a look back at a few dozen of the things that kids used to sell – including candy & candles, popcorn & peanuts.
Have a look at 126 of the most popular toys from the ’40s that millions of kids found under their Christmas trees back in 1948, courtesy of Santa… or from mom and dad.
After shooting several people at a school in San Diego in 1979, teen Brenda Ann Spencer told a reporter, ‘I just did it for the fun of it. I don’t like Mondays. This livens up the day.’
Featuring stars like Morgan Freeman and Rita Moreno, ‘The Electric Company’ was a fab ’70s TV show for kids too old for Sesame Street. With lots of humor and music, this troupe made reading fun.
In animated segments between Saturday morning cartoon shows, Schoolhouse Rock was on TV from 1973-1985. Here’s a Grammar Rock classic, Verb: That’s What’s Happenin’!
Here’s one of the most unforgettable songs from Schoolhouse Rock: Conjunction Junction. One of the first in the “Grammar Rock” series, it made its debut on televisions nationwide in 1973.
See some vintage report cards from San Francisco’s Outer Mission district schools during the ’50s. One of his classmates? Jerry Garcia of the Grateful Dead.
Although the story below was the topic of the 1994 made-for-TV movies Death of a Cheerleader/A Friend to Die For, this story has personal meaning, because I was another teen girl at the same school.
After the war, industry was booming, and they needed workers. This 1946 vocational guidance film gives us a little insight into the world of telecommunications at the midpoint of the 20th century, from switchboard operators to engineers.
This widely-beloved cartoon music video for ‘I’m Just A Bill’ came out in 1975 as part of Schoolhouse Rock, a memorable series of animated shorts that ran with the Saturday morning cartoons.
