COMING OF AGE IN THE 1980'S

PHOTOGRAPHS AND TEXT
BY DAVID PAONE

Nineteen sixty-four is officially the last year of the Baby Boom Generation. But for those of us born then, we don't feel a part of the Baby Boomers at all. To us, the Golden Age of Television is M*A*S*H, All in the Family and Mary Tyler Moore. What we know of the Eisenhower years we learned on Happy Days. President Kennedy is ancient history.

We came of age in the 1980's. I graduated high school in June of 1982 and college in May of 1986. The following September I started my first full-time job in the working world.

All during high school and college I studied photography. Here are some of the photographs I took in the 1980s, between ages 16 and 22. They have nothing to do with the fall of Communism or the rise of the national debt, but a lot to do with the styles and culture of the decade I call mine.

David Paone is a freelance photojournalist and writer.

December, 1985
Nothing says 1980's like feathered hair and lots of it.

1986
Not only was hair big in the 1980's, so were belts.

1981
Legwarmers were popular in the early 1980's, even before the movie Flashdance

1980
Western-themed Roy Rogers fast food restaurants were everywhere in the 1980's.
My first job (after a paper route) was at one on Long Island, for $2.10 an hour. The building has since been torn down and replaced with a tire store. I saw a Roy Rogers in New Jersey and another in Indiana recently, so they still exist.

May 21, 1982
Self-portrait with prom date and crooked vest. New Wave music was at its peak and to this day it's an ever-growing percentage of my CD collection.

May, 1984
Although mulitplexes started in the 1970's, they were everywhere by the 1980's. I worked at this one from 1982-86.

April, 1985
Schoolgirls will always look at teen magazines, only the heartthrobs pictured in them change. Ricky Schroder (right) and Scott Baio (left) still act on TV regularly, but in grown-up roles.

Summer, 1985
I'm told that the shorts these boys are wearing are very 1980's. I never thought something as simple as a plain pair of shorts could be so closely identified with a specific decade but evidently it can.

1984
The classic baby carriage was around for decades but was last seen in the 1980's. It has since been replaced by strange-looking strollers with cup holders and three wheels. This girl's hairstyle, on the other hand, was only around for a short time.

March, 1986
These girls were born in 1972. You do that math...

September, 2011
When did we become middle aged?

David Paone
PO Box 477
Lynbrook, New York 11563-0477
www.DavidPaone.com
E-mail: dptheac@yahoo.com