Rick Just
  • Home
  • Blog
  • Author
  • Speaker
  • Contact
  • Subscriptions
  • Heroes & Villains

Teenagers

9/25/2019

Comments

 
​Parents, of course you love your children. But be honest, haven’t you once or twice wished there was no such thing as a teenager? There was a time in Idaho history, and world history for that matter, when they did not exist.
 
The term teenager didn’t start making its way into popular usage until the 1930s and 1940s. The first instance of the word that I found in an Idaho paper was in the Statesman in 1941. It didn’t come up again there until 1943.
 
Teenage came along a little earlier, though newspapers were slow to standardize it. They used teen age, ‘teen age, “teen” age, and teen-age, depending on the whim of typesetters, perhaps. An expert on the teen-age from Chicago was speaking at a Boise church convention on “the boy problem” in 1914. Thank goodness we’ve now solved that one.
 
This wasn’t just about semantics. In a sense, there were no teenagers through most of recorded history. There were children who toddled around until they were five or six or seven, not contributing much to a family. Once they could start working at some menial labor, that’s what they did, simply becoming more useful as they got older.
 
The introduction of standardized education and child labor laws began to change this in the 19th century. Some scholars attribute the invention of the teenager, more-or-less as we know them today, to the automobile. Cars provided freedom for young people to occasionally get away from their parents. Dating became much more common. Then consolidated high schools began to use buses to bring students from further and further away. There they were, together, learning, dating, beginning to dress in their own fashions in the 1950s (picture). Voila! Teenagers!
 
I have done no research on the subject, but feel confident that eye rolling and insolence came into vogue about the same time as teenager.
Picture
Speaking of Idaho history posts are copyright © 2020 by Rick Just. Sharing is encouraged. If you don’t find a button that lets you do that, find the post on Speaking of Idaho. If you’re missing my daily posts, select the RSS button, or select See it First under the Facebook Following tab.
Comments
    Picture
    The first book in the Speaking of Idaho series is out. Ask for it at your local Idaho bookstore, find it on Amazon, or, if you want a signed copy, click the button.
    Picture
    The second book in the Speaking of Idaho series is out. Ask for it at your local Idaho bookstore, find it on Amazon, or, if you want a signed copy, click the button.
    Picture
    Rick's book about Fearless Farris is available on Amazon! Click the picture above to be taken to Amazon. If you'd like an autographed copy, click the button below.

    Author, Speaker

    Rick Just has been writing about Idaho history since 1989 when he wrote and recorded scripts for the Idaho Centennial Commission’s daily radio program, Idaho Snapshots. One of his Idaho books explores the history of Idaho's state parks: Images of America, Idaho State Parks. Rick also writes a regular column for Boise Weekly.

    Rick does public presentations on Idaho's state park history and the history of the Morrisite war for the Idaho Humanities Council's Speakers Bureau.idahohumanities.org/programs/inquiring-idaho/
    ​


    Check out Rick's history of Idaho State Parks.

    The audio link below is to Rick's Story Story Night set called "Someplace Not Firth"

    Archives

    July 2025
    June 2025
    May 2025
    April 2025
    March 2025
    February 2025
    January 2025
    December 2024
    November 2024
    October 2024
    September 2024
    August 2024
    July 2024
    June 2024
    May 2024
    April 2024
    March 2024
    February 2024
    January 2024
    December 2023
    November 2023
    October 2023
    September 2023
    August 2023
    July 2023
    June 2023
    May 2023
    April 2023
    March 2023
    February 2023
    January 2023
    December 2022
    November 2022
    October 2022
    September 2022
    August 2022
    July 2022
    June 2022
    May 2022
    March 2022
    February 2022
    January 2022
    December 2021
    November 2021
    October 2021
    September 2021
    August 2021
    July 2021
    June 2021
    May 2021
    April 2021
    March 2021
    February 2021
    January 2021
    December 2020
    November 2020
    October 2020
    September 2020
    August 2020
    July 2020
    June 2020
    May 2020
    April 2020
    March 2020
    February 2020
    January 2020
    December 2019
    November 2019
    October 2019
    September 2019
    August 2019
    July 2019
    June 2019
    May 2019
    April 2019
    March 2019
    February 2019
    January 2019
    December 2018
    November 2018
    October 2018
    September 2018
    August 2018
    July 2018
    June 2018
    May 2018
    April 2018

    RSS Feed

Speaking of Idaho history posts are copyright © 2025 by Rick Just. Sharing is encouraged. If you’re missing my daily posts, select the RSS button, or select See it First under the Facebook Following tab.

*As an Amazon Associate I earn from qualifying purchases. That means if you follow a link (generally to a book) from my page to an Amazon page, I get a tiny percentage of any purchase you may make.