Man, kids today don’t know what they’re missing. On a related note, they do not care. I once told one of my classes about the wonders of hearing an old school bell and they looked at me like I had a Sarcastic Fringehead perched on my head. If you don’t know what a Sarcastic Fringehead is, search it up on Google. You will not be disappointed.

But enough about Sarcastic Fringeheads. What follows are some sounds that youngsters of today have never heard. Enjoy, youngsters (and oldsters) of today.

Rotary Dial Phone

Ah, the rotary phone. It’s really hard to describe the sound a rotary phone made when dialing someone up, but it made sort of a swoosh sound as you rotated the dial clockwise to the finger stop, and then the click-click-click as the dial returned counter-clockwise to the start position.

Note: 99 percent of my readers will have no idea what that last sentence means.

Manual Typewriter

Typing stuff on a laptop has never felt as satisfying as hearing the clank of the keys and the ding warning you the page was about to end on the old typewriters. And walking through an old typing class or newsroom was amazing with all the clackity-clacks and whatnot. Get this – if you made a mistake it was permanent. None of that wussy backspacing you see today. You’d have to use something called whiteout to cover your mistake and type over it. Some people still use manual typewriters and I say God bless ’em.

Note 2: Whiteout was invented by one of The Monkees’ mothers, not even kidding.

TV Channel Selector Knob

You know what TV remote my dad used to use? Me. I was the remote. Dad would tell me to get my butt off the couch and change the damn channel from Flipper to The Jackie Gleason Show. It wasn’t as hard on me as you might think because there were only three channels but still. And the amazing clunk-clunk-clunk as you switched channels was an oddly satisfying experience. Trust me on this one kids.

Note 3: Dad loved The Jackie Gleason Show. Sigh.

Record Changer

LPs have made a comeback, but 45’s not so much. Children, 45s were little records that had one song on each side. You’d stack them on a little record player, turn it on, and watch the magic happen. The little record would drop on the turntable and the arm with the needle on it would rotate over and gently drop on the record, all the while making a series of satisfying mechanical sounds. As a bonus, once the song started you actually heard good music like The Beatles or Pink Floyd and not someone called Lil’ Bootycall or something.

Note 4: It worked for LPs too. Genius.

Gas Station Bell

Youngbloods, let me tell you a story. When I was a kid, not only did my parents whip me occasionally, but any adult could beat my hind end. I was smacked by my barber, the neighbors and the guy who ran the gas station. But hey, I kept riding my bike over that wire/tube thingy that rang the bell in front of the station so I deserved it. The gas station bell was there so the mechanic working inside the station would be alerted when someone pulled in for gas. Of course, I used it to annoy the mechanic and he throttled me for it. In addition, I didn’t tell dad because he would have throttled me again. And look at me, I turned out alright. So to speak.

Note 5: For those confused, nobody pumped their own gas back then. The attendant/gas station owner would come out, fill you up, clean your windshield and check the air in your tires. Sometimes they’d have specials and if you filled up your tank they might throw in a set of dinner plates or cool Looney Tune tumblers. I’m being dead serious right now. Oh, and gas was like 33 cents a gallon. What a time to be alive, not including the beatings and whatnot.

TV Stations Going Off The Air

Loyal readers under the age of 50, once upon a time we lived in a world with three TV stations (4, 6 and 10), and they went off the air at like 2 a.m. Gasp! At that point the National Anthem would play, a weird “Indian Test Pattern” would appear (look it up) and eventually your television went to static. And lemme tell ya, if you had fallen asleep it would wake you up because the static was loud.

Cash Register

Old-style cash registers, man. They were used back when people paid with, you know, coins and paper money and stuff. That satisfying sound as the drawer would pop out, accompanied by the ding, was great. I long for a simpler time.

Telephone Metal Bell Ringer

Those old ringers were amazing. I promise you could hear ours from two houses away, right through the walls. Not even kidding. I have the sound as a ringer on my iPhone but it just ain’t the same. And guess what? You didn’t know who was calling! Answering the phone was a total crapshoot. Barbaric I know, but we lived fearlessly on the edge back then. Again, there was an actual bell inside your phone! Wild times my friends.

Credit Card Imprinter Machines

Back in the day, when you paid by credit card, they ran your card through this contraption that made a clunky sound and basically copied your card. Some called these things Click-Clack machines because that was the sound they made while in use. On a related note, when I was in high school nobody used credit cars. It was always straight cash, homie.

Radio Dial

Does anyone still listen to the radio? It’s still hanging in there, right? Anyway, the sound of turning that knob and scrolling through stations was glorious, especially on a trip when you were looking for a clear signal. You’d be somewhere in rural Georgia on your way to Daytona Beach for Spring Break, trying to find a station and then out of the blue, you’d hit pay dirt as Freebird would come blasting through your speakers. I swear I’m getting a little misty-eyed right now.

Dial-Up Internet Connection

This one is relatively new, at least to me. Back in the 90s, you connected to the internet through your phone line, and if you were online you couldn’t use your phone. Not kidding. As you were connecting to the world wide web you heard this weird dinging/squishing/static sound like demons were being summoned from hell or something. Now that I think about what the internet has done to humanity, maybe they were. Then you’d have to wait 30-60 seconds to go from website to website. Somehow, we persevered.

Broken Record

A broken record is really a misnomer because the record wasn’t broken, the needle just got struck in the groove and kept repeating itself. It happened all the time back in the day of 45s and LPs and it was annoying as all get out. Anyway kids, when you hear someone say you sound like a broken record because you keep repeating yourself? Now you know why. You’re welcome.

School Bells

Children, school bells used to be actual bells, not those weird tones you hear today. They signaled class changes and the beginning and end of the school day and they were some of the finest sounds these ears have heard, especially at 2:55 p.m. Stay with me for a second. Close your eyes and imagine it’s 2:55 p.m. and you’re awaiting that last bell so you can go home and watch The Electric Company or one of ABC’s exhilarating After School Specials. Finally, you hear the glorious end-of-the-day school bell. What a time to be alive.

Oh, there were other sounds I used to hear, like my dad playing his Perry Como records or old Mrs. Thurman over on Market Street beating her kids with an iron skillet, but you get the gist. Have a great weekend folks.

Dave Shoemaker is a retired teacher, athletic director and basketball coach with most of his professional years spent at Paint Valley. He also served as the national basketball coach for the island country of Montserrat in the British West Indies. He lives in Southern Ohio with his best friends and companions, his dogs Sweet Lilly and Hank. He can be reached at https://shoeuntied.wordpress.com/.