Our new ~*~MALE~*~ writer Spencer has the coolest mom ever, and she let me borrow this giant chest she has of all her photos, letters, notes, diaries, and even very old pieces of gum from her life as a kid/teenager in the ’60s and ’70s. I felt like a creep being so engrossed in it all, but OH MY GOD you guys! The colors in the photos, the stationery, the mentions of Bye Bye Birdie and bell-bottoms! She kept absolutely everything, and after looking at all of it, you’ll want to do the same, and write lots of letters, and write in a diary every day. THANK YOU, Sue, for letting me borrow your life’s work and for letting us post it, and thank you, house, for not burning down the whole month I kept it in my room. (I took pictures of HOW MUCH STUFF THERE WAS—like, there are at least 100 folded-up notes from school, only about six of which are here—and how pretty all the diaries are with their ’60s designs, but I stupidly forgot to upload them and now I’m visiting relatives with my family, so they’ll probably be on the Rookie tumblr in like a week. I know you will be constantly refreshing it every moment until then.)
42 Comments
I Love # 93, the one in the spinning tea cups.
every picture is like oh my god oh my god oh my god all the time
I knew Sue back in the Lounge Ax days. Gorgeous, funny, generous,… and apparently an archivist. I had no idea she had all of this stuff. It makes me wish I’d kept more of mine than I did.
That’s weird to think that when I’m like 60 the style of clothes my peers and I wear and our hairstyles and music choices will be considered retro or whatever.
#25 Let it Be!
This reminds me to keep all letters from my friends.
#44 made me grin – great post!
literally the best thing ever? this post.
i LOVED this sooo sooo much. i was glad that there were 94 pics but then when it finished i wanted MORE! i really loved the notes between sue and her friends…it reminded me of me and my bff! since we’re not in school anymore i’m going to send her notes through the mail…this has inspired me. we live super close but this is more fun!
seriously, i loved this and couldn’t possibly get enough. THANK YOU SO MUCH TAVI AND SUE!
“My dog just said hello. My vagina hurts.”
hahahaha
This made me cry because I wanted to be there so bad.
I am literally in LOVE with the kid in #33. Is he still that amazing after however many years?
I like how the balloons in picture #2 look like… ummm… never mind. Am I the only one who noticed this?
Thank you Tavi and Sue!!!
no, you are not the only one who noticed the balloons in picture 2 look a bit indecent. :P
by the 43rd picture my heart exploded
Apollo 2 came back to Earth. I washed my hair.
Two equally important events, obviously <3
“Apollo II came back to earth. I washed my hair.”
“You and Mark Gariea having sexual intercourse!!!”
“The dog just said hello. My vagina hurts.”
“Dorothy Nimz is wearing the tightest and shortest sweater I have ever seen in my life”
“Marla Chupak- Always on people’s nerves. Sickening laugh. Pest. Freshie but you wouldn’t think it. Long brown hair, pop out eyes.”
“You’re probably in a nice, soft, warm bed sleeping your vagina off.”
“I keep burping up the taste of oranges.”
I am so obsessed with the notes oh my gosh.
for all of middle school, i wrote pages and pages in a journal every day, planning to save it and give it to my kids or whatever…now it’s SUPER embarrassing and i’m seriously considering burning all, like, 15 volumes–but this might have changed my mind, ahaha
“Apollo II came back to Earth. I washed my hair.”
I love this. Also, ‘sleeping your vagina off’ may become my new catchphrase.
THESE ARE AMAAAAZING omg omg omg
i think it would also be accurate to file this under LITERALLY THE BEST THING EVER
adrsdhgskfdhdjklwhfjk i can’t
my mum has so many pictures like this too
HOORAY FOR ALL THE MUMS
“Apollo 2 came back to Earth. I washed my hair.”
THESE ARE AMAZING
Great photos! Looks like a fun life haha ;P! But I totally still write letters to my friends like that anyways. Fun times :).
Pictures #46 and 54 could be from now. They look so modern. Awesome pics! I didn’t read the notes–they seem too private. I feel like a voyeur.
I’m dying. It’s amazing. ALL OF IT. I think my favourite might be the ‘crying while holding acoustic guitar’. I could look at these forever. Books oh books. Tavi, you are doing OUTSTANDING WORK (across the board)
these are great! look at those outfits! how fantastic
XX
I looked at all these photos while listening to Light my Fire by The Doors.. it was so great.. might have been a different decade- but- still….. so great.
I love these! The ones when she was dressed up as a little ballerina, so cute!
#88, that’s the worst Pooh Bear costume ever!
And I’m glad to see I’m not the only person who has ever made a list of all the boys I’ve liked. Dumb, yes, but at least I can say I was young. :)
there’s a stash of mad comics , old ones in downtown pasadena, in a antique-vintage-everything store
ack, this is all so gorgeous. I am amazed by how much stuff she has. I need to take more pictures. maybe that can be my new year’s resolution. I already save the letters my best friend and I write each other, and this makes me feel less crazy for doing so.
I really want the stationary and envelopes from some of those notes, like 53 and 65. I also love the stuff on the walls in the bedroom shots.
also! this (the pictures, anyway) totally reminds me of a capsule on How To Be A Retronaut. all you guys who loved this should check that site out if you haven’t already seen it. it rocks.
THIS IS JUST PERFECT. What a collection… my hoarding tendencies are justified after seeing this. Going to pester my Mum for some of her old photographs now…
omg all of these are so amazing! the only thing rookie is missing are some cheesy quizzes! :)
ahhhhhhhhhh so perfect! love the bedroom shots
this makes me want to get back into taking photos, maybe my son’s friend will post my life online in the future
I love love love these. Like Tavi said in her fashion rookie post, I think this collection of notes and letters really shows how similar (yet also different in key ways) adolescence was then. these letters are fantastic, and make me wish i wrote more to my friends instead of texting. also
“You’re probably in a nice, soft, warm bed sleeping your vagina off.”
is so funny, and candid, and I love knowing someone wrote that to her friend in a note
ah! i love this! And i love how in one of the notes bit o honey’s are mentioned. like, my favourite sweets! i discovered them in the gift shop on Ellis Island one summer.
OMG these are gold! I wonder what Howard Ventura, Lenny Lowe and the Skolnik boys are doing now! (#43) .. I always wondered, how did girls manage those veryveryvery short mini-dresses in the 70s? Would you wear, like, bloomers under them, or just never sit down or bend over? I would be worried all the time!
i wonder the same thing when i see them!
I just had this thought, and not to be weird BUT. Back in the day of our mothers, the normal thing to do was to be into what was currently cool. New music, New styles etc.
But today it’s cool to be into what was cool back in the day. Popular Nostalgia so like the 60s, 70s which we romanticise. So if popular nostalgia continues as a trend, a zeitgeist, when our children look back into our journals from when we were young, they might have a double level of popular nostalgia.
Firstly, the records of our present, the 2010s, which they are nostalgic for in the future and secondly, the records of our nostalgia for the past (60s, 70s,). Will there be popular nostalgia for the 2010s about how much we were into popular nostalgia of the 60s and 70s? trippy man.
absolutely love this article, made me feel very nostalgic
I wish I could live in these years
awesome pictures!
this was absolutely my favorite post on rookie to date. Halfway through the set my mother came in and it was so strange and beautiful to see these photos as relics from another time while my mother sat next to me reliving her very similar preteen/teen experience – her name is Sue too, and she grew up in the midwest in the 60s and 70s. thanks Tavi and Sue Miller!
22/23 are VERY chloe sevigny. in a good way.
amazing post!
I always feel weird looking private things but
I have always loved the old family pictures and those ones are just perfect.
I loved this! Especially the notes! Reminds me of high school :)
lovely-ness . I wanna live in the 60’s.
All these pictures make me want to live in those years as well. They are lovely!