The “Summer of Love” was in 1968.

The last German-produced Volkswagen Beetle came off the assembly line in 1978. During that time, I transitioned from being a fuzz-faced teenager to a fully bearded parent and contributing (tax paying) member of society. That was one heckuva weird decade.

Music morphed from Haight-Ashbury inspired psychedelic rock, to cocaine and Bee Gees fueled disco dancing, culminating with the last chaos-stimulated performance of the Sex Pistols. As those 10 years moved forward, the music just ran around in circles searching for its lost chord.

During that time, it would appear that travel technology went backward. In 1969, the Apollo 11 lunar excursion launched three brave men toward the first moon landing, a trip requiring about three days of state-of-the-art rocket propelled space travel, a couple of guys walking on the moon, and a third guy just hanging out in space. Compare that to 1978, when the Double Eagle II carried three intrepid travelers on the first transatlantic balloon voyage — almost six days of floating aimlessly amongst the air currents, using a mode of transportation that had been ignored since the Hindenburg disaster, more than 40 years before.

In 1971, air travel and financing were merged into one convenient package. A gentleman, now referred to as D. B. Cooper, boarded a plane in Portland, Oregon and transformed a Northwest Orient Airlines Boeing 727 into a bank. After making a $200,000 withdrawal (about a million bucks in today’s currency) he escaped by parachuting into the wilderness of the Pacific Northwest.

Clyde Barrow liked to use Fords as he get-away transportation — D.B. Cooper was a fan of parachutes.

In 1968, the Democrats hosted their presidential convention in Chicago. Mayor Richard M. Daily (affectionately referred to as “Hizonner”) was certain that he would be the kingmaker by nominating the next president of the United States — until all hell broke loose!

Dan Rather, a young news reporter for CBS, gained instant notoriety by getting decked while attempting to interview someone who had incurred the wrath of someone much more powerful — convention floor security forces roughed them both up, on live TV.

A radical organization calling themselves Students for a Democratic Society showed up and decided to live up to its name. The group stopped (bought and paid for) democracy in action, by starting a riot and bringing the “Summer of Love” to a screeching halt.

This resulted in the Chicago Police Department getting to thump a lot of hippie heads. All-in-all, it was a fun week for watching the evening news.

After the 1968 Democratic National Convention de-evolved into a quagmire, Richard Nixon and Spiro Agnew were elected president and vice president. Although the Republican convention was far less dramatic, their candidates were equally “presidential”.

Nixon’s character was so pure that he, once, had to infamously defend his reputation by stating emphatically “I am not a crook.” Agnew got caught being a good politician (tax evasion, bribery, money laundering, extortion, etc. — the usual stuff) and had to resign as vice president. His Not-a-Crook speech did not work as well as Nixon’s. In October 1973, Nixon named Gerald R. Ford, the speaker of the house, to take Agnew’s place as VP. As it turns out, Nixon really was a crook. Whudathunkit?

He resigned the presidency in August 1974, which bumped Ford up the ladder, and left a vacancy on the bench at the number two slot. Nelson Rockefeller got called up from the minor leagues, and a quirky little thing called the 25th amendment gave us a president and vice president who had never earned a single vote for either of those offices.

Most importantly, wedged among all the fascinating historical events between 1968 and 1978, my first child, Angela, was born (1976). That single event made one heckuva weird decade so much better.

Larry Wilson is a mostly lifelong resident of Niles. His optimistic “glass full to overflowing” view of life shapes his writing. His essays stem from experiences, compilations and recollections from friends and family. Wilson touts himself as “a dubiously licensed teller of tall tales, sworn to uphold the precept of ‘It’s my story; that’s the way I’m telling it.’” He can be reached at wflw@hotmail.com.