It's "The First Time Ever I Saw Your Face," and yes, it was the No. 1 song of 1972. One of my all-time favorites, but I digress. ("American Pie" was No. 3.)
'72 spanned my freshman and sophomore years of college, so the vast majority of my memories are tied to that. But I also do remember everything in the column. The presidential election was the first one I could (and did) vote in.
I also have a head full of random and useless information -- although in my working days as a news copy editor it was actually very useful!
The year the Rolling Stones released Exile on Main Street, the same month Neil Young debuted Harvest, and David Bowie gave us The Rise and Fall of Ziggy Stardust and the Spiders from Mars.
I was an “in-the-rotation” pitcher on my high school baseball team. There were no pitch counts; if you threw seven innings on a Monday, you could go seven again on Friday. Your coach had landed on Omaha Beach—who were you to tell him your arm hurt?
I devoured Watership Down, My Name Is Asher Lev, and Jim Bouton’s follow-up memoir, I’m Glad You Didn’t Take It Personally.
You could sit in the bleachers at Fenway—next to 5,000 guys named Sully—for $1.50. You still called your father “Sir,” even if you had long hair and thought Vietnam was ridiculous.
Kids died more often then—or so it seemed. Car accidents took five drivers, all 18 or under, in my hometown that year.
Some of your neighbors were Holocaust survivors, numbers tattooed on their forearms from Auschwitz.
Swordfish was $1.69 a pound at Wellesley Super. You could bring a five-dollar bill to the local theater and still get change after seeing The Godfather, Cabaret, or What’s Up, Doc?
Life felt secure.
Walter Cronkite told the truth each night on the CBS Evening News. Johnny Carson, egged on by Ed McMahon, joked about how cold it was outside. And you reveled in the latest sitcoms—MASH*, Sanford and Son, Bridget Loves Bernie.
What do we have left? Memories. As Paul Simon wrote:
I ran an online trivia game on AOL for 20 years called Flashback about a specific year each week. I probably did 1972 as often as any other year. It was the year I turned 16 so personal memories are pretty strong, like sitting in the courtroom for our mandatory traffic court viewing in driver's ed and my dear friend Jody sending me a note telling me I deserved "a happy birthday as much as anyone in this courtroom." I still have the note, and more importantly, still have the friend 54 years later.
1972 was the year of the shortened season and the ancient Tigers making the playoffs under Billy Martin. I can tell you exactly where I was when the third out in the ninth happened. It was the year of the Watergate break-in and I can tell you exactly where I was when I heard the news of it; possibly the last time my dad, brother and I drove to our family cottage together, as my brother left for college that fall. It was the year George Wallace was shot at a rally in Maryland, and the next day won both the Maryland and Michigan primaries. I also got my first serious girlfriend, with whom I'm also still close friends. I didn't follow the news as closely after that.
My ex had a theory that the brain has shelves to store memories. And once the shelves fill then to retain new memories something has to fall off the shelf. Seems to make sense.
BTW I think the American figure skater of note in '72, although not a gold medalist, was Janet Lynn
...... so much of this was like you were reading my own very long standing memories that are likewise rattling around in my cranium. The one thing about Johnny Bench winning that MVP in 72 [ after also winning it in 1970] is he beat the same guy twice--- Billy Williams of the Cubs was second in MVP voting both years. Funny that I can remember so much from the 1970s but I'd be hard-pressed to share so much of what was happening in the world for the first 10 years of my children's life. Funny story: about 10 years ago, I met Jody Gerut, who was the AL Sporting News Ra
ookie of rhe Year when my twin kids were infants..... I only vaguely had heard his name before and certainly didn't know he was part of a pantheon that includes Mike Hargrove and Chris Chambliss and Al.Bumbry and Bake McBride and Carl Morton and Jim Lefebvre and John Montefusco and Fred Lynn ....and, well you get the idea 😀. When we're 10 and have fewer cares in the world, these lists are so much easier to commit to memory.
I do think a major difference between Now and Then is that there used to be a certain premium placed on knowing stuff like this. We all had a buddy who knew the Cy Young winners each year, or the Best Picture winners, or the #1 singles. To be fair, they tended to be different people, not all of us were lucky enough to have a Poz. But between you and your friends, you kept alive the sacred pop culture knowledge.
But Now we all have a tiny, powerful computer in our pocket. There's no need to know this stuff because you can look it up whenever you want. And by having the information always there, no one knows it anymore. Why would you need to?
Here's something funny. I just got in from a walk and hadn't yet read today's post. My headphones died with about 2 miles left to go, so I was alone in my thoughts. Wondered how many more times this winter (it's chilly on Long Island today) I'd wear the knit hat I got for the MilanoCortina games, and with that, started to recall all the places that have hosted the Winter Olympics. I got back as far as Cortina in 1956 though I couldnt remember 1964 (and I know 1932 is Lake Placid). The things we remember.
They hosted the second time because Denver, which had been awarded the games, had a failed vote to pay for it. So the IOC had to scramble to find a suitable venue (see also: the deterioration of the sliding venue at Torino so it couldn 't be recycled for Milan-Cortina.
Also didnt realize Germany got both Summer and Winter in 1936. So much has been written about those Summer games and Hitler and the Nazis but Ive never heard anything about the Winter games.
True, but LA and Lake Placid are 2500 miles apart. Much different than a smaller country like Germany hosting both. In Europe, 2500 miles is basically the distance from Lisbon to Moscow.
1972 was the year I discovered Baseball, though I didn't become a diehard until the next year. I was big into Football that year, though. I remember the Dolphin's undefeated season, the immaculate reception, and the fact that OJ Simpson was the biggest star. I was really rooting for Washington in the Super Bowl. (They were my NFC team as I discovered football while living in Virginia) and still feel they would have beaten the Dolphins if Sonny Jurgenson had not had a season ending injury.
But, not mentioned above, the first thing I remember from that year that is at least sports adjacent is the Munich Olympics and the Israeli hostages. In fact, this might have been the first news item I remember having my constant attention. (Other than the first Moon landing a few years earlier.)
Oddly, I remember a lot about heavyweight boxing. Frazier, Foreman, Ali. Boxing was very big then and was very accessible, with title fights often being on the Wide World of Sports.
Here's my question Joe...do you truly remember this stuff from when you were 5 in 1972, or do you just now know this stuff? Here's what I mean. I was 2 for most of 1972 as I didnt turn 3 til November, so I don't "remember" any of the stuff you mentioned. But of course somewhere along the way I learned the A's won the WS and the Dolphins were perfect and the 72 Games in Munich were tragic. And though I bleed orange and blue, the following year 3-year old me has no memory of the "Ya Gotta Believe" season in 1973, but like any good Mets fan, I know Yogi shouldn't have pitched Seaver on short rest in Game 6 of the World Series.
I was 13 in 1972 and I remember a heckuva lot about that year. My primary sports memories, however, are of Boston winning the Stanley Cup over the Rangers in six hard fought games. New York was playing somewhat shorthanded with Jean Ratelle attempting to play on one leg in the Final after breaking his ankle with 15 games left in the regular season. The Blueshirts would have had a very good shot at winning that series with #19 at 100%. I love the Bruins but that Rangers team was fantastic and I wouldn’t have been too distraught if they would have won.
My football memories are of disappointment. After the 1971 season the Vikings traded for Fran Tarkenton to almost guarantee the Purple People Eaters a spot in the Super Bowl. All the team needed was a competent QB and they got a great one. Minnesota then proceeded to have one of those seasons where almost everything that could go wrong did and they finished 7-7.
One of my favorite memories is being called down to the junior high gymnasium for a pep rally in the late fall of 1979, when I was in 8th grade. A couple of athletes gave a talk about an upcoming sporting event. I had no idea who these guys were. They had memorabilia from teams they had played in the previous months. The whole school was there. A few weeks later they won the gold medal in Lake Placid. The players had been Jack O'Callahan and Jim Craig. Craig was from the same town and had gone to that junior high, and had played for the high school I later went to, before playing for Boston University.
It’s amazing how many different memories we all have. I agree that we seem to get rid of a few from time to time. It makes the random ones that much more delightful to remember.
One is that Linda Fratianne won the silver in figure skating in 1980. I met her a few years ago before I was scorekeeping a hockey game in El Segundo. She was coaching a 10 year old. Very nice lady. I was able to not be a total fanboy about it. Although maybe I should have.
As most non-Australian top players of that era, Billie Jean King played the AO sparingly, and after winning it in '68, handing Court her only loss in 12 AO finals, and losing a rematch final the next year, she didn't get back there until 1982.
So yeah, she went 3/3 in 1972, winning her only RG title, where she also played only twice in that decade.
It's "The First Time Ever I Saw Your Face," and yes, it was the No. 1 song of 1972. One of my all-time favorites, but I digress. ("American Pie" was No. 3.)
'72 spanned my freshman and sophomore years of college, so the vast majority of my memories are tied to that. But I also do remember everything in the column. The presidential election was the first one I could (and did) vote in.
I also have a head full of random and useless information -- although in my working days as a news copy editor it was actually very useful!
1972 - Close to the Edge album by Yes.... 'Seasons will pass you by, i get up, i get down!' (refrain).
Steve Carlton won 27 games for a 59 win Phillies team. And I got married.
1972. My junior year of high school.
The year the Rolling Stones released Exile on Main Street, the same month Neil Young debuted Harvest, and David Bowie gave us The Rise and Fall of Ziggy Stardust and the Spiders from Mars.
I was an “in-the-rotation” pitcher on my high school baseball team. There were no pitch counts; if you threw seven innings on a Monday, you could go seven again on Friday. Your coach had landed on Omaha Beach—who were you to tell him your arm hurt?
I devoured Watership Down, My Name Is Asher Lev, and Jim Bouton’s follow-up memoir, I’m Glad You Didn’t Take It Personally.
You could sit in the bleachers at Fenway—next to 5,000 guys named Sully—for $1.50. You still called your father “Sir,” even if you had long hair and thought Vietnam was ridiculous.
Kids died more often then—or so it seemed. Car accidents took five drivers, all 18 or under, in my hometown that year.
Some of your neighbors were Holocaust survivors, numbers tattooed on their forearms from Auschwitz.
Swordfish was $1.69 a pound at Wellesley Super. You could bring a five-dollar bill to the local theater and still get change after seeing The Godfather, Cabaret, or What’s Up, Doc?
Life felt secure.
Walter Cronkite told the truth each night on the CBS Evening News. Johnny Carson, egged on by Ed McMahon, joked about how cold it was outside. And you reveled in the latest sitcoms—MASH*, Sanford and Son, Bridget Loves Bernie.
What do we have left? Memories. As Paul Simon wrote:
"Time it was—and what a time it was.
A time of innocence. A time of confidences.
Long ago, it must be. I have a photograph.
Preserve your memories.
They’re all that’s left you."
I ran an online trivia game on AOL for 20 years called Flashback about a specific year each week. I probably did 1972 as often as any other year. It was the year I turned 16 so personal memories are pretty strong, like sitting in the courtroom for our mandatory traffic court viewing in driver's ed and my dear friend Jody sending me a note telling me I deserved "a happy birthday as much as anyone in this courtroom." I still have the note, and more importantly, still have the friend 54 years later.
1972 was the year of the shortened season and the ancient Tigers making the playoffs under Billy Martin. I can tell you exactly where I was when the third out in the ninth happened. It was the year of the Watergate break-in and I can tell you exactly where I was when I heard the news of it; possibly the last time my dad, brother and I drove to our family cottage together, as my brother left for college that fall. It was the year George Wallace was shot at a rally in Maryland, and the next day won both the Maryland and Michigan primaries. I also got my first serious girlfriend, with whom I'm also still close friends. I didn't follow the news as closely after that.
I remember 99% of this and am actually
pretty amazed by 1972.
Thank you Joe!
My ex had a theory that the brain has shelves to store memories. And once the shelves fill then to retain new memories something has to fall off the shelf. Seems to make sense.
BTW I think the American figure skater of note in '72, although not a gold medalist, was Janet Lynn
My dad always said it was like a filing cabinet and once it filled up you had to remove old stuff to make room for the new.
...... so much of this was like you were reading my own very long standing memories that are likewise rattling around in my cranium. The one thing about Johnny Bench winning that MVP in 72 [ after also winning it in 1970] is he beat the same guy twice--- Billy Williams of the Cubs was second in MVP voting both years. Funny that I can remember so much from the 1970s but I'd be hard-pressed to share so much of what was happening in the world for the first 10 years of my children's life. Funny story: about 10 years ago, I met Jody Gerut, who was the AL Sporting News Ra
ookie of rhe Year when my twin kids were infants..... I only vaguely had heard his name before and certainly didn't know he was part of a pantheon that includes Mike Hargrove and Chris Chambliss and Al.Bumbry and Bake McBride and Carl Morton and Jim Lefebvre and John Montefusco and Fred Lynn ....and, well you get the idea 😀. When we're 10 and have fewer cares in the world, these lists are so much easier to commit to memory.
I do think a major difference between Now and Then is that there used to be a certain premium placed on knowing stuff like this. We all had a buddy who knew the Cy Young winners each year, or the Best Picture winners, or the #1 singles. To be fair, they tended to be different people, not all of us were lucky enough to have a Poz. But between you and your friends, you kept alive the sacred pop culture knowledge.
But Now we all have a tiny, powerful computer in our pocket. There's no need to know this stuff because you can look it up whenever you want. And by having the information always there, no one knows it anymore. Why would you need to?
Unless you use AI, then you the certainty of the answer can be iffy.
Here's something funny. I just got in from a walk and hadn't yet read today's post. My headphones died with about 2 miles left to go, so I was alone in my thoughts. Wondered how many more times this winter (it's chilly on Long Island today) I'd wear the knit hat I got for the MilanoCortina games, and with that, started to recall all the places that have hosted the Winter Olympics. I got back as far as Cortina in 1956 though I couldnt remember 1964 (and I know 1932 is Lake Placid). The things we remember.
Innsbruck 1.0
Had no idea they hosted twice.
Yeah. And in close proximity. Only Grenoble and Sapporo in between.
They hosted the second time because Denver, which had been awarded the games, had a failed vote to pay for it. So the IOC had to scramble to find a suitable venue (see also: the deterioration of the sliding venue at Torino so it couldn 't be recycled for Milan-Cortina.
Also didnt realize Germany got both Summer and Winter in 1936. So much has been written about those Summer games and Hitler and the Nazis but Ive never heard anything about the Winter games.
And 4 years before, the US had both games. Must've seemed less controversial than we'd consider it now.
True, but LA and Lake Placid are 2500 miles apart. Much different than a smaller country like Germany hosting both. In Europe, 2500 miles is basically the distance from Lisbon to Moscow.
1972 was the year I discovered Baseball, though I didn't become a diehard until the next year. I was big into Football that year, though. I remember the Dolphin's undefeated season, the immaculate reception, and the fact that OJ Simpson was the biggest star. I was really rooting for Washington in the Super Bowl. (They were my NFC team as I discovered football while living in Virginia) and still feel they would have beaten the Dolphins if Sonny Jurgenson had not had a season ending injury.
But, not mentioned above, the first thing I remember from that year that is at least sports adjacent is the Munich Olympics and the Israeli hostages. In fact, this might have been the first news item I remember having my constant attention. (Other than the first Moon landing a few years earlier.)
Oddly, I remember a lot about heavyweight boxing. Frazier, Foreman, Ali. Boxing was very big then and was very accessible, with title fights often being on the Wide World of Sports.
Here's my question Joe...do you truly remember this stuff from when you were 5 in 1972, or do you just now know this stuff? Here's what I mean. I was 2 for most of 1972 as I didnt turn 3 til November, so I don't "remember" any of the stuff you mentioned. But of course somewhere along the way I learned the A's won the WS and the Dolphins were perfect and the 72 Games in Munich were tragic. And though I bleed orange and blue, the following year 3-year old me has no memory of the "Ya Gotta Believe" season in 1973, but like any good Mets fan, I know Yogi shouldn't have pitched Seaver on short rest in Game 6 of the World Series.
I was 13 in 1972 and I remember a heckuva lot about that year. My primary sports memories, however, are of Boston winning the Stanley Cup over the Rangers in six hard fought games. New York was playing somewhat shorthanded with Jean Ratelle attempting to play on one leg in the Final after breaking his ankle with 15 games left in the regular season. The Blueshirts would have had a very good shot at winning that series with #19 at 100%. I love the Bruins but that Rangers team was fantastic and I wouldn’t have been too distraught if they would have won.
My football memories are of disappointment. After the 1971 season the Vikings traded for Fran Tarkenton to almost guarantee the Purple People Eaters a spot in the Super Bowl. All the team needed was a competent QB and they got a great one. Minnesota then proceeded to have one of those seasons where almost everything that could go wrong did and they finished 7-7.
One of my favorite memories is being called down to the junior high gymnasium for a pep rally in the late fall of 1979, when I was in 8th grade. A couple of athletes gave a talk about an upcoming sporting event. I had no idea who these guys were. They had memorabilia from teams they had played in the previous months. The whole school was there. A few weeks later they won the gold medal in Lake Placid. The players had been Jack O'Callahan and Jim Craig. Craig was from the same town and had gone to that junior high, and had played for the high school I later went to, before playing for Boston University.
It’s amazing how many different memories we all have. I agree that we seem to get rid of a few from time to time. It makes the random ones that much more delightful to remember.
One is that Linda Fratianne won the silver in figure skating in 1980. I met her a few years ago before I was scorekeeping a hockey game in El Segundo. She was coaching a 10 year old. Very nice lady. I was able to not be a total fanboy about it. Although maybe I should have.
As most non-Australian top players of that era, Billie Jean King played the AO sparingly, and after winning it in '68, handing Court her only loss in 12 AO finals, and losing a rematch final the next year, she didn't get back there until 1982.
So yeah, she went 3/3 in 1972, winning her only RG title, where she also played only twice in that decade.