Born in 1958

If you were born in 1958, Australia was tanning itself nicely in the Menzies sunshine. The economy was reliable, immigration was filling the cities with new energies and new cuisines, and the television had thoroughly colonised the lounge room. The afternoon serial and the evening news were essential.

Children had *Adventure Island* and *The Argonauts*, and parents argued about whether too much television was bad for the kids — a version of an argument that would run for the next sixty years without resolution. Pop music was arriving in earnest: Johnny O'Keefe — "The Wild One" — was the homegrown answer to Elvis, and when he performed on TV it made the girls scream, which shocked and delighted people in equal measure. The local dance was a major social institution, and the boys on one side and girls on the other was the geography of a thousand suburban youth clubs across the country.

Surf culture was beginning to stir along the east coast — the longboard, the boardshorts, the particular freedom of the beach. You could still get a pie and sauce from the canteen at the football for a shilling, and the train out to the ground on a Saturday arvo was an experience in itself — packed, noisy, smelling of cigarettes and meat pies. The country was growing, changing, and pleasantly sure of itself.