Born in 1946

If you were born in 1946, you were among the very first of what would later be called the Baby Boom—though nobody was using that term yet. What they were doing was building: new houses out in the new subdivisions going up on the old farm fields, new Frigidaires and Bendix washers filling the kitchens, new babies arriving at a rate that astonished even the hospitals. The returning GIs were enrolling in college on the new GI Bill in record numbers, sitting in lecture halls still in their canvas duffel bags.

Prices were jumping—inflation was the word of the year—and a wave of strikes rolled through the auto plants and the steel mills. But the mood was fundamentally optimistic. Frank Sinatra and Bing Crosby were on the radio, and you might catch a baseball game on one of the 6,000 TV sets in the entire country—though most Americans still gathered round the radio for the World Series.

The Cardinals beat the Red Sox in seven games, and Ted Williams was back from the Navy swinging that sweet left-handed stroke. It's a Wonderful Life opened at Christmas—a little too dark for some, a comfort to others—and downtown the department stores had their windows full of real goods again, no more "temporarily out of stock" signs. The country felt like a man who'd sprinted a marathon, catching his breath, patching his shoes, and looking ahead with clear eyes.