How old are you?

[Bravo52]

Lots of people I talk to say that, but I'm the only one who remembers the picture was upside down for the first 15 minutes or so.

I didn't watch it on TV. I was on the side of a road near Indian River and Titusville.

 

[rfjustin]

40

 

[MikeT]

Turned 70 last July , still very active.

 

[samb]

Born a month before Sputnik went up ! But on the range I'm still the kid in my avatar pic.

 

[John Kemker]

About to turn 61 in February. Celebrated my 52nd year of rocketry this last Christmas.

 

[prfesser]

Not too far past Social Security age...

Back in the Land Of Ago motors came in thick-walled blue tubes, and Estes had a nose cone made for the mailing tube so that cheapskates like me could build a rocket from them. Motors had cardboard retainers for the ejection charge; the pressed clay came a few years later. No C motors yet, and when they did come out it was just the C.8-0 booster motor. I think they were still using thick-walled casings so there just wasn't room for a delay or ejection charge. The ".8" meant they were still using the SMS (stupid 'murican system ) with average thrust in pounds. The B3-0 was the booster of choice for heavy rockets.

My parents were a bit miffed when they found out that the rocket motors couldn't be reused. After all they were a WHOLE DOLLAR for just three flights!

 

[G's Monster Rocket]

I'm 71 and remember there were 4 channels on TV, all B&W, at night there was sign-off and all 4 channels went to test pattern until morning. No remote, no color, rabbit ear antenna. Kids actually went outside to play without parental supervision. It was a safe time, for a while.

 

[ghostfather]

Of enough to remember the transition from black and white TV to color TV.

My first memory of watching television was the funeral of JFK (in B/W).
I remember it because I was upset that my usual cartoons weren't on, and it was just boring pictures of a casket on a train. I was about 4

 

[loujoe]

62

 

[ksaves2]

I'm 71 and remember there were 4 channels on TV, all B&W, at night there was sign-off and all 4 channels went to test pattern until morning. No remote, no color, rabbit ear antenna. Kids actually went outside to play without parental supervision. It was a safe time, for a while.

Yeah I remember that. My dad installed a 60 foot tower with a whip antenna at our house in Wheaton, Illinois for a radio relay to the pickup and delivery cars for his business. Was duly licensed by the FCC. Used a leased phone line from the business to the house to use the radio. Dad told me the house was at a higher land elevation than the business hence he went that route to get more range out of the system. I believe the radio frequency was in the 27mhz range, leased from the FCC and was shared with a few other parties. I was taught radio courtesy at a very young age not to interrupt communications from the other parties and wait until the channel was cleared before transmitting. It was mainly for pick up and delivery services and dispatching folks like plumbers/workers to jobs. Cell phones eventually killed the need for that.

One advantage to the tower was dad put a big mother Wineguard T.V. antenna up there with an antenna rotator. Could point the antenna towards Rockford, Illinois and receive home Chicago Bears football games in the 1960's. The Bears did local T.V. blackouts in the Chicago area to "encourage" people to attend the games! The Bears couldn't fill Soldier's Field back then so they took that desperate local "blackout" measure. Deal is Rockford was considered "too far" from Chicago for people to travel to the game so local coverage for the home Bear's games was allowed there. Dad would point the antenna towards Rockford and invite the local neighbors (mainly men and boys) to watch the games on a Rockford station. Those were fun times. Especially when Gale Sayers made a long dash or Dick Butkus sacked a quarterback.

 

[ksaves2]

My first memory of watching television was the funeral of JFK (in B/W).
I remember it because I was upset that my usual cartoons weren't on, and it was just boring pictures of a casket on a train. I was about 4

Sheeoot! You too? I was in second grade and I was as upset that the cartoons weren't on and just the funeral procession!!

 

[Cl(VII)]

44, but I don't feel a day over 137.

 

[eugenefl]

46, but haven't matured past about 19. I discovered rocketry late in December of 1989, but got my first kit/set in 1990. I found TRF sometime in 2001 when vBulletins were popping up all over the place just after exiting the Air Force. For a brief period of time the original owners of TRF entrusted me to the forums. I am glad to see the site/forum still alive and well. I have had a recent resurgence of interest to build and finish models. The commercial space race also keeps things interesting.

 

[jqavins]

I find it remarkable that the poll results are monotonic. Not just skewed old, but every age category has more respondents than the one below it.

Trying to see the makeup of this forum and hobby in general, age is just a number, but, as most of the older generation knows, life sort of compounds itself into stages, not unlike rocketry and hobbies in general.

Do keep in mind that you're getting answers from a self-selected group. Those who are TRF members and chose to respond likely don't represent the hobby as a whole. In my club, while I haven't taken a pole, by appearance I'd guess that our peak is somewhere from 40 to 60, and we do have a couple of active young flyers.

Comparing my club's membership, and attendees at our annual regional event (NY Power), the hobby as a whole is majority male, but the forum participants are even more dominantly so, which goes to show the effect of self-selection. Maybe.

UPDATE: 3½ hours later, the 18-24 group has overtaken the 25-30 group.

 

[Paul Howard]

Funny, Slalom-Skateboarding is mostly older skateboarders as well - but that's partly because 1993 Jake Phelps took over Thrasher Magazine until his (fortunate for the rest of us) death around 2021. Phelps put the magazine into the dirt-bag red-zone by promoting underage smoking, drinking, buzzing, and Banning Slalom, "Real" Downhill (full face helmets, full body leathers, slide gloves, pack racing and good sportsmanship), longboards, pure flatland freestyle, and especially Banning ALL Helmets, Pads, Wrist-guards, etc. It was all to make money off of toxic-machismo badass-wannabe-ism and unfortunately trying to redirect that culture post-mortem of Phelps is indeed a hard thing to do. And as a result, most skateboarders now don't even know about Slalom or "Real" downhill, anything done on longboards, etc since the magazine still won't show it. I quit my subscription around 1995 when I saw where the magazine was taking things.

Also, the really good Slalom and Downhill equipment is soooo much better (the trucks are machined, not cast just to mention one aspect), it's priced itself out of most younger skater's budgets.

Then there's the world of Flying Model Aircraft -RC, Freeflight, powered, gliders, etc: It's mostly older members who make up the AMA membership (and very male, very white - I don't think that's due to racist or sexist exclusionary intent, it's just how it worked out) whereas Rocketry is much more age, sex and racially diverse which is refreshing to see.

Yes, I'm still racing at 61 (Grand Masters Division), I helped put on and raced (and raced well! especially for having plantar fasciatis in my Right foot) The World Championship of Skateboard Slalom practically in my own backyard this Sept/Oct 2023 in Salem Oregon and it was AWESOME!!!! 3 days of racing Tight, General and Giant slalom. And most of us putting it on are in the "older half" of the crowd.

That's my 4 centavos -PTH

 

[KenECoyote]

Looking at an Estes catalog, I would've never guessed these age demographics!

Edit: removed my personal spin lol

 

[AcadiaRockets]

I was born AFTER the moon landing but BEFORE the LAST Apollo mission.

 

[jqavins]

Looking at an Estes catalog, I would've never guessed these age demographics!

I was in Advertising for a while and definitely understand the politics (and fully promote trying to gain younger audiences!); however, I graduated with a Marketing degree and believe more in correct representation (and recognition) of your main customers.

Just my 2c and note that I am not in the majority customer profile in that regard.

That makes sense. I don't often see children holding or flying or building high power rockets in the catalogs (web sites) of companies like LOC.

 

[jqavins]

I was born AFTER the moon landing but BEFORE the LAST Apollo mission.

I was born before the first moon landing, but not long enough before to have any but the vaguest memory of it (I was 5½).

 

[K'Tesh]

Old enough to generally know better... Young enough not to care.

 

[ZEDL1]

I'm 66 years of age, but my wife says a act like a 20-30- something a lot. I take that as a compliment...
I started building and flying Estes rockets in 1967, at the age of 10.

 

[kuririn]

Our TV was black and white. But that was ok, because most of the shows were in B/W. Took forever to convince dad to get a color one.

I'm so old that I remember when rainbows were black and white.

 

[OverTheTop]

61.384, but my brain also late 20's or thereabouts. Check Engine light coming on more often than I would like.

 

[gdjsky01]

I'm 64. 65 in Feb. I watched many Gemini and all the Apollo missions. My first rocket was an Orbital Transport (yep. I went straight in over my head). First computer was my Dad's TRS-80 Model 1, my first Atari 800.

 

[jqavins]

61.384, but my brain also late 20's or thereabouts. Check Engine light coming on more often than I would like.

21,936 days. (Approximately 60.059 years, based on the full calendar cycle average year of 365.2425 days.)

 

[Ronz Rocketz]

This is an issue I’ve been thinking about. Most of the innovators and leaders in the model rocket industry are well into their 60s. That’s a huge knowledge base about to retire to Palm Springs. Who will be the industry leaders in 10 or 20 years? I’m doing my best to influence the youts. Bill said it best.



I always wondered what Bill said offline, maybe about the E12s?

 

[rcktnut]

68- As a baby boomer I enjoyed model rockets more than any other "toy" at that time. It sure beat making a parachute out of a baggie and taping it to a green plastic soldier and throwing it up in the air. It was more fun than putting lips and ears on Mr. Potatoe head, or scribbling on an Etch A Sketch Digging in the dirt with my yellow metal Nylint shovel crane was sorta fun. A close second to model rockets was my cox .049 powered control line P51 Mustang. Had fun starting and running it for a few months before flying it. The day I decided to fly it, it lasted maybe 30 seconds at most before a rapid disassembly occurred.

 

[r1dermon]

Just as an aside, there was a show in 2003 on discovery channel called "rocket challenge", and it was about "Aurora", which was launched at LDRS 22 in Argonia, KS. I was 17 or 18 at the time and that is what started me in anything bigger than an Estes. Before you knew it I was certified and buying BSD, Binder, LOC kits and Aerotech SU motors and hardware for reloads. Back then there was a hobby shop close to me that always stocked F and G motors from Aerotech and if that hobby shop had bigger stuff available you can be sure I'd be buying it. Now I can't find a decent hobby shop let alone an Aerotech single use motor on the wall of one. Just some ways the hobby seems to have shrunk in it's reach in 20 years time.

 

[AtlPhilip]

no surprise there, I think that applies to most hobbies.

Yes, but. Geeks like us were often into hobbies that were big in the 80s. Rockets, Arcade Machines, etc. And now we're the grey haired hobby mafia!

Double nickel here.

 

[DaveRKP]

I'm old enough to have a copy of this from my early days... One of many treasures in my binder from the 60s which has NAR and Estes iron-on patches on front and back. Didn't get Vern's signature though until 2021 at NARAM-62.