By William Hirsch

    My childhood was basically the late 40’s and 50’s . . . I grew up in Parma in what was then a sparsely populated area. I remember camping with my father, a scoutmaster, in a field which is now where Parmatown Shopping Center stands.
     I can’t think of anyone in particular who has made an impact on the world or myself in my lifetime but I can recall a few events in my childhood that affected me deeply. On several occasions, sirens signaled practice drills for a nuclear alert and my mother yelled at me to come in the house -- and, of course, I didn’t understand why. (This was the time of the cold war.)
    On a visit to some of my grandmother’s relatives in a small town in Pennsylvania, I was lead through the garage into a room, underground, with assorted canned goods and what I assumed to be camping equipment. Slowly, I came to realize what all this meant -- that our lives could end without notice.
    I feel very fortunate to have been born at a time when major advances in medicine were being made. Polio at this time was still a household word, and I remember my parents taking me to the school for our sugar cubes. I didn’t understand what this was all about until I saw a girl with braces on her legs.
    Another impact in my life was when I was nine years old and on a trip through the South with my parents. At this time there were no freeways and segregation was something I had never heard of. We drove through roads and backroads through large towns and small; therefore, I got to see everything as it really was. There were men in stripes on chain gangs working on the sides of the roads which was something I had never seen, as well as the signs at different establishments that said “white only” or “no Negroes.”
    In 1951, my parents purchased a cottage in what is now Gloria Glens in Chippewa. Major freeways such as I-71 were as yet not built, so the commute each weekend during the summer seemed to take forever. As Parma quickly developed and populated I understood why my father chose to buy the cottage, and I fell in love again with the open spaces of Medina County.
    In 1968, I was due to be drafted into the armed forces, therefore I enlisted in the U.S. Navy and became an electronics technician. The Vietnam war was at its peak and I served an extended tour in Vietnam from 1969-71. It was an experience that definitely changed my life as it was with so many others who served during that time.
    Some of the equipment that we worked on still had vacuum tubes. Now, the size of a vacuum tube could contain a small computer and accomplish thousands of things more. Electronic technology, in my opinion, has by far made the greatest impact on us. This is sometimes good and bad because I feel we sometimes know more than we need to. Sometimes others know more about us than they need to.
    In 1978 I purchased a home in Harrisville Township, again seeking the open spaces that Medina County had to offer. However, society has been rapidly encroaching on the openness, as more family farmers have been selling out to developers. What used to be an occasional parade of Amish buggies and tractors has turned into a constant stream of vehicles up and down our country road.         
    Although my wife loves having a wide variety of stores within 15 miles, I feel a little sad when I look at the night sky and see a yellow glow where there was once blackness and stars. Rapidly, we are losing that small town quality of life.
    Editor’s Note: William Hirsch was born in Parma in 1948 and is a retired Ford worker. He has lived in Harrisville Township outside of Lodi for 22 years.