Popular Trends From The Swinging '60s That Are Incredibly Strange

Lava lamps were the type of thing that people either really loved or really hated. Although they are not as popular today as they were back then, lava lamps were a huge trend during the '60s, with thousands of households having at least one in the house. The world wasn’t ready for such a colorful decor, which was invented by Edward Craven Walker after he got the idea while watching an egg timer bubble on his stovetop. 

In the '60s, American households saw jelly sandwiches blooming at a pace that no one anticipated. The bold snack was usually made of two pieces of white bread, with a generous scoop of grape jelly mixed with a thick slice of very processed melted cheese, eaten grilled or toasted. While it might sound pretty unusual today, kids’ lunchboxes all over the country were filled with these delicious and squished jelly sandwiches back in the 60s. 

It’s basically impossible to forget that at some point in time, hair helmets were a thing and could be seen everywhere. Women would spend hours at their neighborhood hairdressers creating the incomparable hair helmet style that barely lasted more than two days intact. In the '60s, the concept of glamorous “big hair” became increasingly prominent, with crazy amounts of hair spray becoming an essential item in the fashion industry. 

Before social media and Netflix took over the world, families would often spend entire afternoons playing games with their family and friends outdoors. Some of these games were incredibly dangerous though, with dart related injuries being continuously reported to health authorities throughout the '60s and '70s. The games were so hazardous sometimes, that authorities saw no other option but to ban dart-related games in people’s lawns at the end of the 1980s.