Older Adults Are Sharing The Jobs That Were Everywhere When They Were Growing Up That Have Since Vanished In 2024
It's inevitable that with the advancement of technology, certain jobs slowly become irrelevant over the years. Recently, redditor tshirtguy2000 asked older adults of the r/AskOldPeople community to share the jobs that vanished in their lifetime. Here are a few of the careers they shared that were once popular but have faded over time.
1."Telephone operators."
"My mom was an operator for decades! She went from the switchboard to early computers (the mainframe took up an entire floor, and you could walk around inside it)."
2."Paperboy."
"The sound of the paper hitting the porch used to gently wake me up every morning."
3."Fotomat attendant."
"I loved this job during college! Once you sorted your envelopes, you could do your homework; they didn't mind. Also, they would relocate you anywhere you wanted; they were everywhere. In my area, they all become locksmith shops."
4."Gas station attendant who pumps your gas for you, washes the windshield, checks your fluids, and performs minor repairs (i.e., brake lamps, headlamps, belts, batteries, etc.) I was one, and it was hectic at times but, overall, a fun job."
"Not in New Jersey or Oregon."
5."Today, it's hard to believe there was a need for elevator operators, but they weren't always automated. I remember growing up in the '50s, and when few buildings in our town had elevators, there was always an operator. A New York City operator strike in the '40s led manufacturers to create the elevators we have today."
6."Secretary. In the '80s and even early '90s, every middle manager and up had a secretary to coordinate their schedule, type all sorts of things up, take their calls and messages, and often literally 'guard' their door as they were generally stationed right outside their office. There were tons of them, and they were always women. I had a shared one when I started my first corporate job as a junior individual contributor 'manager' in the '90s. Administrative assistants these days seem more reserved for executives and serve as general-purpose personal assistants doing what secretaries once did and more. There are far fewer of them."
7."Toll collectors. There used to be manned booths on the Pennsylvania Turnpike, but they've completely disappeared."
"You just took me back. I remember us digging around in the car for change to throw into the container as we went through the tollbooth."
8."Fuller Brush man."
"I sold Fuller Brush door-to-door while in junior high, probably around '69 or '70. I made pretty good money as a kid."
9."VCR repair tech."
"They came and went during my lifetime. Although, to be fair, there's still a shop on the north side of town that will work on old VCRs, among other electronics."
10."I miss the fruit and vegetable trucks that slowly cruised neighborhoods in the summer with the dial and basket scale hanging off the back and the driver yelling, 'Apples! Bananas! Potatoes! Come and get 'em!'"
"We had a seafood truck on Fridays come around. It was a very Catholic neighborhood."
11."When I was very young, I remember the ice man bringing blocks of ice to our house for refrigeration. I was probably about four years old when we got an electric refrigerator."
12."TV repairman."
"My uncle was a TV repairman for many years. After he passed, we cleaned out his house, and he had scores of vacuum tubes and repair manuals."
13."Printing press operators."
"As well as a slew of supporting jobs in the industry — typesetters, comp graphic operators, paste-up artists, process camera operators, scanners and Scitex operators, film etchers, strippers, plate makers, proofers, paper loaders, collators, and bindery workers."
14."It's not dead yet, but COVID took out the dry cleaning business pretty hard. We used to have a van going door to door with people's dry cleaning, but remote work killed that job."
15."My first job was in the mail room of a large company. I'm pretty sure that job has disappeared."
"Mail rooms exist, but the widespread adoption of email completely killed the concept of intra-office mail. People forget CC and BCC used to mean something!"
16."Phone book delivery. I remember those big, thick things being dropped on our doorstep."
"I was still receiving them up until about 10 years ago. I haven't had a landline in 25 years, so I'm not sure why I got one. Glad they finally stopped, I always threw them straight into the recycle bin."
17."Going but not gone: we have a milkman who delivers up to twice a week. They come by every two weeks, delivering to the milk box by our door. It's a luxury but worth it."
18."Y2K programmer. There were people who would travel to different companies and rework all of their software so that they would still work after January 1, 2000. They did a great job and hopefully made a great deal of money, but after that, they had to go back to regular programming."
19."Travel agents. I never hear anything about them."
"They are still around. They offer many package tours, which are hard to put together on your own, especially when multiple people are going. They are worth their weight in gold, IMO."
What jobs have vanished in your lifetime? Tell us in the comments or fill out this form to remain anonymous.
Note: Some responses have been edited for length and/or clarity.
