Ask someone what they still own from the 1970s or 1980s, and the answers are rarely about money or collectibles. They’re about objects that refused to disappear.
Vinyl records come up first. Albums bought in the 70s are still played today, even as their owners swear every year they’ll finally digitize them. Boxes labeled “albums to convert” sit untouched, holding everything from Beatles and Monkees records to Glenn Miller reissues and even a fragile 78 RPM passed down from a parent. Technology keeps changing, but the ritual of lowering a needle hasn’t lost its pull.
Other survivors are stubbornly practical. Cast iron pots. Corelleware dishes in Harvest Gold patterns. Hot rollers from the 70s that still heat up just fine. A blow dryer from 1975 that finally died in a puff of smoke after nearly fifty years, mourned like an old friend.
Some items carry humor. A Pet Rock named Rocco, still “well behaved.” Others carry history: a 1981 Rolling Stones concert T shirt, a McGovern 1972 campaign shirt, or pottery covered in mushroom designs made around 1980, when mushrooms were everywhere and craft fairs mattered.
Then there are the things people regret throwing away. VHS and Betamax tapes discarded during a cleanup, only to discover later that colleagues desperately needed those recordings or documents for archives. What once felt like clutter turned out to be irreplaceable.
And sometimes, the answer isn’t an object at all. “My husband,” one person says. Married over 30 years. Still here.
What endures from the 70s and 80s isn’t just durability. It’s memory, identity, and the quiet refusal to let meaningful things be erased by time.