The baby boomers and postwar suburbia remain a touchstone. For many, there is a belief that it has never been as good for youngsters and their families, as it was in the postwar years. Boom Kids explores the triumphs and challenges of childhood and adolescence in Calgary’s postwar suburbs.
The boomers’ impact on fifties and sixties Canadian life is unchallenged; social and cultural changes were made to meet their needs and desires. While time has passed, this era stands still in time—viewed as an idyllic period when great hopes and relative prosperity went hand in hand for all.
Boom Kids is organized thematically, with chapters focusing on: suburban spaces; the Cold War and its impact on young people; ethnicity, “race,” and work; the importance of play and recreation; children’s bodies, health and sexuality; and "the night," resistances and delinquency. Reinforced throughout this manuscript is the fact that children and adolescents were not only affected by their suburban experiences, but that they influenced the adult world in which they lived.
Oral histories from former community members and archival materials, including school-based publications, form the backbone for a study that demonstrates that suburban life was diverse and filled with rich experiences for youngsters.

James A. Onusko is a permanent faculty member at Northern Lakes College. He researches the history of children and youth and post-Confederation Canadian history. He has published peer-reviewed journal articles and the public history book Ontario’s Soldiers’ Aid Commission: 100 Years of Assistance to Veterans in Need, 1915-2015.

James A. Onusko's profile page

Even as the boomer generation is beginning to 'age out', their impact on Canadian culture and politics is still influencing events today. An impressively informative and meticulously presented cultural history, "Boom Kids: Growing Up in the Calgary Suburbs, 1950-1970" is especially and unreservedly recommended for community, college, and library 20th Century Canadian Cultural History collections and supplemental curriculum studies lists.

Margaret Lane's Bookshelf, Midwest Book Review

“In focusing on age as a category of analysis, the author has unearthed some very interesting material regarding, for example, the impact of the Second World War on the psyche of young baby boomers, the anxieties created by the Cold War, play and suburban space, and nighttime activities. There are still few histories of childhood in Canada, and with Boom Kids, Onusko makes a significant contribution to the field, especially through the author’s use of oral history.”

Catherine Gidney, author of Captive Audience: How Corporations Invaded Our Schools (2019)

Considering the politicized tensions between nostalgic and critical views of postwar suburbia, Onusko’s use of oral histories, and his explicit discussion of nostalgia and memory, are particularly important. Drawing on these oral histories and archival materials, he respects children’s voices and sense of agency, asking how “children and adolescents influenced suburbia, just as it shaped them.” Such attention to children’s experiences from their own perspectives has often been lacking in the historiography of suburbia.

Erin Gallagher-Cohoon, The Journal of the History of Childhood and Youth

“This work, grounded in rich evidence, makes a significant and unique contribution to the field of childhood studies and the history of the relations and concepts of children. I particularly enjoyed Onusko’s final chapter ‘Things That Go Bump in the Night,’ which offers fresh content and analysis on the intriguing relationship between childhood and the night but also rings true to me as a child growing up in the late 1960s and early 1970s.”

Christopher Greig, author of Ontario Boys: Masculinity and the Idea of Boyhood in Postwar Ontario, 1945—1960 (WLU Press, 2014)

[Boom Kids] especially comes to life when we hear from the Banff Trail baby boomers themselves. Their memories and anecdotes reveal important insights into gender and class, changing sexual mores, and the challenges and limitations that came with living in a largely white suburban postwar monoculture.

M.C. Reid, Canada's History