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“Tony Lee Dow (April 13, 1945 – July 27, 2022) was an American actor, film producer, director, and sculptor. He is best known for his role as Wally Cleaver in the television sitcom Leave It to Beaver from 1957 to 1963. From 1983 to 1989, Dow reprised his role as Wally in a television movie and in The New Leave It to Beaver.”
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Tony Dow is not a Baby Boomer. He caught the extreme tail end of the “Silent Generation.” Most historians and various researchers agree that the Baby Boom that created those wondrous, awesome, incredible Baby Boomers started in 1946 and ended in 1964. Alas, poor Wally. The Beav was a Boomer but you will never belong to our elite club; Generation Jones.
However . . . this is a case of “splitting hairs.” Wally (Tony Dow) is close enough in age to be a part of the Baby Boom cohort. He was required to carry a draft card that would have been available for burning at the upcoming anti-Vietnam protest and surely if some cute hippy chick flower-girl made the move on him he would have done his manly duty.
What Wally/Tony can never be, however, is that sub-set of the Boomers referred to as Generation Jones of which I am a proud non-card-carrying member since there are no damn Generation Jones cards that I am aware of.
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“Generation Jones is the social cohort of the latter half of the Baby boomer generation to the first years of Generation X. The term Generation Jones was first coined by the cultural commentator Jonathan Pontell, who identified the cohort as those born from 1954 to 1965 in the U.S., who were children during Watergate, the oil crisis, and stagflation rather than during the 1960s, but slightly before Gen X.”
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The early Jonsers were much closer in thought and attitude with the earlier Boomers than were the later Jonsers whose youth was further removed from the absolute craziness of the earlier Boomer period. Where a person lived had great effect upon Boomers as it does with every generation and every grouping as researchers and others label cohorts/herds of humans. My growing up in the San Francisco Bay Area had me in direct contact with ample weirdness that kinfolk living in a rural area of the middle less-crowded more isolated part of the USA never experienced. When we visited them yearly for a couple weeks the differences in lifestyle, ways of thinking and other formative aspects of growing up and living life in general was obvious to me.
So . . . Tony Dow can be considered one of the earliest Boomers. He made it to 77-years before departing this existence plane. Debates have been endless and relentless and still there is no definitive proof that any type of self-awareness continues after death. Well, no proof that meets my requirements for proof-positive no-doubt “It’s a fact Jack” certainty. There’s also no proof that there is not continued something. Looks like it’s a wait-and-see situation.
The Boomers are dying off. Slowly but there are no new replacements being made. Jerry Mathers, the Beaver, was born in 1948. If drafted he might have served in Vietnam around 1967 or so, the heart of the most vicious years of combat there.
This chart shows the number of USA troop in-country Vietnam deaths
| 1966 | 6,350 |
| 1967 | 11,363 |
| 1968 | 16,899 |
| 1969 | 11,780 |
| 1970 | 6,173 |
The Beaver was either smart or lucky or something else, depending on your personal viewpoint;
“Mathers is a former member of the 146th Airlift Wing, California Air National Guard, a.k.a. the “Hollywood Guard”, Van Nuys, California.”
It was difficult joining any “national guard” type unit during Vietnam. Common folks often tried but the spaces were quickly filed by those with the right connections or who were simply very lucky to find a rare open spot.
And so it goes . . .
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There is ample anti-Boomer sentiment on the Web:
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All good things come to an end. I am extremely grateful to have been young when I was. In the not-too-distant future, maybe sooner, maybe within seconds from now, nobody knows unless they are planning on performing the extreme life-altering deed and send themselves into oblivion, I shall follow Tony/Wally into whatever or whatever not lays ahead.
The great equalizer!!!
Remember, folks, the typical Baby Boomer is/was a nobody just like you. A commoner. Living in a land where an elite few with massive amounts of wealth control finances, corporations, industries of every type and even government at all levels. The voting charade keeps us calm and mostly sated. On the positive side at least we do not live in North Korea, Somalia or other cesspool of humanity.
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Disgruntled Old Coot 