My son-in-law's dad would just drop his wife off at the hospital! He was a loving man (and an excellent dad), but she could handle it and he had work to do (ND farmer). I think it's funny. Men were men at one time.

My husband watched from outside the delivery room (late '70's) and to tell the truth, by that point I didn't care where the hell he was-just get this over with.

When I was born, my dad was conducting an office pool concerning the time of birth and the sex of his second (and last) offspring.

I, however, made sure that I was present at the births of all four of my kids, and I plan to be on hand later this year for number five. My wife was glad that I was around for the birth because after nine months, she wanted someone else to carry the kid around. It was a great feeling, to hold on to the newborn baby, the first three times.

The fourth one was a bit disappointing because the hospital ladies snatched her right out of the birth canal, injected her with some kind of syringe, and stuck her in a glass box. My wife though that the shot was Vitamin K, but I insisted that it must have been some kind of microscopic chip implant that will allow the government to track her movements for the rest of her life.

Hey, it could happen.

Just going with a hunch here, Colleen. Was your child born June 6?

Also, was "Carmina Burana" playing on the delivery room muzak?

No reason.

We have a family photo of my mom in the hospital holding my newborn eldest brother, and to her left on the endtable clear as day...an ashtray. Gotta love the 1950s!

My birth actually made the newspaper. I was born at Glenwood Hills Hospital (which later turned into a "home for the mentally challenged and/or incompetent, and then got bulldozed over and is now a development of $750K+ homes all tightly packed together). My birth was the first one at that hospital where the father was in the delivery room. And there is a picture of him sitting in a waiting room chair, lounged back, hand cradling his head with a cigarette between his fingers, and the caption reads "Man am I tired after that!" (or something to that effect).

And I look back to the births of my 2 kids and how I was immediately afterwards, and I'm thinking "just wtf was so difficult about what YOU had to do back then, Dad??" I was born at 6 PM so it wasn't like he had to get up in the middle of the night for it.

I enjoy reading your blog. KyleX

I too, along with the Gladstone Hotel in Jamestown, died on March 27, 1968. I was the 1st man in space, but unfortunatly, I crashed a MIG-15 on a routine flight to Kirzhach, on this date.