To the older GLpers, can you remember when microwave ovens came out and what was people's reactions?

How many people have microwaves above their stove and use them while cooking?

Brain tumors rise, pre-cell phones!

I'm going to change my name to Paul Harvey. IIRC, the heating properties of microwaves were discovered by Navy elec techs when one was on deck while the radar on and it melted the choc bar in his pocket.
That may or may not be true.

Russians always had better sense about stuff like that.

Do you think that microwaving food makes it better? Wanna buy a bridge?

That's true.

A guy I worked with on the road was hungry one night.
Got a bag of chicken somewhere and went to heat it up.
He stuck it in the motel microwave, set it for ten minutes
and walked away.

It was no time and the fire department was there and we all had to evacuate. The bag had some kind of aluminum in it or metal of some sort. Smoked the whole place up for 2 freaking hours.

Yes I still don't own one never will

yes and they were big. I remember my folks getting their first one at jcpenny. It was $500 and it was huge. and yes lot s of buying special cookware made especially for the microwave, and lots of experimentation. I think the bacon tray ended up being the only thing that got much use.

I remember when the iPhone first came out my mate came to my house and I said that won’t catch on

My aunt was the first in the family to get one. She invited the entire family over for a chicken dinner that was cooked using only the microwave oven. It was disgusting and bland. The chicken was the worst part. The skin was rubbery and grey with yellow bits of scaly flesh at the end of the grey drumsticks near the bone.
She was so proud of it LOL as it only took her about an hour to prepare the whole meal.
I remember being disturbed thinking about eating food that was cooked with radiation also.

I was in 6th grade, and on the day before Thanksgiving at the Catholic school, we dressed as Indians and pilgrims and they had a bunch of Swanson turkey TV dinners that they were going to cook in a Microwave oven. It was the first time most of us had heard of one. I remember the peas and carrots were burnt and the metal foil divider trays were blackened. If the door had been see-through the nuns may have gotten a kick out watching all the arcing.

My parents had no interest in getting one - until after I moved away to college. Same with the VCR, and that nice new Toro lawnmower - big upgrade from that AMF junker.

I only use microwaves to reheat, never to cook with.

First microwave I ever saw was an Amana commercial radarrange on the Alaska ferry in 1969.

Heated a slice of apple pie in only 30 seconds. Nice!

Took another 25 years before we could afford our own, though I remember working in a building where they held a "cooking class" for poor people who owned microwaves. I must have been even more poor, because I couldn't afford one!

my mom got me my first one for a birthday present (mid 80) my kids used it to heat water, pop corn, make coco and reheat pizza ... and that's about all I have ever used it for, but I don't heat water in it any more (daughter gifted me a hot-pot) but I do use it daily, to I heat my coffee because it comes out of the pot warm - cold when you add cream ... on a rare occasion, I will use it to defrost (no heat) I really hate what it does to the texture of food ... but I love how it heats a frozen roll in ten seconds - or a piece of apple pie in 15 ... I like to mike icecream too ... 10 seconds HA

but I do all my real cooking in or on a gas stove ... I don't plan on replacing the micro waver, when it krapps out... been looking at convection oven for small meals in a smaller - more economical oven

I remember our first TV too ... 1955, but we only had it for about six months, then dad got stationed in Germany and they didn't have TV yet ... the one we got when we returned state-side, was a 24 inch black and white with rabbit ears ... my parents didn't get a color TV until 65 ... it became the family "fireplace" ... where we all gathered to watch gunsmoke, Rawhide, X-1 and the Twilight zone... Mayberry and Perry Mason ...and the Saturday cartoons and Sunday Movie ... my fav was Route 66

Not me...I still have my iPhone 6 Plus, my first and only iphone, over 6 years old and going strong.

My friend was the first to get one in around 1978. My only memory is of him putting spoons in it, so we could watch the sparks. I was 9 at the time. I’m not sure how long the microwave lasted.

My husband bought me one. I thought it was an expensive piece of junk. You gotta remember we didn't have microwave food in the freezer. Even TV dinners and pot pies were foil. And even my melamine dishes could not be used in it.

Microwave couldn't Brown anything. Basically destroyed food Fast... What was the point?

I was one of the many women who didn't work and could spend time making a nice meal. It sat around for about a year and then we tossed it out cause we heard the micros could leak out.

Never thought microwaves would ever be popular

The term for it in the early 70s at college lunchroom time was 'Nuke' your food. The Rival slow cooker crock pot was also a strange addition, to think you could set it in the morning when you went to work, and have dinner ready at home when you returned late in the afternoon was something to get used to.

It was 50 years ago I saw my first one when my friend

Jerry invited me over to his house. He had 2 brothers.

They were upper middle class. We were poor working class.

His father owned a miniature golf course.

We were in middle school. Most of our friends did not

have one. They did because their parents worked all the

time. It was a luxury not everyone wanted because most

of our moms cooked for us. Back then not every mother

was working...

A lot of noise about how unhealthy they are because the resonating frequency in the food that caused the heating, continued to resonate even after you eat it and that resonation in your body caused all kinds of bad things to happen from cancer to other less known alignments.

Oh, and when we finally got one, all we could figure out how to do was cook hot dogs and heat water. We tried cooking eggs but it took nearly as long on the stove top with far better results so we just didn't.

I remember destroying more food than we ate as kids. Eggs and hotdogs exploding quite nicely.

I REMEMBER THE CHINESE USING MICROWAVE WEAPONS ON THE INDIANS AT THE indian?tibet? BORDER..may 3/4 months ago...

My mom was the first to buy one. She loved it because she couldn't cook, so now we- at age 5 and 8- could finally take care of ourselves...lol
Hot dogs, French bread pizzas, and exploding marshmallows is all I remember.

I still don't use one, don't have a use for one.

Cancer is the leading cause of death in my country by the way.

Microwaving food in plastic containers is definitely a contributing factor. I have a family member who used to work at Health Canada and saw many of the studies himself. Told me if I'm going to 'nuke' something, to use a corning plate.

Remember there are actual poor people, and then there are people who are just lazy and bad with money.

My friend had a microwave and her mom always told us to stay minimum three feet away from it whenever it was on. This was in 1982-83.

And 8 track, cassettes, touchtone phones....

I remember being very confused, after watching the Incredible Hulk TV series with Lou ferrigno, then our parents bring this box into the house that uses radiation. Never was a big fan.

Me too.

I remember going to someone's house and there was a boy sitting in a stuffed chair just staring at the TV.

That was early 60s, things haven't changed much.

Microwaves didn't really seem like a big deal.

I vaguely remember seeing them in stores first like 7 Eleven since they were prob expensive.

After they were in homes I remember everyone trying to use them for everything until they realized that food turned into a hard rubber texture.