How did 70s kids in NJ survive following the mosquito fog trucks?

Some people survive despite themselves. I cannot state this emphatically enough.

There are those who smoke four packs a day and never get cancer, drink three bottles of whiskey a week and never get cirrhosis of the liver, or drive like an imbecile and never get into an accident.

Then there are those late 60s early 70s kids who did something so ridiculously stupid it’s hard to believe they’re still around.

Remember the bug man? The city (or county, who knew?) would send these vehicles through our residential streets across New Jersey equipped with a big tank and a spraying apparatus and cover anything in its wake. It was a dense, white fog, like a cloud on earth.

It was all part of an effort to control the mosquito population. Which I get. Believe it or not, because of diseases they can carry and transmit, the mosquito is the deadliest living creature on our planet.

Now we kids knew what these fogger trucks were doing. We knew the thick spray was to kill mosquitoes. It was evidenced by the fact that boys all over the neighborhood would excitedly shout, “Bug man! The bug man!”

And they would run to grab their Huffy or their Schwinn and they would pedal furiously to catch up to the truck…

…and they would delight in disappearing inside that fog. In and out. Sometimes blindly colliding bikes in the mist, only to get right back in the thrill.

Just what in the hell did they think was in that cloud? And just why in the hell did the bug man never stop and scream at the kids to point out what they were breathing?

It was a pesticide, with DDT as an active ingredient. This insecticide is considered toxic, a probable carcinogen, and was banned in the United States in 1972. Yet there was almost every kid in the neighborhood sucking it in as frequently as they came.

It’s insane when you think about it. Perhaps we just didn’t believe in science as much back then? Even though the U.S. Surgeon General already gave his warning on the danger of cigarettes the smoking rate by the year DDT was banned was still 43%. Drunk driving was considered almost a joke. Even though seat belts were mandatory the compliance rate was less than 10%.

So yes, many of us survived despite ourselves. But was there a bigger F you to common sense than the bicycle brigade riding behind the bug man inhaling DDT? People still remember it with a sense of fondness that’s usually reserved for the skin left behind on Action Park’s Alpine Slide.