Rushing across campus on a blustery November morning was not an ideal way to welcome a new week. Foolishly, I had broken an experienced college student's ironclad rule by signing up for an 8 o'clock class. Pretty careless, especially in a winter term.

I got to the doors of the Mass Communications building anxious, but still in time to hit a coffee machine before class. Two coeds were also heading toward the entrance, so I grabbed the door handle and typically pulled it open, waiting for them to enter first. I did not know such an effortless polite gesture was going to bring the furor of 'get lost' into my world.

The door handle was jerked from my hand by the nearest girl. She was wearing a brown coat and matching gloves, one of which was providing warmth to quite a grip. "We don't need your help. I can open the door myself."

Terse lecture over, I watched dumbstruck as they flew past me into the halls of academia. You might say, I was frozen in time.

Sure, I had realized by 1974 that American society was in flux and people were changing.

Before that morning, I had experienced three earlier years of college, followed by three years of U.S. Army, including 12 months in Southeast Asia. Demonstrations, draft card roasts and relocation to Canada were realities of the time. Homegrown political terrorists had become more regular than unusual in headlines. The Weathermen carried out four bombings that year. A kidnapped Patty Hearst joined her Symbionese Liberation Army captors in a bank robbery.

I arrived at the disputed door handle with GI Bill assistance and Vietnam memories. I also remembered where I was when President Kennedy was assassinated ... also his brother Robert and Martin Luther King. The unspeakable actions of Richard Speck and Charles Manson were known nationwide. Ted Bundy later confessed to 14 killings that year, many of whom were college coeds.

Even so, the door incident slapped me on a personal level. I was raised by a single mother who stressed good manners. She believed in gentlemanly behavior and insisted that all females were to be treated as 'ladies until they proved otherwise'. Born in 1921, she grew up in the Depression and worked through World War II. She was subservient to no one, but she truly believed civility in actions and words was essential. Today, she would be an unappreciated anachronism.

The door incident upsets me more now, than back then. When it happened, I was a journalism student. There were operating news wire services in several of my classrooms. It was in those years my thirst for understanding people and their actions was ingrained in my makeup. The incident caught me socially and mentally flat footed. It has become my individualized symbol of the demise of American society.

The year before I was put in my place at a door of scholarly pursuit, the Supreme Court ruled on Roe vs. Wade, and the Watergate hearings began. The year of the 'door jerk', Nixon was forced to resign. In 1975, my graduation year, the Vietnam War ended and so did South Vietnam. In addition, the Microsoft company was created, followed by Apple a year later.

All these headline events added fuel to a national environment of upheaval. They reinforced a changing American psyche. Stoked by the media and special interest groups, they still burn as if eternal flames. They threaten to end the 'Great America Experiment' in Democracy.

I still open doors for presumed ladies. I cling to civility. Now, I'm labled a sexist. I'm also categorized as a racist because I thought Obama did a poor job as president. You can add 'Alt Right' to my character because I'm a history nut who prefers his statues standing. Historical figures should not be evaluated as if they lived in our times.

But I'm none of those things. Next birthday will be my 70th. Most people my age accept who they are, warts and all. Today, we have far too many younger Americans who don't know who they are. Multiple generations rely on outside sources to give them identities and associated 'marching orders'. Civility has been replaced by selfish intolerance.

As a consequence, if my mother was alive today, she could see and hear her beliefs, and herself, reviled on TV and in social media. But she would take it in stride. Hell, a few unkind nasty words would not bother a Depression- raised, World War II American woman. Like millions, she rationed, worked hard, and prayed in an era when America's success was necessary for the free world's survival. She, and her contemporaries were tough, and I don't mean Hollywood pretend tough.