The 80’s were a significantly historical period for a variety of reasons. The decade saw both the escalation of the Cold War and its peaceful resolution, both of which have been largely attributed to the now almost legendary exploits of the U.S. President of the decade, Ronald Reagan.

The 80s also were a time of economic upheaval, with Reaganomics being a subject of great debate. The Eighties saw financial prosperity and depression, the latter best illustrated by the stock market crash of 1987.

On the consumer electronics front, the 80’s witnessed the dawning of the modern computer age with the mainstream introduction of the personal computer in 1981. Computer geeks everywhere rejoiced and could no longer think of any reason why they should talk to the opposite sex or even leave the house, for that matter.

But hardly any of the teens, youth, and young at heart of the 80’s were concerned about any of that. No, we had far more pressing worries, namely the welfare of Tommy and Gina, two working class heroes from New Jersey. You see, Tommy worked on the docks, but then the union went on strike. Gina worked at the diner, pulling twelve hour shifts. It was tough for both them. But they held on to what they valued most: each other. Yeah, Tommy and Gina made it, and all of us succeeded vicariously through them. We felt their pain. We felt their joy. We felt like parachute pants were cool. You can't win 'em all.

The Berlin Wall? Gorbachev? Bruno?? We could tackle any of those problems as long as Tommy and Gina didn’t give up and gave it a shot.

The travails of Tommy and Gina became well known and inundated the pop culture and entertainment of the era. Now that I think about it, I vaguely remember a heavy metal hair band that had a hit song that mentioned Tommy and Gina. That’s weird. I wonder whatever happened to those guys. They were called Bon Jovi or Air Supply or something like that. Are they still making music? Probably not.
 


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