Fifty years ago, tattoos in America carried a heavy social price. They were marks worn primarily by sailors, bikers, convicts, and those who lived life outside the “respectable” edges of society. In the eyes of many, they weren’t art — they were warning labels. Parents cautioned their kids that tattoos were for troublemakers. Employers saw them as unprofessional. In the polite company of middle America, they were something you kept covered up, if you had them at all. Back then, a tattoo could brand you for life. It wasn’t just ink — it was identity, and not necessarily one that opened doors. As a child of the 1960s and 70s, you might have been told exactly that: tattoos were naughty, rebellious, or outright dangerous in