A lot of things weren't "like that 30-40 years ago."  Including what you call "police surveillance". (ugly term)--we used to call it "patrol."  But some things never change. 

Didn't see the police much growing up in Vernon, B.C.--I hunch some of them typed with two-fingers, too.  A little girl was abducted (likely sexually abused--we didn't get THAT detail back then, either) and later found dead in the brush near the end of Polson Park. Believe they caught the guy. Happened in the summer.  

Next September, in an era of one-car families, kids--like me--walked to school and back every day.  So did my younger brother and sister.

And when we got into the (one) family car to go "for a drive" (people did that back then, too. Strange, eh?). Guess what?  No seatbelts.