Oh, to have been a kid in the summer of 1976, when America turned 200.
New Orleans marketing executive Ellie Hobson Rand, 60, vividly remembers her Bicentennial skateboard, her older brother’s Bicentennial edition Ford Pinto and the special red, white and blue Speedos her swim team — the Tulane Greenies — wore that summer.
Artist Rebecca Birtel Mardura, 59, remembers the colonial officer’s costume, complete with topcoat, vest, knickers and ruffle shirt, that her mom sewed from a Simplicity pattern for her little brother, Michael…