Yep, my first year out of college (1998) I was making 50K at a local public tech company. Anyone in tech would laugh at that nowadays, but that was considered a "good" starting salary.
There was a reset between then and now: The Great Recession around 2008. Starting salaries were below 50K, and I was really surprised when a few years later I got an offer at that amount (also right out of college) - I remember looking around for what to expect, and it was more like 35K.