My mom, in the late 60's, paid for her master's degree at an accredited university with a summer waitressing job. It enabled her to get a career as a teacher.

Separately, my father built a 2k square-foot house on 5 acres of land for $10k in the 70's (about $100k adjusted for inflation). He did this on a telephone lineman's budget without a degree.

There was the GI bill, which both of my grandfathers used to get professional degrees essentially for "free" (one accountant and one doctor). I guess it wasn't really "free" because one of them had to fight through North Africa and Italy to get it, and the other one had to drop a few bombs on Germany before spending the rest of the war in a POW camp.

Both the UC and CUNY system were famously tuition free until things like this started happening:

1960: The Master Plan for Higher Education in California maintains that tuition at University of California and state colleges should be free, but that fees are necessary to help cover non-instructional costs. “The two governing boards reaffirm the long established principle that state colleges and the University of California shall be free to all residents of the state.”

1966: Ronald Reagan assumed office of Governor of California and changed the course of the state’s higher education system. In his eight years, he cut state funding for college and universities and laid the foundation for a tuition-based system.

According to a New York Times article from 1982, during his eight years as governor, “Reagan fought hard in the legislature to impose tuition at four-year colleges. He lost the battle to lobbyists for the university, … However, the Legislature agreed to increase student registration fees.”

[0]https://www.abc10.com/article/news/local/what-happened-to-ca...