yikes, i can't remember that far back....my first car was a 53 chev, and we certainly never cared about mileage at that time (the early 60s....am i dating myself?)
in recent memory:
85 honda accord (when they were still small) - seems like it was in the 40s, with a 50 thrown in now and then on a road trip
93 civic - 30-40, again with 50 thrown in on road trips
98 forester - 25-27 on a good day

2004 hond crv - 24-25 no matter how hard i tried
2005 HCH - almost 50 even in the snow, and i hope to keep it much higher if spring ever gets here
these all had a manual transmission, by the way.