Prevent Directory Listing

I've just made a transition from a VDS to a Dedicated and I'm having problems preventing directory contents from showing. In my previous server whenever I created a directory, it would automatically give a 403 when you tried to access the directory directly in your browser (which is what I want). Now when I set up directories in this new dedicated the contents of the directories display when there is either no index page or if I didn't have an htaccess file preventing it from listing the contents.

So what im asking is how did my previous server automatically set up the directories to not display the contents but use the contents and allow access to say for example pictures in the directory?

Is there a way I can have apache automatically do this for me or do I have to place a blank index page in every directory i create or have to place an htaccess file in every directory I create? How can I protect the contents with a 403 but still allow the contents to be accessed only through full path?