50s/60s Britain and Now

[Colin]

Growing up round Barkingside & Ilford (Essex) meant going most places by bus before Dad got his first Ford Pop; I always used to express a preference for the trolleybuses and remember feeling very sad when they disappeared. I can still recall seeing the wires partly removed and tied off near road junctions, and my horror one time when at the cinema when I saw a Pathe News feature on the buses themselves being scrapped. (Think it can still be seen on YouTube).

Mind you, the good old RT could provide a lively ride, especially when running late!

 

How about those exciting new pop singers, that bloke with his Shadows as a backing group for example!

[eastglosmog]

2 hours ago, TheQ said:

The out toilets with only a half roof over the sitters open over the standers,  but if the wind was in the wrong direction both got wet.

 

Still got a septic tank.... 

 

Yours must have had the same architect that ours did!

We often got sent home in winter when the pipework froze.

Half the school rooms were in a "temporary" wooden block, put up on the paved playing surface during WWII some 15 years earlier (and still there at least 20 years later).

[Maltazer]

The breaded ham still exists (try the Deli counter in Sainsburys after the current nonsense ends). 

 

The difference is these days some customers ask for the breadcrumbs to be removed because they are gluten intolerant (the answer is 'no').

[jcm@gwr]

21 minutes ago, Colin said:

How about (manual) cars with only  3 forward gears? I well remember my Dad’s Ford Popular and 100E Anglia which both had to be almost revved to destruction in 2nd before dropping into 3rd, when it would almost sigh with relief.

One of his friends had a Vauxhall with a terrible vague column gear change that would occasionally try to select reverse, with “interesting” results.

Radios and heaters were only supplied in the Deluxe trim version as I remember! Dad’s cars were company vehicles and he only got a deluxe after becoming a Senior rep!

 

3 speed column change = 3-on-a-tree, or you had the latest hi-tech, 4-on-the-floor!

[The Stationmaster]

5 hours ago, iL Dottore said:

The COVID-19 lockdown has, amongst many other things that had me rummaging through the detritus of my early life, which were spent growing up in 50s/60s Britain. This got me thinking about what has really changed in the UK since then. And I’d love to know how other RMWebbers view the changes as well.

 

To start things off, here is a list of what I think has really changed or disappeared since then...

• Saturday morning cinema for kids (gone) - available locally starting at 11.00 on Saturdays (in better times of course).
•  
• Sweets from large glass jars, weighed out into paper bags - were available locally until a few years back but the shop had to close due to rent increases, still avaialble elsewhere but plastic jars nowadays
•  
• ”Proper” butchers with carcasses hanging in the window (pretty much disappeared today, I think) - one within a 10 minute walk although only seasonal (game) carcasses outside, another proper butcher within a 25 minute drive
• Double-Rovers (combined LT underground and bus pass) - replaced by various other passes although the Freedom Pass is age/residence related
•  
• Ham, cut off the bone as you waited (and whatever has happened to “York Ham”: boiled, de-rinded, rolled in yellow breadcrumbs and then sliced to order?) - ham off the bone available in some outlets if you know where to look but now very rare
• Cadbury’s Smash (instant mashed potato) - still available. but different packaging, now produced by Batchelors
• BabyCham (pseudo Champagne - marketed as being a “sophisticated” drink) - still available but a different producer and probably not quite the samne as ut once was,  Tesco have it as an online sale item
•  
• Milky Bars - still made by Nestlé
• Skool Uniform of short trousers and blazer, plus cap (not forgetting white shirt, skool tie, knee-high socks and lace-up black leather shoes) - still worn by some private schools round here but no longer with a cap for the boys
•  

 

 

I have highlighted the items above which we have within either a 30 minute drive or, in some cases, a 10 minute walk.  Am I living is some sort of time warp?  

 

But what you can't get are pickled eggs (yuck) or pickled onions in local chip shops although at least two locally do deep fried Mars Bars (in a posh part of the Thames Valley!!j.  

Tobacconists have all but vanished but there is one in Reading (unless they've gone bust in the lockdown).  

We have a local bakery still surviving (or it was before lockdown - might still?).  

What we can definitely no longer buy locally are shotguns and cartridges, .22 rifles & pistols and ammunition for target shooting, nor can I buy .177 air rifle pellets locally.

We no longer have garages selling petrol from pumps situated on the pavement (they were made illegal in, I think, the early 1970s).

In the 1960s we did have a local Swiss (honest) restaurant although serving mainly English dishes - best restaurant in the town, they cooked steak properly), it became an Italian restaurant years ago and has since closed completely.

We don't have steam trains - they survived on our branch until 1963 (passenger) and a year or two later for freight.

We still have the same telephone number at this address which my parents had here in the 1960s - but (dialling code apart) it has acquired an extra three leading digits since then.

 

Something we couldn't do in the 1960s - in about an hour from now my son (working from home) will be doing an online training course with a college in Lausanne.

 

Oh, and I've got a front hedge - which is growing fast and needs cutting.

Edited April 6, 2020 by The Stationmaster

[chrisf]

Model shops!  When I lived in Acton I was a frequent visitor to Jones Bros at 56 Turnham Green Terrace, W4, easily reached by the 55 bus.  I also patronised Taylor & McKenna in Harlesden right by Craven Park, NW10.  My journey there and back was by trolleybus, practically door to door.

 

Green Shield stamps, a promotional device sold to shopkeepers to lure customers into their shops.  I must not be too rude about them because not only did they employ my dad for upwards of 20 years but they also gave me a job for two university summer vacations.

 

Chris

[Fat Controller]

11 minutes ago, jcm@gwr said:

 

3 speed column change = 3-on-a-tree, or you had the latest hi-tech, 4-on-the-floor!

Dad had a Cresta PB, with a three-speed column change (and a 3.3 litre engine). It was virtually impossible to observe a 30 mph limit in Top. When dad was no longer able to drive the car, he gave it to us; by that time, 2nd gear was 'missing', which made for some interesting driving techniques.

[Bill Radford]

Proper meat.

 

Bacon that fries properly not ending up like a ryvita (dry & tasteless). Pork with proper crackling on it.

[burgundy]

21 minutes ago, russ p said:

Not being quite that old was born in 66, was the threat of instant vaporisation or a lingering death from a nuclear attack a very prevalent thought at the time obviously it must have been in the Cuban missile crisis 

I can remember a Civil Defence practice evacuation, in which we were taken off in coaches to be entrained for a journey to somewhere safer (with hindsight, it is difficult to imagine where that might have been). We ended up at Sheffield Park for a quick trip up the Bluebell line!

Creative thinking by someone. 

Looking back, I would not wish to go back to those days, but I think we have been an incredibly lucky generation. For starters, we have lived at peace. Not something that our parents could claim. 

Best wishes 

Eric 

[Clive Mortimore]

Yeah going to school in the sixties was great, especially when the teacher made me stand in front of the class and shouted at me because of my bad spelling, totally humiliating me. Thankfully today teachers are aware of dyslexia.

 

Waking up in the morning with frost on the inside of my bedroom windows.

 

The smell of sulphur  when the wind was in the wrong direction  and the smoke from the brickworks hung over Bedford.

 

Sitting outside the hospital because children were not allowed to visit their dying grandmother.

 

Travelling on trains that were so dirty mum made us wear our play clothes. On arrival having to wash and change to our smart clothes in the station toilets before we visited her mum and dad.

 

Times were great.

Edited April 6, 2020 by Clive Mortimore

[caradoc]

3 minutes ago, Clive Mortimore said:

Sitting outside the hospital because children were not allowed to visit their dying grandmother.

 

 

That's a sad memory for me too, me and my two sisters were not allowed to visit my Grandmother in hospital in her final days. A great regret also is that I was too young (12) when she died to have thought to ask, and record, her life; She was born in 1896 and had therefore lived through times of incredible change, not to mention two world wars.

 

[drjcontroller]

56 minutes ago, BernardTPM said:

I'm sure that not only was there a second walnut half inside the creamy part, but the base was biscuit with some kind of jam (strawberry?) on it. The current one is a sickly, pale reflection of that.

 

Don't remember that, maybe before my time (I was born in 1959).

 

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Walnut_Whip

[Colin]

1 minute ago, Fat Controller said:

Dad had a Cresta PB, with a three-speed column change (and a 3.3 litre engine). It was virtually impossible to observe a 30 mph limit in Top. When dad was no longer able to drive the car, he gave it to us; by that time, 2nd gear was 'missing', which made for some interesting driving techniques.

I’m surprised it lasted more than a couple of years, apparently some Vauxhalls were even delivered from the factory with visible rust on the bodywork. The early Victor looked pretty good but was a real disaster with its twin exhausts passing through the rear bumper, the heat from the pipes used to bake the chrome plating off the bumper with predictably rusty results!

 

On a different subject, well do I remember (as Clive says in his post) some of the awful bullies at school - and they were the teachers. Some of them used ridicule and sarcasm as a means of keeping the class in order while others were more physical in their approach - one in particular was positively violent and quite scary.

 

[BernardTPM]

4 minutes ago, drjcontroller said:

Don't remember that, maybe before my time (I was born in 1959).

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Walnut_Whip

Two years older - sometimes that makes the difference I guess.

 

Walnut Whip without a walnut - Nestles have no clue, do they?

[Fat Controller]

5 minutes ago, Colin said:

I’m surprised it lasted more than a couple of years, apparently some Vauxhalls were even delivered from the factory with visible rust on the bodywork. The early Victor looked pretty good but was a real disaster with its twin exhausts passing through the rear bumper, the heat from the pipes used to bake the chrome plating off the bumper with predictably rusty results!

 

On a different subject, well do I remember (as Clive says in his post) some of the awful bullies at school - and they were the teachers. Some of them used ridicule and sarcasm as a means of keeping the class in order while others were more physical in their approach - one in particular was positively violent and quite scary.

 

It lasted twenty years, having been an ex-Demonstrator, bought in 1965, and scrapped in 1986. 

[Reorte]

Good thread for making me feel young, I wasn't born until the 70s!

 

[Pete the Elaner]

6 hours ago, iL Dottore said:

 

• Double-Rovers (combined LT underground and bus pass)
• Milky Bars

A couple of things on the original list I would question:

 

Travelcards are still available. With the odd exceptions, these are valid on most buses, trains & underground within London.

 

Milky Bars. The recipe may have changed & possibly also the manufacturer, but the product itself has remained available to this day.

 

AM radio was mentioned. This is still available, but modern equipment has favoured FM & now DAB to such an extent that AM is now no more than a token gesture. It sounds awful but not because of the limitation of AM itself; modern broadcast & reception equipment is lousy.

[Colin]

 

3 minutes ago, Fat Controller said:

It lasted twenty years, having been an ex-Demonstrator, bought in 1965, and scrapped in 1986. 

That’s really impressive! I think it must have been the PA Crestas from the late ‘50s which had the real body rot problem.

[Fat Controller]

4 minutes ago, Colin said:

 

That’s really impressive! I think it must have been the PA Crestas from the late ‘50s which had the real body rot problem.

The first-generation Crestas (and the other big Vauxhalls) were not good, apart from the engine, which was originally based on a wartime Bedford lorry engine.

[Enterprisingwestern]

 

At least outside toilets had one saving grace, bladder control, when I started my drinking days I could last all night without wasting time and money evacuating what I had just bought, very useful for a Yorkshireman!

 

Mike.

[Hroth]

1 hour ago, Colin said:

How about (manual) cars with only  3 forward gears? I well remember my Dad’s Ford Popular and 100E Anglia which both had to be almost revved to destruction in 2nd before dropping into 3rd, when it would almost sigh with relief.

One of his friends had a Vauxhall with a terrible vague column gear change that would occasionally try to select reverse, with “interesting” results.

Radios and heaters were only supplied in the Deluxe trim version as I remember! Dad’s cars were company vehicles and he only got a deluxe after becoming a Senior rep!

 

Dad had a Ford Pilot (3.5 3.622 litre flathead V8 monster) with a three speed column change...  It had a heater but no radio.  Other features included Fords favourite vacuum-operated windscreen wipers, an opening front window and integral hydraulic jacks (the Jackall system) which made changing a punctured tyre slightly easier.

 

He also got a Fidelity open-spool tape recorder for Christmas one year, us children got to pretend to be the Beatles and recorded our interpretations of their songs on it...

 

Edited April 6, 2020 by Hroth

[Joseph_Pestell]

24 minutes ago, Colin said:

 and they were the teachers. Some of them used ridicule and sarcasm as a means of keeping the class in order while others were more physical in their approach - one in particular was positively violent and quite scary.

 

 

We had one of those - a nun! A thoroughly evil woman probably more responsible than anyone else for my atheism.

[Joseph_Pestell]

5 minutes ago, Fat Controller said:

The first-generation Crestas (and the other big Vauxhalls) were not good, apart from the engine, which was originally based on a wartime Bedford lorry engine.

 

"Not good"!!! They were bl**dy awful. Average life of a Vauxhall of that era was less than seven years.

[Colin]

Our resident nut job was one of the games masters. He definitely went too far and even in those days should have been disciplined himself. One day, he clouted one of my classmates round the head and the lad replied that he could get him into trouble - all of a sudden the teacher was falling over himself trying to be Mr Nice Guy, how nauseating.

[Fat Controller]

14 minutes ago, Colin said:

Our resident nut job was one of the games masters. He definitely went too far and even in those days should have been disciplined himself. One day, he clouted one of my classmates round the head and the lad replied that he could get him into trouble - all of a sudden the teacher was falling over himself trying to be Mr Nice Guy, how nauseating.

Our annual 'Staff against Sixth Form' rugby match was a real grudge match, with a lot of 'off-the-ball' play. On at least one occasion, a member of staff ended up in casualty. 

Given how many of the staff had been in either WW2, or the various 'Police Actions' that National Servicemen were sent to, then their brutality is perhaps not surprising.