30-03-2018, 03:20 PM
22
Re: Life in the Fifties as it really was
I was 14 as we entered the 1950s.Families were still rebuilding their lives after the war.
Finished at the new trial "comprehensive" in 52 .
Clothes were still very simple and going out was usually about going to the pictures.
Posh eating houses were, virtually, unknown and a good meal was from the many Chippies.
Thinness seemed to be the norm.
Trains were steam and had corridor carriages! It took about 6 hours to go from Yorkshire to London!
Went on the plane, first time, in early 1957. Flew home from Singapore on a big plane with 4 propellers (Super G Constellation?). Engine failed half way and we had to sleep over in Calcutta whilst they fixed it.
Children's toys were few and often made by the parents.
Although we all had school holiday part time jobs, the first real job I had was in the Merchant Navy - where my wage was around 60 pounds per month.I didn't crack the "thousand a year" target until 1964.
Courting was good but you had to be very careful - pregnancy was going to mean disaster.
None, of our sort, had a telephone - we had to stand at the BT Box waiting to ring the other half.
A TV was a rarity - never saw one, myself, in the 50s.
Learning to Snog, in the back row, was fun though!
Got married in 1959.
Yes, a very good decade for me!
30-03-2018, 06:03 PM
23
Re: Life in the Fifties as it really was
I remember my mother putting our zip up snow boots on the ’Last’ and hammering studs in the soles to make them last longer!You could hear us clomping along from miles away!
They were ugly boots with studs in but great for skidding!!
I still have the ‘Last’!!
30-03-2018, 10:32 PM
25
Re: Life in the Fifties as it really was
Originally Posted by Artangel
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I remember my mother putting our zip up snow boots on the ’Last’ and hammering studs in the soles to make them last longer!You could hear us clomping along from miles away!
They were ugly boots with studs in but great for skidding!!
I still have the ‘Last’!!
He also used to cut out the new leather soles to fit over the holes in our shoes
31-03-2018, 02:26 AM
26
Re: Life in the Fifties as it really was
Originally Posted by Docholliday
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If i could swap the fifties for now i would be straight in there. Yes most were poor but weren't people so much nicer then chatting over the garden fence with a cuppa.
Ah! the fifties... Rationing, polio, scarlet fever, the Kray twins, the Hungarian uprising, Thalidomide, Peter Rachman, rickets, Korean War, Harold Macmillan...
What fun times they were and how quickly we forget, what would I give to have it all back? absolutely nothing.
Now the 60s they were something else...
31-03-2018, 08:58 AM
29
Re: Life in the Fifties as it really was
Im a fifties child too I was brought up in a one parent family just me my sister and my mum, I will admit life wasn't easy but as a kid you just accept your lot ..It's normal for you. It's only looking back as an adult you realise blinking heck yes life was hard.I was lucky to have an older sister who was capable as mum used to disappear for periods God knows where but we managed.
I counted with my sister once how many different rooms in different houses we lived in when we were kids we stopped counting at 16 , mum would run up the rent and we would move on....luckily it was always in the same area so my school was constant and I still had the same pals. My dolls pram was a godsend for moving us about.
For all that though I had some happy times as a kid but not like most of you with family mine were with other kids and adventures in the streets.
I'm glad to be a fifties child if I were born later I'm sure we would have been taken into care and that would have been a disaster for us. We both did quite well in life by the way my sister became a head mistress and I didn't do too badly in my own way
31-03-2018, 08:58 AM
30
Re: Life in the Fifties as it really was
Back then one could play in the street without the worry of a paedophile waiting to pounce. games were invented like "searchlight he" bit like hide and seek but using a touch to spot someone hiding.Discarded pram wheels were quickly adapted to make what we called a dandy ( go cart with pull anong string).
Horse drawn rag and bone carts with a guy ringing a bell and shouting out.
Blue police boxes with flashing light on top if the station wanted to get hold of the copper on that beat.
Trolley buses watching them changing over the roof pickup rails to the overhead cables.
Croydon airport was an airport back then and watching the planes fly in/out.
link
http://www.croydonairport.org.uk/The-Airport
owning a new push bike was a rare event if your parents could even afford one.
Starting school at the age of 3 and a1/2 and how scaring the first day was in 1948/9.
Teachers very strict and loved punishing kids for very little reason, now they would be in court for child molesting.
having to go play football in the freezing cold one half day a week, it didn't matter if the ground was covered in snow or it was icy
Oh yes good and very bad times for children back then
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