Genealogy Chat

Jannice, did your Easter bunny have a touch of Miximatosis or was the paint on your cot not lead-free? I believe one of the side effects of lead poisoning can cause a profound lack of sense of humour, culminating in severe cases with a total inability to chill out. Get well soon, Pam

My brother and I spent a lot of our childhood at my grandmothers in the country. Very basic two up two down place. Coal fire, door always open whatever the season, range to cook on till Mum and Dad eventually persuaded her to go electric, larder for the fod, meat safe with mesh front to keep the flies off. Any mould on top of the home made jam was scraped off and the rest of the jam we ate without question. No water to the house, just an outside well which grandad dipped a bucket in after work and we marvelled at the newts that arrived with the water. Boiled on a kettle in front of the fire it was ok for us. There was a pump up the lane we got water from as well and there was the daily visit to the farm for a churn of milk straight from the cow. As for the toilet - that consisted of a wooden affair at the bottom of the yard with a lid and daily newspapers on a string. This was emptied once a week. At night we had a chamber pot under the bed. Washing was done in a copper in the barn heated by a fire underneath it and was done every Monday whatever the weather. Grandma used the old flat irons, different size for different garments. Grandad had three allottments to tend as well as a garden full of fruit, vegetables and flowers - how he found the time I'll never know. Grandma looked after the chickens. There was no hoover, no TV (until we all bought them one for their Golden Wedding) and everything stopped for the news onthe radio. We had few toys there but miles of fields to wander around in and play 'make believe'. I can't ever remember saying 'I'm bored' which seems to be a favourite phrase now with anyone from 7 to 17. How we lived would certainly never be allowed today but oh, we had fun ! Mary Brooke

Oh Janice, You have obviously not been following the 'History Lessons' I thought it was more interesting on here than saying 'hello is anybody there?' as on the 'chat' board

These amusing and interesting stories should be on the Chat Board not on the Tips Board. Happy Easter!

How true John, I was born in 1952. My dad was a foundryman and made my brother and I lead soldiers which, when really bored we would put in the ash pan of the fire to watch them melt. We never washed our hands after touching lead and never got burned by the fire. Dad also used to bring home jars of Mercury for us to play with !!! We had never heard of duvets and had no central heating, so on really cold nights mum would take the iron upstairs and iron the bottom sheet that was on our beds to warm them, then we would jump into bed quickly, extra bedding came in the form of coats on top of the blankets. Apart from the open fire the only other sources of heat came from Parafin heaters and as the eldest child ( 8 or so ) I was usually sent to the shop with a gallon can to collect it, and the kitchen was often heated by the door of the gas oven being left open. One of my brothers was born in the hard winter of December 1963, it was a home birth and there were complications to such an extent that the midwife warned dad that he could be faced with the choice of choosing between saving the baby's life or my mum's as the road to our house was too deep in snow to allow an ambulance to get through. Luckily both brother and mum survived. We played from dawn to dusk on the hottest of summer days in just shorts, no sun block or factor 30 for us, just the occasional dab of Calomine lotion ! We climbed the highest of oak trees by banging 6'' nails in the trunk to get to the first branches, any kid who couldn't climb at least a 40 foot tree to the top was considered a sissy. Does anyone remember a toy oven that I got for Christmas about 1959 that had tiny cake tins, cake mixture and used candlewax night lights to heat the oven? Talking of candles, remember the coal tar burners in the bedroom when you had a really bad cough,cold or chest? Another memory is of my eldest brother getting a tin car clamped to his lip because the metal seam had opened, the same brother also came a cropper when he got his leg trapped between the chain and cog of his three-wheeled bike ! There were no shutters on the doors and windows of shops after closing time, cigarette and chocolate dispensing machines were a feature of every shopping parade, telephone directories hung in every telephone box unabused, babies were left in their prams outside shops while their mums were inside. I could go on and on.............I am beginning to think that I lived in the last age of innocence. Pam

How true John, I was born in 1952. My dad was a foundryman and made my brother and I lead soldiers which, when really bored we would put in the ash pan of the fire to watch them melt. We never washed our hands after touching lead and never got burned by the fire. Dad also used to bring home jars of Mercury for us to play with !!! We had never heard of duvets and had no central heating, so on really cold nights mum would take the iron upstairs and iron the bottom sheet that was on our beds to warm them, then we would jump into bed quickly, extra bedding came in the form of coats on top of the blankets. Apart from the open fire the only other sources of heat came from Parafin heaters and as the eldest child ( 8 or so ) I was usually sent to the shop with a gallon can to collect it, and the kitchen was often heated by the door of the gas oven being left open. One of my brothers was born in the hard winter of December 1963, it was a home birth and there were complications to such an extent that the midwife warned dad that he could be faced with the choice of choosing between saving the baby's life or my mum's as the road to our house was too deep in snow to allow an ambulance to get through. Luckily both brother and mum survived. We played from dawn to dusk on the hottest of summer days in just shorts, no sun block or factor 30 for us, just the occasional dab of Calomine lotion ! We climbed the highest of oak trees by banging 6'' nails in the trunk to get to the first branches, any kid who couldn't climb at least a 40 foot tree to the top was considered a sissy. Does anyone remember a toy oven that I got for Christmas about 1959 that had tiny cake tins, cake mixture and used candlewax night lights to heat the oven? Talking of candles, remember the coal tar burners in the bedroom when you had a really bad cough,cold or chest? Another memory is of my eldest brother getting a tin car clamped to his lip because the metal seam had opened, the same brother also came a cropper when he got his leg trapped between the chain and cog of his three-wheeled bike ! There were no shutters on the doors and windows of shops after closing time, cigarette and chocolate dispensing machines were a feature of every shopping parade, telephone directories hung in every telephone box unabused, babies were left in their prams outside shops while their mums were inside. I could go on and on.............I am beginning to think that I lived in the last age of innocence. Pam

No Geoff, it means Barbara, like the rest of us, was dressed to fight off the cold - remember vests, and horror of horrors for us girls, liberty bodices? When the sun shone our teachers took us for nature walks, no prior parental permission, no insurance, no minimum number of adults per child but as far as I remember no disasters either . Happy days Judith

Barbara - I think they call that "selective memory"!

For a laugh over Easter, add yours if you wish. All people over 25 should be dead. To the survivors: According to today's regulators and bureaucrats, those of us who were kids in the 40's, 50's, 60's, 70's probably shouldn't have survived. Our baby cots were covered with bright coloured lead-based paint. We had no childproof lids on medicine bottles, doors or cabinets, and when we rode our bikes, we had no helmets. (Not to mention the risks we took hitchhiking.) As children, we would ride in cars with no seat belts or air bags. We drank water from the garden hose and not from a bottle. Horrors! We shared one soft drink with four friends, from one bottle, and no one actually died from this. We ate cakes, bread and butter, and drank pop with sugar in it, but we were never overweight because we were always outside playing. We would leave home in the morning and play all day, as long as we were back when the street lights came on. No one was able to reach us all day. No mobile phones. Unthinkable. We would spend hours building our go-carts out of scraps and then rode down the hill, only to find out we forgot the brakes. After running into the bushes a few times, we learned to solve the problem. We did not have Playstations, Nintendo 64, X-Boxes, no video games at all, videos, surround sound, mobile phones, personal computers, or Internet chat rooms. We had friends! We went outside and found them. We fell out of trees, got cut and broke bones and teeth, and there were no claims from these accidents. We made up games with sticks and tennis balls and ate worms, and although we were told it would happen, we did not put out very many eyes, nor did the worms live inside us forever. We rode bikes or walked to a friend's home and knocked on the door, or rang the bell or just walked in and talked to them. Football teams had trials and not everyone made the team. Those who didn't had to learn to deal with disappointment. Central heating. This was a coal fire in just one room of the house. Remember the cries of 'don't bang the door' and if you did the clouds of smoke that ensued...... and being asked if you were born in a barn if you left doors open. The idea of a parent bailing us out if we broke a law was unheard of. Theyactually sided with the law. Imagine that! Where grass was the thing you cut. This generation has produced some of the best risk-takers and problem solvers and inventors, ever. The past 50 years have been an explosion of innovation and new ideas. We had freedom, failure, success and responsibility, and we learned how to deal with it all. And you're one of them! Congratulations. we had the luck to grow up as kids, before solicitors and governments regulated our lives, for our own good.

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