How did people leave home at 15…

I was born in the 70's but my goodness you forget how much times have changed (for better and worse).

There's that, too. My parents both left school at 13 because their wages were needed (each had lost a parent early, and was the eldest of a poor family).

Someone recently said it was terribly sad that when I left home, my sisters moved into my room, and I was on the sofa if I came back for a visit, but we were poor. My parents had left home and been independent far earlier than I had. There wasn't the room in the house to keep a room for someone who had moved out, or the cultural contexts for boomeranging back and forth between university and home.

Also worth remembering that although London has always been a wealthy city, it wasn’t always a desirable place to live. The property boom that resulted in ever increasing gentrification of what would have been fairly undesirable parts of London really didn’t start till the 80’s.

places like Notting Hill were considered working class if not slums at that time. There was lots of very basic accommodation, bedsits and hostels. There were no credit checks and rent was collected on a weekly basis.

Basically the 70’s were not a good time for inner cities and there was a lot of middle class flight from outter zones to the suburbs.

I know SM portrays life for boomers in the 70’s as some utopia where everyone had a car and detached house funded by a job in Woolworths but it isn’t true.

Honestly, no idea. I left home at 17 and was financially independent, but somehow I lived on no real money in massively shared accommodation. Everyone I knew was skint, it was just the done thing, to kind of scramble up out of nothing with no support from family or state.

My DB left home at 15 and lived in a shared house. He worked part time and then maybe more at a guitar workshop where one of the men lived.

I sometimes say I left home at 15, because essentially, I did. I became an inpatient in an adolescent unit at 15, and was living in a supported flat by the time I was 16. This was mid to late seventies.

My uncle finished his junior cert in ireland and was in london the next month aged 15.
There were 9 siblings and my grandad was dead.
You had to work.

He rented a shared room in a house where his sister in laws (my other uncles wife's) brother was staying (they shared the room) so he had someone he knew. A few friends moved over too.
There were a load of them in the house... 2 or 3 to a room.

By 19 he owned half a house in Holland park woth one of the lads....they lived there and did some work on it and sold it for 11k when he was 21 (which everyone thought 11k was a king's ransom and was v impressed by)

I find it WILD.

He had a v interesting life...

There were masses of jobs in the 70s. Children were much more independent at a very young age. From primary and all through our teenage years my brother and I looked after ourselves during schoool holidays. Doing housework lighting fires, shopping and cooking.

When I left school in 1964, I was offered every job I applied for. I started work earning £10 a week. My Dad said he been at work years before he earned that much. 5 years later, having changed jobs s 4 times I was earning £22.

We got married, lived in rooms,paying £2 pew week rent from an joint I come of £40.

My husband left home at 15 in the mid-80s. Lived in squats, got a job when he was 16, rented a room in a shared house, got a better job, etc.

I know someone who at 15 started running errands for a famous designer's studio and progressed from there. It wasn't an official job more of a "go there, bring that" kinda arrangement for "experience" and pocket money. I assume it's the similar setup with this "working as a music PR".
And yes, would be lodging with someone or squatting.

It's also worth bearing in mind the jobs didn't have to offer much - they might have been freelance but even if they weren't they didn't have to offer minimum wage, I don't think sick pay or pensions were a thing for part time etc. So if someone nagged you for work and volunteered for a particular job, or task above their station, there wasn't much risk to the employer.

Yes, I was a bit older, but did something similar. Also moved over from Ireland. Lived in a squat on Kilburn High Road, and did bits of cash in hand jobs.

MF claims to have lived in a squat and supported herself through odd jobs in pubs and shops. Which was definitely more common in the 1970s-1980s, casual employment was easier to find, landlord checks weren’t really in place, and standards and approaches to child safeguarding were a lot poorer than they are nowadays.

Well, I don't think she waltzed straight into music PR, she had some fairly menial tea-girl/mailroom type job in a recording studio first.

Or is the moving to London at 15 bit that is primarily intriguing you?

Genuinely, a lot of people in that era moved into squats, or took up a bed subletting 3-4 to a bedroom. You could work full time at 16 so it's not unreasonable to think you could negotiate as a 15yr old school leaver especially if you were prepared to work all hours for a pittance.

It was very common to live in 'digs'.

Which would normally be a bedroom in someone's house (or a shared bedroom).

You'd pay a small amount and the rest would be made up of babysitting/cooking/cleaning/odd jobs etc for the owners.

This is what my dad did when he left school.