Did anyone grow up in the 50's? (and 30's and 40's if you are on here!)

I grew up in the 50s. My mum is Irish and married an Englishman and came to live in a small English town she got called an Irish b##ta*rd, an Irish gypsy etc.
We got a 3 bedroom new council house on an estate with lots of grassed areas and wild places around the railway line. We roamed all over the town and the surrounding countryside and played wherever we wanted and came in as it got dark. I knew families of 12 kids living in 3 bedroomed prefabs. We thought we were a small family of 6 compared to these families.

Everybody seemed to be in the same boat and all the dads seemed to work in one of several factories in the town, and the roads would be packed with men on bicycles at starting and finishing time. We thought our house was big with lots of brick built sheds and outhouses and a large front and back garden in which most people grew their own veg.

My aunt and uncle and my cousin came over from Ireland, and for a few years lived with us - nobody thought this was unusual or that we were overcrowded. It meant that my aunt could look after us while my mum was at work, as child minders or pre school was unheard of. I knew one girl who went to a nursery and that was because there was no father around. It was rare to see single parents and it was assumed that the father had died in the war.

We got family allowance for of, I think, about 18 shillings a week for three of us (just under £1.00). It was collected from the post office and you had a book that had to be signed by my mum or dad and collected on a Tuesday. My mum and dad got paid on a Thursday in cash in little brown envelopes and very often there wasn't any money left on the Tuesday when we got bailed out by the family allowance.

In the mid 50s hire purchase became available and people often bought clothes and furniture from catalogues or the club and a tick man came round the houses to collect the weekly payments

At primary school, I remember being taught to use the reference library to find out information and we'd do a project that we had to research. We sat the 11 plus and about 8 of us passed, and I went to the girls high school but my mum really struggled to afford the uniform and I felt like a poor girl amongst posh girls. We had elocution lessons which made me feel even more the council estate girl, lthough with hindsight there were quite a few girls from council estates. I was the first in my family to get a degree thanks to a full grant.

There were perverts and odd characters but somehow we knew who they were and kept out of their way and didn't tell our parents

I think I must have had measles - I can remember being in bed for ages, with the curtains drawn, & the doctor coming.

Also chickenpox. Not mumps though, afaik. And I used to get terrible earache in the cold - my mum used to put warm olive oil in, and stuff my ears with cotton wool.

I spent all of my time in the countryside playing and walking the dog and looking at the wild flowers. It was a riot if colour that no painting could ever do justice to.

The village that I used to live in has gone. My old school is a house. The barn I used to play in is a house. The flowers don’t exist anymore nor the wooden gate that I used to look over and gaze at the flowers longingly. The old pub too is a house.

There are hundreds of small new houses and cars. The village is now a commuter town.

I used to live in a small village in North Yorkshire. Only the village name remains. The river still runs through it. I sometimes go back to the river and stand by it’s banks watching it flow. I pretend I am back in time.

Everything else has gone.

My sister and I both had all the childhood diseases except scarlet fever. One of us would catch something, and pass it on to the other.

Knitted I will never forget the waiting room at the dentist and one of our neighbours was there with her son, younger than me, about 6 or 7 years old. He was shaking with fear and wet himself.

It's a wonder I don't have a lifelong fear of dentists!

Who remembers having to put your head on your desk and sleep for half an hour after lunch?!

I'd forgotten the dentist @Roussette... I had a tooth pulled out that had an abscess behind it without any anaesthetic. My mum was appalled and we never went back to him again. I went to bed for two days and felt very sorry for myself. It was a very big deal for her to leave that practice ; she was the most non-confrontational person ever, almost bowing to those with more education than her.

The streets were for playing in. Nobody had a car or television. The schools were Victorian. Food was kept cold on a marble slab in the pantry. The washing was done by hand and put through a hand operated mangle. Housework took up most of the time.

Dad would get up early to light the fire using coal. There were no carpets. A phone was a luxury for the rich and well off.

The population was slim and people ran or cycled out of work at the sound of the closing Bell. Britain was experiencing austerity after the war and national service still existed but rationing had been stopped. There were no sweets.

Although university was free nobody went. You had to go down the mines like your father to earn some money. People smoked. There was smog. Buses were cheaper and full as there was no other transport except a bike.

You rented a place to live in. Few bought houses. Most lived in council houses.

It’s depressing so we were given nhs spectacles tinted red to make things appear less grey.

If we wanted ice cream for pudding in the summer - the newsagents in the parade used to open briefly on a Sunday - one of us had to sprint down the road, buy a long block (the kind for slicing between wafers), get it wrapped in newspaper & sprint home again

Me too, and many similar memories. Will never forget the freezing cold house, and ice on inside of the windows.

My parents used to buy LPs of all the Musicals of the time and even now I know all the words from Annie Get Your Gun, The King and I, Seven Brides for Seven Brothers, Oklahama, South Pacific, Calamity Jane etc. One of them was on a while back and I immediately broke into song!

I had older brothers and sisters so got into Elvis, Beatles, Stones from a very early age ... all records played on a Dansette record player.

As far as other memories... dentists were butchers and just filled your teeth with mercury, it was a terrifying experience to walk into the dentist with a big black chair you sat on, and the dentist didn't even talk to you or put you at your ease. Perhaps I was just unlucky.

I have no time for anti-vaxxers. I had both mumps and measles in the 50s, and it was horrible. My whole face was swollen from above my ears to my shoulders with the mumps and it was so painful.

Was it a happy time growing up then? Yes and no, for me.

Following! My parents grew up in the fifties. Their childhoods sound a lot like those described.

In my head I could still do a hand stand or cartwheels, but sadly would snap like a twig, now!

It's fascinating to share all these memories, thanks to all.

Incidentally my DH is 3 months older than me and had a more comfortable upbringing, but we both ended up at university, the only difference being I got a maintenance grant and he got nothing, his parents having too much income. There were no tuition fees, though.

I was born in 1952. It was a simple time.
There wasn’t the harshness in society that you see now.
The war had been over for 7 years and only the last few things were still rationed.
People were really slim and wore lovely tea dresses.
Men suits or shirts jackets and trousers often with ties
There was a prosperity spurt. Plenty of employment. Most men were in work and some women. Mainly mums stayed home.
We played out in the street . Very safe
We were the first to have a car in the street.
We had a week on the south coast in May and then a week on cardiff in September where we stayed with family 😁

Loved that week.
My welsh cousin has just been for a week. We’ve kept up the tradition for 60 years

There was no sense of lack

My junior school photos show a class full of beautifully dressed, clean well fed mainly happy children. Makes my heart swell with pride

I had a very happy childhood. I just sold my family home two years ago but I still have my aunt’s who lived in the next street and who didn’t have children

Do it was win/ win... two mam’s and two dads... and a nana
All adored me 👍

Schools were strict. Corporal punishment was used, I don't think my school had the cane, but I think a plimsoll was involved. We had a teacher who scared every child half to death, a ruler was her piece of smacking equipment. Hand out, a swift smack, it stung if it caught your fingertips. No child ever went home and complained though, we just accepted that's what happened if you misbehaved.

Anyone here remember the school dentist coming in and inspecting everyone's teeth, with a letter to take home if they found a cavity. We dreaded it, the school dentist was a nightmare, No injections for fillings, vile gas masks for extractions, I can still smell the smell of that gas. Nitty Nora, the nurse that rummaged through our heads for nits. We also lined up for a spoonful of cod liver and malt.Same spoon for every child, there was 47 children in my class, one teacher.

47 children in a class, can you imagine the uproar if that was nowadays. We sat in rows and all faced the front, absolutely no talking. When we took the 11+, there was no preparation before hand or testing of any kind.In fact my brother didn't even know he was taking it until the day. We were told our results in the school hall. They called your name and you were told either, pass, fail or borderline which meant you could have another smaller test. No worrying about us being upset at failing.

Snowball fights in the playground, making slides from one end of the playground to the other. Every child trying to make it as slippery as possible, pouring water on it to make it nearly lethal. No going home if the heating failed, you just kept your coats on and did star jumps every 30 minutes to stop you going blue with the cold. Looking back it seems almost impossible that's how it was, but I loved my primary school although it was hard in some ways.

kitten yes the seasonal games! All the girls doing handstands in a row, skirts well tucked into knickers! I made sure to buy my grandsons chalk so they could draw on the concrete slabs in my garden, not sure they would be able to chalk in the street where they live now ;-)

I was also on a newly built council estate. There was so much green space, including a large recreation ground with football pitches and even a metal maypole. The outskirts of the estate were just wilderness. I spent hours looking for tiddlers in the ditch, or picking brambles. We were not expected to be at home much during the day in the holidays.

I was born in the 50s and remember starting school. I remember reciting times tables every day, and sitting at the teacher’s feet for story time. We used to have to put mats out for a nap after lunch. No choice at dinner time, you got what you were given. Assembly every day with all those lovely children’s hymns. Daisies are our silver, buttercups our gold... and All things bright and beautiful. The toilets were through the air raid shelters, and had Bronco toilet paper. School milk with a paper straw at break time. It was often frozen in the winter and had to be thawed out on the radiator. We did PE in our vest and pants. Concrete playground, so our knees were often skinned. We were scared of the headmaster. I don’t remember any overweight pupils, and generally people behaved well. I remember a class for children who we called ‘backward’ . No children of other ethnicities at all. I remember the excitement when a black family moved locally.In our school two classes were taught in the same room with screens down the middle. We just got on with it. At the end of the day we put chairs on the desk and sang a song which went ‘Hands together softly so, little eyes shut tight. Keep us when the dark is near, and through every night. Aaaaamen!’ Then we walked home. I was never taken or collected. Everyone walked home from an early age, often a fair distance with some busy roads. I remember being given raffle tickets to sell and my friend and I ringing doorbells and going into strangers homes to sell them. We never thought anything of it. One day we were told we were going to do the 11 plus exam. No warning or preparation.It was a good time to grow up. At 11 I got two buses every day across town to my senior school.

Always had chapped knees in the winter, from my lovely St Michael gaberdine mac which was somehow always the wrong length. I can remember wishing I was a baby in a pram again on one of those cold wet dark walks home from school!

Also chilblains from sitting too close to the fire with freezing cold feet. There was some weird stinky brown ointment for those.

Oh I do remember chanting times tables! That’s still the best way to learn those IMO - it never leaves you

So many children in one class!
Sounds very competitive too.

lozengeoflove

What was school like in the 50s? Was there a lot of learning by rote? How about discipline?

Can’t remember a thing about learning! but as for discipline, I was caned (on the hand) 4 times in junior school & not for anything particularly bad either.

Education was about being told stuff, learning it, & not asking questions. (Esp in my class of 55! I can’t imagine how the teachers coped)

Lozenge there were 40ish children in my primary class. Yes, tables and spelling were by rote, the teacher used the board a lot and we were in small groups much like today to do our written work. We were in top set, bottom set etc, and had exams every term to determine our place in the class. I was usually top or second, alternating with another girl! We later did lots of practice papers for the 11 plus, only a handful of us passed. I got a place at the local girls' grammar school but didn't go.

knittedfairies!

Very similar memories to everybody else here - ice flowers inside the windows, getting dressed in front of the coke stove in the kitchen, paraffin heaters (we had TWO, there’s posh) in the hall & bathroom (used to hear occasionally of house fires caused by stoves being knocked over so we were very careful!)

Lived in a modern council house on a new estate in Middlesex (that house’s current market value is close to half a million ) with almost no cars & a 1-mile walk to school. My class had 55 pupils right through juniors (110-120 per year but for some reason there were only 11 classrooms, so every 4th year was divided in 2 instead of 3)

There were seasonal activities at break times - the changes were always mysterious to me, but suddenly everyone would be bringing skipping ropes, or roller skates, or bouncy balls for 2 balls, or chalk for hopscotch.

We had a Hoover washing machine - a single drum with a small rotator at the back & a mangle on top. Mangling was a privilege, my brother & I used to fight over it

In the hard winter of 1963, because there were no cars the kids on the estate managed to create an ice slide on the packed snow that was about 100’ long. I don’t think any bones were broken.

Didn’t have a telly until I was about 10 - I think - though I remember Watch with Mother (Andy Pandy, Bill & Ben etc) so maybe it was earlier. Pre-school was listening to Listen with Mother (“are you sitting comfortably? Then I’ll begin!”) Telly was rented for 10 bob (50p) a week from Rumbelows - 20 cigarettes cost 15p-20p so the telly was expensive!

My mum didn't go out to work; she stayed at home to look after 4 children and her MIL. There was always somebody at home when I got home from school, either my mum or grandma. I was very excited to get home from school once to find they were both out. It was a Thursday...

I can remember/ relive the EXCELLENT posts of the 50s, I used to live in a mining village Dad on silly shifts and then down the welfare for a drink or two every night , my mother was ALWAYS washing clothes using the copper gas fired tub with me , younger brother and another one on the way +2 later on into the 60s , So in embarrassment WE were the smelly kids with candle snotty noses ,cardboard in the boot soles and bum hanging out of our short trousers with tattered /thread pulled woollen tank top type jumpers and used to scrump everything available in the allotments when we were hungry and played outside in the woods and local river after school and ALL day at weekends even Sunday after Sunday school until the sun went in and it started to get cold. We were brown as berries and as fit as fleas, we might have been poor but we were happy ragamuffins THEN we moved to the City !!!!!!!!!

We had to know our tables by the age of 7, and wrote them out from 1x2=2 to 12x12=144 every Monday morning while the teacher did the register and collected the dinner money; 5s per week (25p!) We used a dip pen and an inkwell from that age too. It was a great day when a ballpoint pen was introduced (except I couldn't have one as I was a pencil-chewer...)