Life before plastic

[ifigoup]

What did people use before plastics were everywhere? I don’t mean hundreds of years ago when most people lived in filth and had a miserable quality of life; I mean from, say, the late 19th century, when lots of aspects of society then are still pretty recognizable today.

I feel as though if I knew more about what people used before plastics, I’d be encouraged to try some of them and thereby reduce my own plastic use. In the scheme of things it really isn’t very long that plastic’s been ubiquitous, but we seem to have totally naturalized it, and we all know we can’t carry on the way we are.

I know part of the answer is that there are just so many more products now that wouldn’t even have existed in the past and that in all honesty we could probably do without entirely. But what did people use instead of plastic stuff in the following kinds of situations?

Washing up bowls (big ceramic bowls like old-fashioned mixing bowls? Just directly in the kitchen sink?)

Cups and plates for babies/toddlers who are still in the “throw everything on the floor” phase (metal mugs and dishes like you might use for camping? Just accept normal glass and ceramic stuff would get broken?)

Containers for products like facial cleanser and moisturiser (I know we have lots more products now, but in the early/mid 20th century people definitely already used stuff like “cold cream”: what was it contained in? Glass jars?)

Bringing home raw meat, fish etc. (People had their own shopping bags and baskets but what was raw meat etc. actually wrapped up in? Just paper?)

Shampoo, washing up liquid etc. (Did people just use solid soap for everything like this?)

Bars of soap, not sure about washing up detergent, but probably hard soap versions.

Meat/fish wrapped in paper.

Glass jars, yeah. Lots of paperbags for things like flour.
Actually bread: folk made up the dough at home, and took it to the baker in a tin to bake (collected it later to eat). In a shop, the grocer chose things for you & packaged it all up (paper bags or put on counter & customer added to own cloth bag, like a bunch of brocoli or a jar). Loose veg & fruit were the norm. We were suspicious & appalled when plastic wrapped plastic started (1970s).

Babies: Wooden plates and spoons, paper straws (there was a whole article in engineering magazine about how clever paper straws are).

www.onebrownplanet.com/life_before_plastic/

Greaseproof paper for meat.

Oh, great link, Palominoo. Thank you for that. Fascinating.

Containers for products like facial cleanser and moisturiser (I know we have lots more products now, but in the early/mid 20th century people definitely already used stuff like “cold cream”: what was it contained in? Glass jars?)

I'm not sure there was such a thing as cleanser earlier in the 20th century, but creams were in glass containers.

Bringing home raw meat, fish etc. (People had their own shopping bags and baskets but what was raw meat etc. actually wrapped up in? Just paper?)

Yes, paper. And greaseproof paper.

Shampoo, washing up liquid etc. (Did people just use solid soap for everything like this?)

Yes, my father (92 now) says that when he was a child, he used soap to wash his hair. And he remembers washing up with a wire basket under the taps that was filled with bits of soap ... that was used as washing-up liquid.

Shampoo came in glass bottles. Or you could buy foil sachets which were intended for single use, but in practice if you had short hair you could get two or three washes out of them.

Milk, Ribena, squash etc in glass bottles.

Veg always bought loose. The greengrocer weighed it, then tipped it straight into your shopping bag.

Tin plates, mugs etc. I think my grandma had a tin bowl for washing up.

Ceramic pots were used for various 'goos', even cream was sold in ceramic pots.

Washing up biwls would be tin. Buckets were wooden or metal. Bowls and cutlery could be wooden or horn.

When I shop now I notice people buying, say, 4 oranges, and they put them in a plastic bag. Why?
And they do it for everything. Carrots, bananas, whatever.
We have gone bag mad! Just stick them in your shopping bag.
I’m going to start bringing a plastic tub to local butchers too, as he uses a plastic bag.

I'm a child of the '50s.

Food shopping with my mother in the market used to be using an oil skin or cloth shopping bag. Everything was bought loose and tipped into the bag.

Cheese was cut to weight you asked for e.g. 6oz and then wrapped in greaseproof paper, folding all the edges in neatly. Ditto meat.

Glass bottles were used for milk and other liquids. The majority of which were recycled.

Rubbish was wrapped in several sheets of newspaper before putting it in the dustbin (which was made of metal).

The kitchen sink was a butler's sink. Lunch sandwiches were wrapped in greaseproof paper. Bread was unwrapped on the shelves and then just wrapped in a bit of tissue type paper.

Babies’ plates used to be either lightweight tin or enormous heavy ceramic things that no baby could lift let alone hurl. Like this

I vaguely remember one of those Bean, it must have been my dad's. My mum still has the plastic weaning bowls (from the 70s/80s) she used for me and bro, used for picnics these days.

MIL said on wash day with the whites her mother used to use soap and a blue cloth to enhance the whiteness. That would have been the 1930s.

I've started using hard soap for handwashing, showering and shampooing to cut our plastic use.

A lot of glass, greaseproof paper and paper bags were used in the past.

I can remember my Grandma obsessively saving things like used brown paper. She'd flatten it out, then put it under the seat cushion of the armchair so it would flatten some more.

I've just seen an idea on FB to use old net curtains to make little bags for loose fruit and veg, thought that was pretty cool (except I have no net curtains and cannot sew)

You would need to shop pretty much daily for fresh foods. The whole supply chain and distribution of grocery retail is now based on foods being packaged to prolong life.

I remember granny called her kitchen bin a ‘bit bin’ and it was literally that, for all the ‘bits’ that couldn’t go in the fire or on the compost heap. It was tiny and that was what went out for the bin men weekly. Probably less than one plastic supermarket bag worth.

And yes glass or earthenware bottles for all liquids and creams and paper (often old newspapers) for meat and fish and paper bags for veg. All of which were disposed of on the fire and bottles returned.

And the pop man and the milk man of course.

Not necessarily @smarmy granny would shop on a Friday. She had a fridge and larder. Friday would be fish (so it was fresh still) there would be meat on Saturday a roast on Sunday that would last as cold meat for a couple of days then longer lasting meats like bacon later in the week. By Thursday you were on things like eggs and cheese that last longer.

Babies bottles were glass, dolls had China heads, sinks were porcelain, meat and fish was wrapped in paper, certain things just weren't used like our plethora of grooming products - bar soap was all they had and make up was limited and in glass or china pots. People lived quite differently!

People didn't eat out like they do now. During an average working day, I see people carrying their morning coffee (in a single use cup) whilst carrying a crossiant in plastic wrap. Then, at lunchtime, it will be a salad in a plastic container, alongside a plastic bottle of juice and pot of fruit!!!

Just accept normal glass and ceramic stuff would get broken?
There, in that one sentence, you show the different mentality.

Back then physical goods were expensive so people looked after them. They treasured what they had. They repaired, re-used, re-purposed. They didn't have the throw-away mentality.
It's why oldies are such hoarders.

Washing up bowls were enamel.
Lunch was wrapped in grease proof or waxed paper then packed in an old biscuit or oxo tin.
Sliced bread was sold wrapped in waxed paper.
Milk was delivered in glass bottles that were returned.
Pop bottles were glass, when you returned them to the shop you got your ‘deposit’ of a few pence back.

This is a really interesting thread.

I have to say that I’ve never used wooden bowls or horn cutlery!

Bottle feeding (history!) was unusual before 1890s. It's tied up with industrialising cow's milk production (knowing how to do that safely, reliably, cheaply), and recognising that germs caused illness.

People got wet nurses instead. My grandfather (b. 1897) was in a wealthy family; his twin got the wet nurse (died around 11m old & great-gran blamed the wet nurse). They didn't understand how to formulate healthy human milk substitute and couldn't sterilise the equipment, or even understand that germs existed (if you got back in time far enough).

At one point, babies were on (woman's) milk until 9m, when they would be weaned completely off mother's milk onto runny porridge & other things that came out of bowls. Tin bowls were common... lead bowls, if you go back long enough, iirc.

Breastfed infants turn into more stroppy kids?! Well that explains a lot

We didn’t shop daily, though milk was delivered daily.
Vegetables were seasonal, and winter root vegetables kept well, so didn’t need to be bought daily.
Tinned vegetables were used more extensively than they are now.

We didn't have a fridge until the early 60s so shopping was pretty much daily and only things in season could be purchased.

Everything was wrapped in paper from tiny paper bags for sweets to meat in greased paper and fish in newspaper. Cream cakes in thin cardboard boxes. Tinned food including fruit, cream, veg and baby food were the norm.

As a child even my dolls baby bottle was glass with a rubber teat though plastic dolls had become the norm by the time I was growing up. My dolls pram was a complete replica of a standard Silver Cross with no plastic and my toy oven was metal and had little burner things you could light - yes really. It was also really sharp. Toys were often dangerous!!

I get bottles of milk delivered and I rinse and return, I'm in semi rural Scotland and had no idea hardly any people do this until my cousins from London were visiting and were fascinated