Meet the Other Phone. Child-safe in minutes.

Meet the Other Phone.
Child-safe in minutes.

Buy now

Please or to access all these features

Chat

Join the discussion and chat with other Mumsnetters about everyday life, relationships and parenting.

Things from your childhood that feel like ancient history now

433 replies

Echobelly · 13/05/2021 22:29

  • 3 TV channels
  • Everything shut on Sunday (and local shops often shut Wednesday afternoons for some reason?) Confused
  • 1/2 pennies
  • Only asking 'What does your dad do?'
  • A lot of people having black and white tellies
  • Holiday brochures

These are some of the things that I think will seem inexplicable to my kids!

OP posts:
Thread gallery
5
the80sweregreat · 14/05/2021 06:43

I remember decimal currency coming in as a small child and my mum trying to work out what equated to which coins or notes as both parents tended to still work out the price of things in old money!

One pound notes in bright green were cool.
Shops being shut on Sunday ( apart from the newsagents) they didn't open on a Sunday until
1994!
Outside toilets at primary school
The caretaker of the school living on the property in a school house of his own. (He was horrible as well. )
Tuf shoes
Finding 2ps for the phone box.
Most clothes out of C and A being brown or orange.
Daisy boutique shop in town which always sold floaty long dresses we couldn't afford.
Window shopping
Sing something simple on the radio
Man about the house on tv. Very risqué for its time.
Carry on films being on all the time.

Confuseddotmum · 14/05/2021 06:57

Having your hair checked in class by the school nit nurse

BikeRunSki · 14/05/2021 06:59

School dinner puddings that were actual cake a d custard. No hidden veg!

Ifailed · 14/05/2021 07:13

PE at primary school in your knickers and vest, undressing as a class in the school hall. Teacher would wheel out a radio and we had to follow the instructions of a very posh women from Music & Motion: "small as a mouse, now as big as a house!"
The teacher would keep an eye on us through the window as she had a fag outside. At the end all got dressed and walked back to our classroom. I remember there would always be couple of kids with no vests who would stand their shivering in winter.
Being forced to sit on my left hand when writing (it was the devil's hand, apparently), even though I was left-handed.
A remedial class for kids of all ages, where they spent the day painting and playing. Headmaster would visit it every day with a cane to dish out the punishments.
A boy in my class lost his hand in an accident with some farm machinery. He was back in school within days and would try and scare us with his stump. He drowned in the summer in the river and everyone speculated whether he had killed himself - he would have been about 8.

fourquenelles · 14/05/2021 07:15

Many similar memories to PPs.

Mini skirts being fashionable before tights became affordable for school girls like me. We rolled over the waistbands of our skirts trying not to expose our stocking tops and suspenders (and granny knickers in winter).

Wearing a sanitary belt fashioned from a crepe bandage.

Getting Jackie magazine every week.

Writing a letter to join the fan club of my favourite group (The Herd)

Platform shoes being the only sort you could buy once they became fashionable.

The local corner shop with open sacks of flour and a cat sleeping on top.

Black Jack's 4 for a penny

Deathraystare · 14/05/2021 07:18

If you got an electric shock your parents didn’t even bat an eyelid.

Too bloody right they didn't!" I got a shock from my bedside lamp and screamed! No one came so I marched downstairs to get some attention. My mum coolly told me that "they give electric shocks to people with rheumatism all the time" which was an added worry because I had had juvenile Rheumatoid Arthritis (Stills disease)!

I remember green shield stamps and the Co op ones.

I loved teletext!

Undeuxdrei · 14/05/2021 07:26

being smacked at school I remember one teacher at secondary school throwing a board rubber at someone and another tipping the contents of someone's bag over their head Shock late 70s/early 80s
Going on a day trip in year 8 to Whitby. Not educational in any sense, allowed to wander round the arcades etc unaccompanied whilst the teachers sat in the pub. This was at a decent secondary school in a nice leafy suburb.
Out on our bikes all day, cycling full speed down a hill in the middle of the road. No thought given to traffic.
In and out of others kid's houses, parents didn't have a clue where we were. Going down to the canal, near some locks, probably 9 or 10 years of age, wandering round some local woods in an off the beaten track area.
Agree that girls' clothing was pretty plain, certainly no pinks, frills etc. Girls looked their age, only a minority wore makeup for school, could be sent home for wearing it.
Swimming lessons, maybe football for boys after school. Certainly not the wide range of stuff available now. And you just went to your local school, end of.

Ylvamoon · 14/05/2021 07:34

Different country & idyllic village life (🤔)

We had to go to school ever other Saturday.

Cycling everywhere as a teenager, no chance for lifts from parents. Even to the local swimming pool in 30°C + heat.
Having a walk-man.
3 TV channels
Spending the summer holidays in groups of 8+ kids playing in the local river/ fields...
(and parents always knew somehow what we were up to!)

NoseOfJericho · 14/05/2021 07:35

I remember only 2 TV channels, only black and white.
Old pennies for the phone box, no phone in the house.
No central heating and a bath on Friday night.
Ice in pretty patterns on my bedroom windows.
Books for school, no internet, pens with nibs and inkwells in desks, blotting paper. Blackboards, no whiteboards.
Educational films were shown via a projector on a sheet of white paper which was hung up.
Buying No. 6 cigarettes in packs of 10 for my mother from the local shop, they new me and what she smoked.
Milkman delivering to the back door, milk in glass bottles and carried in a metal carrier that rattled. It progressed to also being able to order Corona, and bread.
Coal deliveries, big bunker in the back garden.
Coal fire, toasting fork and sliced bread, we took turns making our own toast for Sunday tea in winter, and fishpaste sandwiches and celery in summer.
Sanitary towels with loops and an elastic belt, suspender belts and stockings that slipped down, and then one day there were tights, which also slipped down. I would get as far as the bus stop (normal bus, not a school bus, we didn't have those) and the tights would be almost at my knees.
Half day closing on Wednesdays for shops and closing at about 5.30. Proper shops, no supermarkets.
Being able to make an appointment for the GP by phoning and not holding for 40 minutes to be cut off when your turn came. GP visits when you were ill.
Bike rides, safe ones in country lanes, hardly any cars, and when there were they didn't pelt along like a bat out of hell.
Records that played at 78 on a big wooden radiogram, followed by vinyl ones that played at 33 on a steriogram, and 45's, with needles in a little tin with the HMV dog on.
Walkman, much, much later.
School milk, frozen and popping out of the little glass bottles in winter, and a biscuit for morning break.
School dinners, served on proper plates, which were pink, yellow and blue and school puddings, real food, cooked in a kitchen and delivered daily.
Cameras that took black & white photos, box brownie cameras, then coloured film, developed at the chemist and took about 2 weeks to get your photos.
Getting 6d worth of chips in a little bag, wrapped in newspaper as a treat. Old silver 6d coins and old 1d coins, half crowns, threepenny bits, ten bob notes...
Films at the cinema like 'Whistle Down the Wind' (Hayley Mills).
Binmen collecting the bins from outside the back door, up the driveway, bins were metal and noisy. They never left rubbish strewn about.
Same 2 weeks holiday every year, when the factory closed down, usually to the same boarding house or a similar one, holidays were always spent in one of 2 places.
Grass was mown with a rotary mower, no electric ones, no petrol powered noisy leaf blowers, just rakes and brooms.
Cars were black, then they gradually became coloured.
Not owning loads of stuff, life was simple, and slower, and quieter, and the air was fresher.

NoseOfJericho · 14/05/2021 07:36

'knew me' not new me.
Also remember, no printers, a Roneo thing for making copies. And manual typewriters.

AuntieStella · 14/05/2021 07:39

Roneo thing for making copies

Banda machine - remember the smell?

btchymcbtchfce · 14/05/2021 07:42

Going on a boat to get to school with a man from the town across the bay
No internet
Looking for eels in the stream

Amelia666 · 14/05/2021 07:52

No mobile phones, childhood freedom to go off exploring/playing outside all day with no parental contact or concerns, no home internet.

Ludoole · 14/05/2021 07:55

Going round the neighbours to see if anyone had 50ps for the gas and electricity meters and the slot in the back of the telly Grin
Climbing all over the corona pop flatbed wagon to see what flavours he had.
The chip van that came round on Friday nights and the sweetie van that came round twice a week.
Getting my nans cigarettes on tick from the ice cream van Grin

BikeRunSki · 14/05/2021 07:58

I remember being sent home from school netball practice early to watch C4 launch! Our reception was so bad we couldn’t watch it anyway!!

2 pairs of shoes - brown Clark’s school shoes and PE pumps - either the black elasticated ones or Dunlop Green Flash when our feet got too big. Wellies too, generally too big and adjust by wearing lots of socks!!

Clothes were expensive! New clothes were handmade or a big treat!! Not something you could throw in the trolley with the weekly shop. A lot of clothes were handed down.

Puffinhead · 14/05/2021 08:39

Posh writing paper. My friends and I (age 10-12) would spend all our money on fancy sheets and envelopes - all bought individually.

Strip washes at the kitchen sink. I hated it.

Puffinhead · 14/05/2021 08:47

At Primary-

Hymn practice assembly once a week. I went to my DC harvest assembly a few years and was most disappointed that they didn’t sing any hymns at all - I was looking forward to belting out ‘we plough the fields and scatter’!

Also, learning ‘Joseph and the amazing technicolour dreamcoat’ in music lessons.

stillcrazyafterall · 14/05/2021 08:57

Crapping yourself when you got your homework back, marked with a 'see me' in red pen. 😭

NoseOfJericho · 14/05/2021 09:00

@AuntieStella

Roneo thing for making copies

Banda machine - remember the smell?

Yes, the smell, and they were wet.
Krook · 14/05/2021 09:04

At school in the 70s/early 80s.
PE in vest, pants and bare feet, no such thing as PE kit!
Dense cigarette smoke in the staff room.
Getting smacked when naughty.
One telly for the whole school, then when computers came along, one of those for the whole school, ceremoniously wheeled in to a hushed classroom Grin

NoseOfJericho · 14/05/2021 09:05

@BikeRunSki

I remember being sent home from school netball practice early to watch C4 launch! Our reception was so bad we couldn’t watch it anyway!!

2 pairs of shoes - brown Clark’s school shoes and PE pumps - either the black elasticated ones or Dunlop Green Flash when our feet got too big. Wellies too, generally too big and adjust by wearing lots of socks!!

Clothes were expensive! New clothes were handmade or a big treat!! Not something you could throw in the trolley with the weekly shop. A lot of clothes were handed down.

I had Clarkes T bar shoes, horrible things. And black plimsolls.

No new clothes until I was about 15, everything else was second or third had and usually far too big. School uniform was new but always big enough to last until I left, elasticated waist skirts that were taken in and let out as I grew, almost touched the ground. Summer dresses were home made and horrible pleated things that blew up in the wind.

PopsicleHustler · 14/05/2021 09:07

@musication

Wnat a coincidence. It was Portsmouth

MoonCatcher · 14/05/2021 09:09

Thinking it was fun when waking up to find frost on the inside of the bedroom windows and being able to scratch drawings onto them (and I didn't grow up in a poor household)

Howshouldibehave · 14/05/2021 09:12

Having a ‘telephone table’ in the hall where your one phone was-alongside the family telephone book, the BT phone book, the yellow pages and chatting away being aware that EVERYONE in the house could hear every word you said Grin

Echobelly · 14/05/2021 09:14

When we bought our house 6 years ago it still had the downstairs loo that you could only access from outside! I think it was the only one on the row, and possible the street, that had. We moved it inside 4 years ago.

I don't think handmedowns is an old thing really? Have definitely had them between my kids, even though a girl and a boy. I was youngest of 3 so I did get a bit tired of them though!

OP posts:
Swipe left for the next trending thread