Occupations that no longer exist.

[Eyresandgraces]

I was changing the bed and remembered that in the 1970’s, so not that long ago, dh’s aunt was a tick turner for Fogarty’s.
She spent her whole working day turning pillowcases the correct way round and pointing the corners with her thumbs.
i can’t imagine such a monotonous job.

I found a list of old occupations but Tick turner is not listed.

A Tosher made a living by scavenging the Victorian sewers. Grim.

Please feel free to add any you can think of.

https://rmhh.co.uk/occup/a.html

Asbestos miner, retailer.

Audio transcription could be really well paid in the 2000s. I was a freelance transcriber for a small company based in London who had corporate communication, TV and radio clients. Cassette, dictaphone and VHS tapes would be biked over. Digital files were rare.

I was paid £7.50 per 1000 words of the transcript. On a fast script with one or two speakers, you could type 3000+ words, for which you’d be paid £22.50 per hour. In 2003!

I don’t know the most I ever typed in a day but I remember making £1000 in 6 days.

Nothing had been offshored back then so you weren’t competing with typists working for peanuts on the other side of the world. And of course there wasn’t the AI software that there is now, which can produce a 95% accurate transcription in seconds.

https://www.todayyoushouldknow.com/articles/how-do-court-reporters-type-so-fast

The shabbos goy.

@godmum56 Thank you, I didn't know the name until now.

Thank you! That's so interesting. 😀

Reading this brought back memories. I trained as a secretary, and one of the exams we had to do was an RSA in audio transcription. I used an audio machine for years in my job; I used to love it. Did you have a machine with the foot pedals to pause or rewind the tape? I wish they'd paid me what they'd paid you; that was amazing money for the time and well deserved! We typists were considered the lowest of the low (I worked for Social Services and some of the Social Workers were so snooty towards us and couldn't even be bothered to remember our names - one woman just called me "Admin" for years 😂 - what a charmer 😂 )

A man handed me one outside Moorgate station 2 Thursdays ago!

Back in the 1960s I was a British Rail Fireman on Steam Locomotives, not very much call for them nowadays.

Dark room technician -take the X-ray film from the cassette and feed it Ito the machine- all automated or computerised now.

@Foodie333 I am glad this thread got resurrected. I had been trying to remember your post and what the lady in the mink coat did in NY in the 80’s. My DH was working in NY in the 80’s and I wanted to see if he remembered anything like that.

WANG word processor

Something similar. Many, many years ago (long before I was born), my DF used to cycle to a Jewish bakery on a Saturday to light the ovens. It wasn't nearby either, so he had to cycle quite a few miles.

I've just remembered at my first 'proper' job we had someone come round to clean the phones.

I've just been reading back this thread.

I don't think it exists any more but I bet Andrew would have one if he could.

yup, they were called "Kleenafone"

Bristow and his dreams of Miss Pretty of Kleenaphone.

considering the flap he got in when a pen was in his way, gesturing for people to move it while looking mortally offended, I doubt he wipes his own bum.

My Grandad had a shop that did TV repairs (later video repairs too) and rental TVS and video players.
apparently, growing up, my mum had a colour TV, until someone bought or rented the shop model, then theirs would go back in until they got another one in.
they also had the coin operated ones, and would go around and collect the money from them.
when video rentals became a thing, they had that too.

although it all sounds pretty obsolete now, he did end up very well off by retirement.

I get milk delivered. glass bottles. local dairy.
both of my parents were milkmen/women.
and then branched out into things like selling bags of potatoes (remember we spent evenings weighing out a bag, and I'd use the little tape dispenser thing to seal each bag, with the tape like you get on a bread bag) and other general things.
also, used to LOVE the Dairy Diary. found it fascinating. it had loads of recipes, conversion charts, things like wedding anniversary traditional materials, birthstones and all that. I loved it. we always had one.

I used to get taken to school in an electric milkfloat. there was no passenger seat, no seatbelts, no DOORS. I sat on an upturned milk crate in the passenger seat area, and held on for dear life. thank goodness it really couldn't pick up any speed.

we still get one from time to time in summer.
when lockdown happened I started instantly craving a Mr Whippy (the weather was lovely at the time) the first time he came back I let myself be talked into going for a large whippy, and felt a bit sick by the end of it, but it was SO GOOD.

I expect so. as far as I know MDEC still exists (the people that type in the addresses that IMPS machines can't automatically read) my husband used to do that.

used to do this manually when I was a dental nurse. loved processing the x rays.
but I also did GCSE photography and adored the dark room. admittedly, for the x rays, we didn't have a dark room, we had a machine where you put the casing in, closed it, stuck your arms in the sleeves, opened it and fed it into the rollers that would take it through the different tanks until it came out the other end developed. but I always enjoyed it.