Can anyone tell me honestly that back in the 70s they didn't know.....

[Jux]

... that hitting your head badly could result in brain damage? And that hitting your head repeatedly, badly or not, could also result in brain damage?

I was 12 in 1970; it seemed self-evident that head bang could lead to brain damage. Like a punch the lower back could injure something inside (wasn't sure what, mind, v ignorant of biology at the time!).

DP had a friend who as a student, when he received his first grant cheque (those were the days)
paid it in at the bank
immediately withdrew it all, counted it
then paid it back in

I think he thought there was a little cubby hole back there with his name on it and a stack of notes

The problematic thing with being paid by cheque in the 60s and 70s was that the banks were only open during weekday working hours. Building societies were open on a Saturday morning so DF had what I think was a special arrangement with his to let him withdraw cash. He had to sometimes forego his lunch hour to cycle into town to go to the bank (not sure if it closed part of lunchtime too.)

I found an unopened paypacket — that’s a weekly paypacket of course, not monthly!

There were credit cards in the 1970s and writing a cheque in a shop was a normal thing. I think you might be referring to the 60s, decimalisation was in 1971

I think there was some awareness, but it wasn't as widespread as it is now. That's likely due to better safety awareness, better diagnostics, better statistics and better sharing of information both nationally and internationally in terms of the long term effects.

Think of all the activities that it is now common knowledge generally requires a protective helmet now than before. Cycling and skiing for example. Building sites. Rollercycling, skateboarding...

As a child, there was literally no such thing as a cycling helmet. You fell off, you hit your head hard, you cried and you got up. I once momentarily knocked myself out on the pavement after falling off my bike aged about 8, but as I was OK afterwards it was "all right".( I didn't even bother telling my parents about it at the time because I was "all right" and went on to play!)

The one exception I can think of is horseriding, where hard hats were expected to be worn even back in the day. Obviously falling from height was seen as more serious than "just" the blow to the head aspect.

I started full time work in 1974 age 16 as a lab assistant and my pay was paid monthly into a bank account, I got £63 a month iirc, I kept one third, saved one third and paid one third board to my parents, by the mid 70s I think a lot of pay got paid via bank accounts.

regarding head injuries, it was probably known but people didn't take so much notice of h and s then

We knew about head injuries, concussions etc but didn’t really know about links to dementia, long term damage. Remember we didn’t have the sophisticated imaging we have now. No CTs or MRIs, or complex neurostimulator tests or contrast imaging, just X-rays which aren’t always terribly helpful.

Dementia was known about but it wasn’t terribly common in acute care when I started nursing in the early 1990s as people often didn’t live long enough to become demented.

I still find it quite bizarre and shocking that in the 21st century, with the knowledge we have relating to brain injury and concussion that boxing is legal and considered a sport.

My first ever job was paid cash.
In the little brown envelope with a clear window, you had notes folded over (like a third showing) and change in the window side so you could count it.
On the non window side was the calculation from memory.
Gross
-tax
-NI

• payments for tools or clothes

Net

Usually hand written.
You had to count it there and then, sign for it all before you opened the envelope.
Once you had opened it you were deemed to have accepted it as correct.

Yes, we knew. I was in hospital with concussion at age 7 in 1976 so clearly the knowledge was there.
But like a lot of things in the past, knowledge of danger didn't necessary translate to behaviour modifications. Children didn't wear helmets to ride bikes, and a slap round the head was not uncommon. I had a teacher who would hit students over the head with the board rubber.

How many people today are aware of the increased risk of brain damage to women from head injuries as compared to men?

I remember my DGM having accounts with local shops, she would place a weekly order which would be delivered, then she would settle up at the end of the week.

Sounds familiar, no?

My uncle died of brain cancer in the 70s. My father always told us it was the rugby that caused it. Getting hit in the head again and again. He never allowed my brothers to do any contact sports.
I was a child, so I don't know where my father's opinion came from.

I was writing cheques for school trips etc up to about 2008!
Senile dementia was a thing but people were generally hidden away - as my mother would say: 'Mrs X went a bit doollally, it's very sad...'

I don’t think I was aware in the seventies of those things but I was only 12 in 1979. If I was aware I didn’t give it much thought.

There were credit cards in the 1970s

I don't think many people had them and fewer really used them. I got one when I opened my first bank account before going to uni in 1979 because it was Barclays, and their barclaycard also served as the 'cheque guarantee' card. I didn't use it as a credit card till my second year when I'd run short of funds one term and needed it for a train ticket home - but paid it off before interest was due.

Ah cash was lovely. Cheques a pain (especially when you needed a cheque guarantee card to go with it).

I remeber head banging ( as in heavy metal) being highlighted as very dangerous so yes everyone knew about repeated damage.
However smoking was everywhere so you were more likely to die of that and heart attacks/ industrial accidents were rife. So perspective is everything.

I think we all knew a blow to the head could be dangerous. But we tended to think that if the person got up and seemed ok afterwards, then it hadn’t done any real harm

Im in my 50s so, yep, this. and what @toastofthetown said. we knew a bang on the head to knock you out was bad. We didn’t realise that lots of smaller bangs was as dangerous as it appears to be. We didn’t have the data tracking medical records through to old age, or sophisticated imaging technology. So the connection just wasn’t made.

But this is worse as they use their heads, NFL is much more dangerous

Such a shame this thread has been derailed as it is an interesting discussion about head injury.

Paid in cash or by cheque, either way the payslip had the taxes etc. worked out.

child Benefit and pensions etc. came in a Giro; you had a book of beautifully printed and embossed tear off squares and would queue up in a post office to get it cashed. They’d stamp it and tear it off and hand you the money.

Tuesdays were pensions day; the queue in the post office would go on forever. Cash into the purse and then do the weekly shop when it.

you could endorse the slip fo give permission for someone else to cash if. Heady stuff as a girl, being trusted with the giro to cash it out and bring back whatever was on the shopping list.

cheques and credit cards existed too. You’d write a cheque for most things or go to the bank to get a bankers draft for bigger items. And credit cards were fed into a marvellously tactile clicky clacky slider thing which used carbon paper to take two copies of the numbers and name on the card. I so wanted to work somewhere where I could feed the card in and slide the thing.

The first cycle helmet I ever saw was in the early 80s, a flatmate's boyfriend bought one of these newfangled things after coming a cropper on a pothole.

I received conventional payslips from my teaching job, but holiday jobs as a student were indeed cash in a brown envelope. A payslip was included, showing how the wage had been calculated, and what deductions had been made.
It became more common in the 70's to write a cheque at the checkout for the big weekly shop.
Slightly earlier times, but after the "Mods & Rockers" disturbances in the late 60's, it was a cause for comment that one young miscreant, when brought to justice and fined, cause a small stir by producing a cheque book to pay his fine; this was considered decidedly uppity for a young working-class man. It was still possible to conduct one's affairs entirely in cash, unless enjoying a lavish lifestyle.

I even remember the rooms full of clouds of purple smoke in the 80s and we smoked in a pub for the last time when I was a student for what I remember as 2004. I know the ban was later, it's just the last time I personally lit up in a pub

in our playground were metal bars like at playgrounds and DC used to hang upside down on them, there was no safety stuff underneath, I can't imagine DC would hang upside down from bars at schools nowadays in playgrounds

I was still being paid by cash in the mid-late 90s. 1500 people all being paid in cash on the same day, probably £300,000 in cash in a small office behind a sheet of glass with a couple of older ladies handing over the pay packets and ticking your name off the list. It's amazing there weren't more armed robberies.

I love that there are two different conversations going on on this thread.

Reminds me of being at my Nan's house. It happened frequently there 🙂