What jobs did your Grandparents do?

[VioletBam]

And your Great Grandparents....AND what do you do? I'm just interested in the journeys...and I know this isn't really an AIBU but hey...there are more people here!

Here are mine....

Maternal Grandfather: Steelworker
Maternal Grandmother: Cleaner

Paternal Grandfather: Steelworker
Paternal Grandmother: Waitress

Great Maternal Grandfather: Boilermaker/Steelworker
Great Maternal Grandmother: Maid in a private house

Great Paternal Grandfather: Docker
Great Paternal Grandmother: Cleaner

Me: Actor and copywriter

I want to see other people's lists if possible...I find it fascinating that such a short time ago, some of my relatives couldn't write...a couple of those listed signed their marriage certificates with an X and beside that, the Registrar had written "Her mark".

It seems so strange...so few years have passed but so much social change has gone on. What will OUR great grandchildren see when they look at our records?

Paternal grandfather: policeman
Paternal grandmother: housewife
Maternal grandfather: dressmaker in the East End
Maternal grandmother: hairdresser

Nurse / bus driver and miner / housewife

What a rich tapestries of histories. Am loving this thread.
I am currently looking at the ideas around 'housewife' and all it entails with group of young women students.
Things that have surprised them

• Women giving up work on marriage - some professions you had to for others it was tradition
• Women unable to take out hire purchase agreements in their own right
• Women either going without or giving the larger meals/pieces of meat to their menfolk
• The really hardious work some women did (one has found her ggm worked in the mines in Scotland) I could go on .. but will derail the thread and bore you all

Here's a thing, EastMids.

My perception of Eng&W censuses is that women living with their husbands almost never have an occupation listed. Occasionally a particular census taker has recorded them, but they've been crossed out. Adult daughters in the household often DO have occupation recorded.

Once the husband dies, the married woman starts being described as "laundress" or "nail maker".

Where the husband's occupation was low-paid, I would be astonished if the wives weren't doing these occupations all along.

Like I say, this is my perception rather than something I've rigorously analysed, but if even partially correct the impact of this failure to record on our understanding of women's contribution to the paid workforce and the economy must be substantial.

By contrast, my perception of the Scottish censuses is that they frequently do record married women's occupations.

So interesting!

My paternal GP were dairy farmer and housewife. PGGPs were dairy farmers and housewives, and builder/soldier and housewife. F was senior civil servant and trained as teacher and bookbinder.

MGGPs - draper/soldier and housewife (amateur performer I think with GGM - loved music and although uneducated had an intuitive sense of literature, danced the charleston in her 70s). Laborer and housewife.

MGPs - accountant and housewife/store assistant and administrator. Mother is teacher.

Siblings and I - youth worker training to b teacher, community sector and scientist/public policy. My son's dad is a musician/cook/business man.

From a lineage:
Paternal Grand dad- King
Paternal Grand ma- Housewife (one of many)

Maternal g.mother - book keeper and mum of 4
Maternal g.father - production assembly worker AC Delco

Paternal g father - cook in the army then signalman for British Rail
Paternal g mother - nurse in native country then came here. Not sure what job she did here, was not nursing.

Dad engineer, milkman, s e landscape gardener.
Mum auxiliary nurse, then administrator

Me. Shop worker, office administrator then cleaner. Wharever I can get to earn nmw to fit in with school hours.

Think my great great grandfather was a roadworker

My Maternal grand parents had a plant nursery where they grew tomatos and cucumbers and had a little greengrocers/florists

No idea what my paternal grandfather did as he died in 1939 other than gambling. My grandmother was probably just worked the land they had in Cyprus

My mother started off as a secretary and ended up Import administrator and my dad was a shoemaker

DH and electronics engineer and I am accounts administrator

DC both students but work p/t
DS currently a lifeguard and DD and SEN playworker

Maternal Grandfather - ? died when my Mother was very young
Maternal Step-Grandfather - coal miner
Maternal Grandmother - in service before marriage.

Paternal Grandfather - coal miner
Paternal Grandmother - housewife

Me - retail manager before being a SAHM (who incidentally lives in a house built on the site of the colliery where her grandfathers worked)

That's interesting, Surely. Men of my parents' generation - so most MNers' grandparents' - considered it shameful if their wife "had to work". This would be the 1950s-60s, so in fact it was becoming normal and expected that women would have careers - although they could still have their employment terminated on marriage or pregnancy. But I remember this attitude being very deep-rooted. That suggests it was a generational prejudice learned at their parents' knees (war work excepted, of course.)

Perhaps the census takers were sparing the husbands' manly pride?! (By erasing the wives' realities.)

The word 'spinster' means a woman who didn't find a husband to rely on for a living. Spinning wasn't a compulsory occupation but was considered less socially awful than, say, taking in washing or brewing beer.

EastMids

what is quite amazing for my maternal grandmother was she got divorced in 1930s I think - she married a conman (not my grandfather!) but she thought she was pregnant when she married him (she wasn't, but became so).

Her father had a bit of property and money (tallyman but basically working class made good) and he helped her get a divorce.

Her aunts (his sisters) apparently would not speak to her for a while after her divorce (shame obviously).

Another fascinating story.

My maternal grandfather was away in WW2 (Paris etc) and my mum was sent to boarding school by her mum (mum born 1941) for safety but also education - maternal GF came back from war with syphillis I think (yes nice!) maternal GM promptly divorced him. maternal GF then found out my mum was in boarding school and wanted to bring her up. He got custody but by bringing his mum (my maternal GGM) over from Germany where she was living - maternal GGM and my GM (my mum's mum) both had same surname, apparently court believed this or maybe just were happy to grant custody to a female relative. My mum eventually went to live with my nana (her mum) at 13 - she was sadly told by her dad (maternal GF) that her mum was dead - untrue. Interesting about the custody though isn't it?

slightly derailing - I have a few stories of bombs etc (quite sad sometimes) in London where both GPs lived pre war etc.

The one that stuck in my mind was a doddlebug above a cafe near Brixton Town Hall which I think bombed the cafe and all people in it.

the other one was I think Clapham South tube station was bombed and flooded - my nana told me as a child/teenager that it was flooded, people obviously drowned who were down there using it as an air raid shelter and apparently you could see hand prints on the tube station walls after it happened. thanks nana!

Garlic - my nana worked pre-WW2 and after despite her marriages (she was married 3 times!).

My nana (maternal GM) was very much a career woman and wanted her own money. In fact she started and ran her own business an employment agency after WW2 with help of her 3rd husband (his money), word has it that he wouldn't let her expand the business much (his money) otherwise I'd be one of the Brook Street/Reed etc heiresses!

Nana still did very well out of it though... she had the business acumen apparently not her 3rd husband.

2nds - how is this a 'class' thread?!

we are just swapping stories about history and what people have done.

I will say this - my brother's GF as a teenager was in care with an unhappy childhood (the girls I think asked to be taken into care) - though she knew of her father she didn't know much and didn't know much about her mum's side either, her mum sadly died when brother's GF was in her mid 20s. I think maybe she would have liked to have known more about both sides but found it painful etc. For people in those situations I do think this can be hard on them emotionally to deal with. Hope I am putting this well.

My great grandmothers didn't work I don't think. My grandmothers didn't either from what I remember, though my dds mum may have had a PT job for a while.

I can't remember off hand so need to go get my laptop and look up my ancestry stuff.

I was the first in my family to go to university though.

Sounds like your nana had the sense to divorce anyone who wouldn't let her earn some dosh (or give her syphilis), Super Wise woman.

I hadn't heard that story about Clapham South - and it was my local station for years! How ghastly.

A lot of the older people in my life would freak out whenever they heard anything that sounded like a doodlebug. Actually, the BBC sound file just gave me the chills. The air raid sirens were still sounded for practice in my childhood, and I must have learned the fear of the buzz-bomb (especially when the engine stops!) from my elders.
We are so fortunate not to have lived through war on our country.

The 'air raid' siren (general emergency siren) gets tested once a month where I live Garlic - the first time I heard it after moving here I freaked out wondering why the hell there was an air raid siren blaring!

PGF - DK, he was killed in the war and my dad never knew him (that's the official story -, my DM who disliked my PGM, maintains Dad was the result of GMs liaison with a married man who then abandoned her).
PGM - Cleaner

MGF - Radio Operator for BOAC and then admin at the Irish Lighthouse service

MGM - SAHM and cleaner

Me - many things over the years but recently got an MSc and am now setting up a professional practice in my new field.

Maternal great grandmother - homemaker

Maternal great grandfather - Pastor

Maternal grandmother - Cleaner / unemployed (my mum jokes that she worked one day in her whole life lol)

Maternal grandfather - rum shop / pub owner (Barbados)

(Paternal - I am not close to my dad so don't really know anything about his family)

Mother - nurse for most of her life, but has also been a childminder and a florist

Father - Bus driver

Me - I work in software support.

My sister and I were the first ones in our immediate family to go to university and complete degrees. My mum always pushed us to achieve more than she had, although I think she has done well for herself!

Maternal Grandfather - Carpenter and Joiner
Maternal Grandmother - Housewife (before marriage worked in a hotel)
Paternal Grandfather - Army Officer
Paternal Grandmother - Housewofe (before marriage worked in a paper mill)
Maternal Great-Grandparents - Minor, Tailoress, Tailor and Shop Assistant
Paternal Great-Grandparents - Paper Mill Worker, Housewife, Lorry Driver and Housewife

My occupation: Assessor

I think this is yet another class thread

Yes it is, in that it shows how individual histories connect to broader national & international histories, and how class - access to capital, to education - form individuals', families' and nations' lives/histories.

I'm struck by how many people's grandparents were in domestic service - within living memory. And how certain types of jobs/professions recur in family histories.

I find it fascinating also how both World Wars have had such a huge effect on individual & family histories - I know that WWII had a very material & significant effect in my father's family. Not least my regret I never met my father's father, who was, by all, accounts, an extraordinary man.

Previous ancestors:
Few of the women were working; bringing up families; some before marriage had service type jobs
Males - lots of miners and agricultural labouring; also one GGGF was a station master

GGM - none worked outside of home
GGF - not 100%, lots of mining primarily

Maternal GM - didn't work; brought up 6 children
Maternal GF - think he worked in factory offices (can't remember!)
Paternal GM - don't work; brought up 7 children; single parent for a while
Paternal GF -

Mum - worked PT in an admin job for a few years; pre didPT cleaning work in schools; now retired
Dad - currently works in a logistics support role in an office; pre worked in a factory (initially on shop floor, moving up to office)

Me: Teacher (was, now HLTA)
Brother: Software engineer (or similar I think!)
Sister: solicitor

My immediate grandparents missed the wars mostly due to being either too young to go to war; or being too old. Some of their siblings went to war however - more than one lost their lives due to the war, so ever actually got to have a job. Have visited a couple of their graves/memorials in France.

For my family - I was the first to go to university, get a degree and a job requiring such qualifications. My brother and sister also went on to do so. Only a couple of my cousins have done so. I suspect more of their own children will do so though - its much more of an expectation now, and more accessible, than in the past. It just wasn't an option in the past for some families - my dad had to leave school at 15 to work to help support the rest of his family. Staying on to gain school qualifications wasn't an option, despite being clever enough to do so. luckily, in most situations, this has changed.

Yes, Foggy - and WW1 made a massive dent in the English class system. So many people died, on the battlefields or from the flu, that there simply weren't enough of the lower classes left to do the work and wait on the better-off families. The working class exploited this by getting the vote and improved wages.

There was a lot more deliberate social engineering after WW2, to try and offset the damage. The Welfare State & NHS were triumphs in this respect :)

My father's education and an essential surgery were paid for by a local wealthy person. His mum had to go & plead for him. I'm not sure people realise what we'll be giving up by losing our "welfare".