AIBU-to ask how big families 50+ years ago did it?!

[mamabeeboo]

DM and MIL are both one of 7, great aunt is one of 14, FIL is one of 12...and the families just get huge going back only a couple of generations... How did they do it?

I'm interested to know how the general set up was and day to day life...

Where did everyone sleep? How big was your fridge? Did you all shower everyday? Was there a conveyor belt of 200+ nappies a week?

I've asked DM who said they all used to sleep in a king sized bed top and tail, and they had "partners" so the older kids would partner with the younger kids to get everyone ready and out the door for school.

Would love to hear from those from big families back in the day - when you didn't have a prep machine, shopping delivered and washing machine on the go 24/7!

I'm one of 10, mid 60's now, third born, 20 years between eldest and youngest. As a child, we had a bath under the kitchen floor, bath once a week, sharing the water. A mangle for squeezing wet washing. Outside toilet. By the time there were 10 of us, we had a 4 bedroom council house, baby in with mum and dad, rest of us sharing 3 rooms. Mum sahm, dad got tax relief, free school meals were a godsend, and family allowance. We all had Saturday jobs when old enough. Encouraged to stay on at school, most of us went to uni / poly. Mum made most of our clothes. We did have a fridge and washing machine. Didn't get a phone til mid 80's, standing in the cold with 2p pieces, waiting for the phone back. None of us have had more than 2 children!

Youngest of three, small 3 bed Victorian terrace, born mid 1950s. Most families in our road had two or three children.

On the council estate there was a terrace of three 4-bed houses with 10, 11 and 12 children, one child from each in every school year.

The council houses had upstairs bathrooms and big front and back gardens, and I so envied them. We had an outside loo and just a cold tap in the kitchen, no washing machine, and we only got a fridge in 1966, but my parents owned their house and a car and I was meant to believe that made us better.

I just wanted running hot water.

50 years ago?
Im over 50yo.
There was a washing machine in the house, a fridge and a freezer. I seriously do not remember a time when we didn’t have all that.
My mum was also working (granted the family wasn’t as big as that).

But the idea if the tin bath filled once a week with a kettle, all washing by hand was not my experience at all.
Nor were families with 5~10 children that common anymore.

The 1940~1950 were different though…

I don't think people washed much. Themselves or clothes.

@Heartbreaktuna I think mid 70's the pill was available to unmarried women.

This mum never worked outside the home but was always working in the home. She had a twin tub washing machine and did several loads on Mondays. Washing all got put through a mangle and hung on the washing line to dry. She ironed everything. I didn't have a clean top for school every day. I got 2 clean tops a week and had to wear an apron to eat to keep my clothes clean. Until I was about 8 only one bath a week on Sundays. My Mum vacuumed and swept the kitchen floor every day and was always cooking and baked twice a week too, cakes on Tuesdays and pastry on Friday. I still miss her home baked cakes, scones, pies, jam tarts and pasties. She was always cleaning. She told me once she enjoyed cleaning. She used to have a real fire that was cleaned out everyday and Dad chopped up sticks for it and lay it every morning before going to work. There were 5 of us DC in a 3 bedroom house. My older sisters had bunk beds and a single bed in and me and my younger sister shared a room. There is 16 years between my eldest sister and youngest one. When my youngest sister was 4 my eldest sister got married at 20 and left home. My Dad was one of 8 in a 3 bedroom house and he said boys shared one room and girls the other with parents sharing with youngest baby. Despite being quite poor I never felt I missed out as a DC. We didn't have a car but none of my friends' families did either. We rented a TV for years. We had one holiday every other year and it was 5 days by the seaside. The second year we went on bus and train train trips for a week, always to the seaside. Mum took us on long walks on Sundays afternoons and Dad took us to the park on Saturday mornings. My 2 Aunties, neither of whom had any DC took us to Saturday morning cinema occasionally or a circus once a year when it came to town. We had second hand clothes and Mum and my Aunties knitted all our cardigans and jumpers. Without my Aunties treating us sometimes to ice cream and comics each week we would have had a lot less.

All the replies have been so interesting to read.

Going further back, my Nan was born 100 years ago. She was the eldest of 13, with more than 20 years between her and her youngest sister. Nan had already married and moved out, by the time her mum was pregnant with her youngest sister.

It was awfully tough. Very little to go around, and her father worked on casual labouring jobs. He was also violent and a gambler. At one point, the whole family ended up in the local workhouse (this closed down in 1930). The children were separated from their parents, and sent to the children's home, up on the Downs.

My Nan was a wonderful woman. She went on to have two children (my Mum and uncle), as she wanted to be able to provide for them. She would also always make sure that you had a meal or a snack, when you went to visit. She couldn't abide the thought that someone in her home might be hungry.

She also kept a fearsome store cupboard, she hated the idea of running out of food. I remember her bringing bags of tins from her cupboard, in a shopping trolley, on the bus, in the late '80's, when my Dad had lost his job and my parents were struggling to make the mortgage payments.

She taught me to knit and sew. About the only thing she couldn't do was make a Yorkshire pudding rise. We always have orange juice and lemonade at Christmas, to remember her.

I miss her so much.

Just remembered the outside loo with the broken toilet seat and squares of newspaper on a hook. When times were good we had Izal shinny medicated toilet paper. but were rationed to 2 sheets per visit! We didn't have a fridge until the late 1970's and the washing was done in a dolly tub in the yard and hung out to dry whatever the weather. I remember coming home from school in the winter to a house full of steam as our Mum tried to dry clothes in front of the fire. Both parents worked and we all had chores. If we were sick, we were given vegetable broth or Lucazade and stayed in bed with a comic for entertainment. I can't remember our Mum staying off work when we were sick. We didn't have a car so the shopping was done at the greengrocers, butchers and bakers and carried home in bags heavy enough to make your arms ache. My siblings were all born at home in the parlour and Dad was either at work or asked to wait outside until he heard a baby cry! Phone calls were made at the end of the street in the phone box. If you got a call, passing neighbours would answer and come and get you.

My Granny was the eldest of six born in 1908 to a farming family. She was bright and amazingly, her parents supported her going to university in London, the first person in the family.

Sadly, her mother died during her second year (she was advised not to have a large family as she wasn't physically strong). Granny was summoned home to look after her younger siblings and that was the end of her education. 🙁 It’s so different to today, modern parents wouldn’t consider asking their child to give up such an amazing opportunity, but back then, it was expected.

Something similar happens to DH’s granny. Her mother had her seventh child and his granny was pulled out of school at 16 to help with the younger children. My FIL found her school reports after she died and her teachers were advocating for her to finish school and apply to university, but her parents thought otherwise.

@Heartbreaktuna I was on the pill when I was 17 (unmarried) in 1972. I had a very forward thinking gp (thanks Dr. Bell)

This has been an interesting read! My DH and I (born in 60s and 70s) are both 1 of 3, but we were brought up in quite normal houses - fridges, inside toilets, our own bedrooms etc. The only thing I remember is only having a bath once per week. We didn’t have a car so Mum went shopping more often, but the grocer would deliver the food in the afternoon. My parents are only children (war babies) so no big families there. Both parents went to University. My Grandad, on the other hand, did have to leave school at 14, but was very bright and aced the dockyard exams which set him up for a good career.

These replies are so interesting! Thank you all who have commented.

My Grandad, on the other hand, did have to leave school at 14.

Yes, @Numbersarefun, one of my Grandpa’s had to leave school at 13 to work on the family farm, it’s mind-boggling by today’s standards! All his children went to university, though, he encouraged them to take the opportunities that he didn’t have, he was a lovely person. ❤️

My great grandfather was one of 20 children, all singletons. He was a great storyteller and I loved to hear stories of his family when I was a child.
He was one of the oldest, born in early 1900s. They had a small farm and bought a cow during ww1 as there were milk shortages. His mum took in washing- as if she didn't have enough to do already and his dad was a wheeler-dealer type, always looking for a way to make money.
They had a boys bedroom and a girls bedroom. As one of the oldest grandad had to shove the little ones over to make space beforehe could get in to bed. He had got married and moved out before the littlest ones were born.
His dad ruled the family with a rod of iron. Grandads younger brother was horse whipped after he fell asleep and let the cow wander off the common.
The kids all helped out on the farm and home before and after school.
Baths were in short supply, no running water in the house, all water came from the well.

@BitchyHen Wow, I’m surprised his mother survived after having so many children! She must’ve had a strong constitution!

I knew a lady in her eighties who said children did jobs from a very young age for large chunks of the day. Hers was ironing. From a very young age she did a lot of the family ironing daily. And that was that. Kids these days have more fun.

The other question is why have so many? (actually I think I know why)

We have had affective and available birth control for over 100
years.

Personally, I think parents did it for the money. It was the
tradition that kids would go out to work young, then give a good chunk of wages
to the parents. More kids = more money. I think that was the bottom line. Now,
for the most part, money flows down the generations, not up, and when this changed,
we want far fewer, or no children.

DF 1 of 13 and would be 97 this year if still around used to eat his food and finish a meal in seconds.

main meal for him as a child in Ireland was a pot of spuds on a chair in the kitchen and you are quick or went hungry.

He and his sister had lifelong nerve damage in their left hand as a result of being badly canned at school for using their left hand. He was also beaten for being unable to read - he now think he was dyslexic following my son being diagnosed as dyslexic.

@Kendodd because contraception went against her religious beliefs.
Fuck all to do with needing money of her children

@JustExistingNotLiving

yes 50 years ago, my family did have an indoor bathroom but my dad rationed the hot water because it cost so much to have the immersion heater on. My nan and grandad, with the youngest child, still had the tin bath, outside toilet and the only heating was the coal fire in the living room. My nan never owned a washing machine or freezer. She did her washing by hand all her life, I remember her in the yard with the aforementioned tin bath, wash board and mangle. Only when she was getting quite elderly did she consent to my mum taking the laundry - she did have a washing machine at home by this time.
She did get a shower room in the late 80s but hated in and preferred to wash in the kitchen.

We had a fridge but no freezer, like my nan, my mum shopped nearly every day, on Saturday a big shop at the green grocer. No washing machine until I was in my late teens - I used to go with my mum to the laundrette and spend hours washing and drying clothes. Our heating was gas fires downstairs and paraffin heaters upstairs.

I was born early 80s and had a few Irish friends in my class who had 5+ siblings, largest family had 9 dc. They were in a 3 bed terrace, dc slept top to tail in sets of bunk beds. They were fairly poor, the dms didn't work, fathers were labourers. They didn't do any extra curriculars, no day trips or holidays. All clothes were hand me downs and the mother did hair cuts. At Christmas they got underwear/socks and some sweets.

@Kendodd Also, just because contraception was available didn’t mean that people were willing to use it, especially in communities where large families were the norm.

The story goes that my great-grandmother’s doctor advised her not to have any more children after the first two, but she had six, became steadily weaker and died when youngest was five. Hence my Granny had to come home to look after her siblings. I’m guessing that my great-grandfather wouldn’t use contraception. 🤷

Hilariously, we lived in a fairly modern house in the 1970s which actually had central heating. But my parents were too mean to switch it on for more than about an hour per day, so we still woke up to ice on the inside of the windows in winter. Sometimes it was so thick that it stuck to the curtains 🤣

Because expectations were lower. There were less, if any, rules about how to bring up your children. Nightly baths weren’t expected, you could leave a baby to cry without guilt, children didn’t have many toys to clean up, older siblings watched the younger ones, kids were allowed to roam about outside the house after the age of 4 or 5. Even 30 years ago ‘playing out’ for 6+ hours a day at the weekend was the norm for kids age 7 or 8. I mean just imagine how much more time that gave parents to do things.