Growing up in the 70's

[morethanpotatoprints]

I bet there's been one of these before but who remembers stuff about the 70's, looking back to me it was all a bit weird.

So some of my memories.

Mary Mungo and midge, the music in the lift. my orange space hopper, gridsy marbles and clackers.
Dehydrated potato, free milk you had to drink at school.
Playing out from after breakfast until dark or tea.

Growing up with lots more music.
The theme tunes to our fav programmes which many would still recognise now.
I'm sure it helped/assisted peoples musical education.
The BBC orchestra must have recorded thousands over the 70's.

Mr Benn, Black Beauty, Ludwig (the really fast one).
Our kids don't hear real life orchestras every day now a days.

I remember:
Loon pants
Afghan coats that stank of wet dog when they got rained on
Bazooka Bubblegum
The smell of Patchouli oil
Angel Delight
Sugar sandwiches
Gorgeous hot summers
Miners makeup
Chopper bikes
The music! I had a huge crush on Mickey Finn from T Rex and had posters of him and Marc Bolan on my bedroom wall

Miners strike, domestic abuse being ignored by the police, street gangs, heavy tranquiliser prescription by GPs. No central heating, no fridge, no phone. Child sex abuse bringing shame on the victim's family, employers at work knowing it was fine to give their secretaries the ocassional slap on the buttocks. Female children not allowed to do any engineering or technical subjects at high school and being taught how to sew and iron instead.
Crap food, Angel Delight, hardly any fruit, living on corned beef and potatoes.
Children being beaten with leather belts in schools. Scabies and head lice rife.

No I wouln't want to go back there again.

My life wasn't like that ^^.

No street gangs here, and we had a fridge. Then we had central heating in 1976.

Wasn't the miners strike in the 80's?

All girls did metalwork and woodwork at my school. And all the boys did needlework. (Mid 70'S)

I love this thread.
Having tartan strips applied to my jeans a la Bay City Rollers
Taping the Top 40 on radio 1 on a sunday night
Yes to long dresses for parties
Yes to sliced banana with home made curry. Sprinkled with desiccated coconut might've been my mum only
Going to friends who had a telly to watch Princess Ann get married

The Three-Day Week was one of several measures introduced in the United Kingdom by the Conservative Government 1970–1974 to conserve electricity, the production of which was severely limited due to industrial action by coal miners. The effect was that from 1 January until 7 March 1974 commercial users of electricity would be limited to three specified consecutive days' consumption each week and prohibited from working longer hours on those days. Services deemed essential (e.g. hospitals, supermarkets and newspaper prints) were exempt. Television companies were required to cease broadcasting at 10.30 pm during the crisis to conserve electricity.

I wasn't allowed to do metal work or woodwork, only home economics or needlework. We did have a fridge though.

We didnt have size zero and this crap obsessive celebrity culture and shit reality tv in the 70s either.

Blake 7
Chinese ropes (a long rope made out of tights you had to jump over)
Fizz bombs
Making cracks in the tarmac using a magnifying glass
Gorgeous long hot summers

Did anyone play that game with elastic; big long lengths that you had to twist into different patterns between your two hands?

Middle, do you mean Cat's cradle?

Duh, yes

Though of course there was the game of elastics (with it round your ankles), and that hoop skipping gam (hoop round one ankle, string, ball to jump over; can't remember proper name)

BTW: this is a lovely thread. Should it be moved to a permanent forum? Perhaps the History Club?

i like that idea Stella.

Haven't read all 24 nostalgic pages yet, but can offer - the 'AA book of the road' - hardback UK road map with little descriptions of towns and villages: Silvikrin shampoo (I can smell that herby smell now!): the nifty little Dymo label making machine: macrame everywhere. And I kept my clackers, they're in the loft!

Oh, and Z cars on TV! As well as Dixon of Dock Green - 'evenin' all' !

Oh this brings back so many memories for me!!!! Good and bad!!! Mary Mungo and Midge. My lot can't get their heads around the lack of technology either!!!!

Oh yes Blakes 7 absolutely for me!! I was lucky enough to meet the two principle actors too!! Nice people they are!!

Its frothy man:

Chopper bike, Banana Splits on Sat morning, Wombles, Bay City Rollers, mum sewing tartan on jeans (BCR fan), Bouquet of Barbed Wire, The Brothers, Roots, Upstairs Downstairs, Poldark, Cathy and Claire problem pages in Jackie, Saturday Night Fever, Charlie perfume, satin bomber jacket, leather trench coat, Martin Ford, Chelsea Girl.

When was Juliet Bravo, that was a great change to all the macho Police programmes we had seen. I'm sure it was 70's.

My school also encouraged metalwork, woodwork and physics for the girls, and the boys did home economics.

Love this thread, it's bringing back some great memories...

db getting a pellet gun for xmas when he was aged 10
wearing a brown polyester jumpsuit with a Charlies Angels badge
sugar sandwiches
df covering us with baby oil so we'd tan quicker
weathermen having to place clouds/rain/sun on the maps
paper dolls cut out from the back of Bunty magazine
everyone bringing thier tables and chairs outside for the Jubilee Party
lovely legs competitions on our holidays
grandma always wearing a hat

Auntie Stella I saw Aqua Manda advertised in a mag this week - it was £50 for crissakes! We wore platform soled shoes that were poorly made and poorly attached - its a wonder we didn't break our ankles.
I loved loon pants, rainbow and star patterned t shirts anything in crushed velvet . T Rex... Going to the record shop to hear the latest singles. Dansettes. Juke Box Jury. 8 tracks We had Biba make up and Mary Quant and that wonderful dome-topped lemon scented Love range in Boots. We thought Ski yoghurt was le dernier cri - it came in a waxy pot. Vesta Paella. In Sainsburys you got served by an assistant.. We had real candles on our synthetic Christmas tree, candy striped flannelette sheets. Whatever happened to candlewick bedspreads? Well maybe the Continental quilt happened (we could only get them at Habitat in our town). Coffee with chicory... tea bags hadn't really taken on and hardly anyone had an electric kettle. Soda siphons filled up at the pub. Shopper bikes. strap on roller skates... Having a real shower rather than a rubber tap attachment in murky blue or pink... perms. rain hoods. quilted anoraks... dungarees. .....

I had cork soled platform clogs.

Which I wore with a cheesecloth shirt and a tiered skirt.

We got a grant to build an indoor bathroom and a gas fire in the 70's. We were well posh after that, no more running to the bottom of the garden to go to the toilet, no more freezing cold baths in the shed. No phone till the late '80s though, and no central heating till the nineties. The best thing was being up the woods all day long and our mothers never knew where we were.