Life in 1970s and 80s

[MrGruWeLoveYou]

Evening all.

I wondered if anyone had any views on life in the 1970s and 80s in so far as food stockpiling or prepping. I've realised that my mother kept in large amounts of tinned and long life food, we had an outhouse that was used and was always very well stocked. Probably more than just the odd spare can, I remember rows and rows of shelves. In recent years I have wondered what reasons my mother may have had for doing this. She was born in 1948 and I grew up in the early 1980s. Sadly I cannot ask her as she has passed away. Is anyone aware of what prepper type thinking was at that time?

I can remember st Ivel 5 pints powdered milk, power cuts, every home had candles & matches, home made wine, watneys party 7, nuclear threat, videos VHS vs Betamax, Falklands war. Radox bath salts. Germolene. TCP.

I think the memory of rationing (which ended I think in 1953) is key. I was born early 60s and we had the cupboard under the stairs which was full of tins and home preserved fruit and home made jam. I was also broght up never to waste anything. We were also prepared for power cuts. As well as this, while my parents considered themselves 'comfortable' (meaning we had a second hand car and holidays at grandparents house at the seaside) they had the memory of growing up poor and that meant they felt more secure with a good stock of food.

I remember having tins of food stored in my bedroom cupboard as a child of the 70's.
My dad stored tins everywhere, and toilet roll!

They always had gas to cook on, and a gas fire in the lounge, candles in jam jars for safety. We had a lot of power cuts in the 70's.

I remember having tea in the dark with a candle in the middle of the table.

I'm a keen prepper due to my dad. He taught me how and what to prep.

He's the same now. He's always got 50+ Toilet rolls, but he always has, it's not new behaviour.

My mum and dad, now in their early 80's could live comfortably for three months without opening the door.

My Mum had a large cupboard that had several shelves which were always filled with tins and packets in addition to the larder in the kitchen. There were frequent power cuts and sometimes snow meant it was difficult to get to the house so she liked to be prepared.

Dad grew up poor in the war and had his rations given to the older brothers. We had a big cupboard of food in a bedroom and a big chest freezer.

Reckon the 'protect and survive' campaign in the early 80's had something to do with it - Leaflets distributed to everyone on how to build a shelter against radioactive particles (pushing a mattress against the door!) and storing food that could not be contaminated. We still have a copy at my parents!

digitalarchive.wilsoncenter.org/document/110193.pdf?v=c77f06e782d33a2ec8bf00d7c597ea10

Link to the PDF for anyone interested!

Thank you all so much your stories and insights are so interesting. Some things I genuinely hadn't considered xx

We had a walk through attic and it was filled with everything you could buy in cash and carry quantities. (Cash and carry card a perk of being in the pta) Making your own jams etc was normal. We had a big freezers too.
Rampant inflation, no public transport, harsh winters and power cuts that lasted weeks. (Welsh borders). We swapped a lot for what we didn’t have. Walked miles to get fresh milk direct from the farm in winter. I remember spending a lot of time using the sitting room fire for heat, hot water and cooking as well for drying laundry.
When the cold water tank froze in the loft, things got interesting trying to melt snow and not panicking about burst pipes as well.
Toward the end of the 70s there was a campaign to prep for a nuclear war as well.

The fish tank - gold fish, had hot water bottles out in to keep Mrs fish alive.

Yep, I was a teenager in the 70s and remember the power cuts, shortages, etc. Our family had a traditional "corner" shop (like Open All Hours) and sold all kinds of things besides our core trade of a newsagents. We had to buy whatever stock we could whenever it was available - our garage, garden shed, living room, bedrooms and even kitchen was often full of the latest deliveries. None of this "just in time" delivery system back then. Whenever there were shortages of, say, coal or firewood, or candles, we'd sell huge amounts of it if we had any in stock. We also kept plenty back for ourselves of course. I remember selling fireworks by candle light one Bonfire night - completely crazy and dangerous looking back now, but at the time we had to do it.

My mother always kept a full larder of basic ingredients in the 70s/80s. She also used to bottle green beans, pears, peaches and apricots and made all her own jam. We had a good-sized garden which provided lots of fruit and vegetables in season so this was how she preserved them.

We also had a large chest freezer which she used to fill with staples, so although I don' think she would have considered it prepping, she did it because that's what people did!

I was studying for my A Levels when we had most of the power cuts and the 3-day week. It was not fun trying to revise by candlelight!!

On a number of occasions we had to use a small primus stove and camping gaz cooker to cook some vegetables to go with cold meat!

They were fab days though!